HEY BABY ~ BIENVENIDOS ~ E KAABO ~ AKWABAA BYENVENI ~ BEM VINDOS ~ WELCOME

Welcome to the eighth conference of the African and Diasporic Religious Studies Association! ADRSA was conceived during a forum of scholars and scholar-practitioners of African and Diasporic religions I convened at the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School in October 2011 and the idea was solidified during the highly successful Sacred Healing and Wholeness in Africa and the Americas symposium held at Harvard in April 2012. Those present at the forum and the symposium agreed that, as with the other fields with which many of us are affiliated, the expansion of the discipline would be aided by the formation of an association that allows researchers to come together to forge relationships, share their work, and contribute to the growing body of scholarship on these rich traditions. We are proud to be the first US-based association dedicated exclusively to the study of African and Diasporic Religions and we look forward to continuing to build our network throughout the country and the world.

Although there has been definite improvement, Indigenous Religions of all varieties are still sorely underrepresented in the academic realms of Religious and Theological Studies. As a scholar-practitioner of such a tradition, I am eager to see that change. As of 2005, there were at least 400 million people practicing Indigenous Religions worldwide, making them the 5th most commonly practiced class of religions. Taken alone, practitioners of African and African Diasporic religions comprise the 8th largest religious grouping in the world, with approximately 100 million practitioners, and the number continues to grow. Despite their noted absence from Religious Studies in the past, more and more, the knowledge embedded in the rich traditions of Africa and the Americas is coming to the fore. The ADRSA is proud to be a part of that development.

African religions have always been dynamic and cosmopolitan, transcending spatial boundaries to blend and reform themselves in conjunction with neighboring traditions. Once introduced into the Americas, the pluralistic nature of these traditions lent to the development of unique African Diasporic religions that have grown, moved, and changed over time. The divination, ritual, song, dance, incantation, craft, festival, spirit possession, dreams, herbalism, acquisition of sacred knowledge and many other aspects of these traditions have traversed the African continent and the world to become formidable forces in the realm of world religions. Practitioners of the traditions represented here today exercise active agency and engage with the world on every level, using every one of their senses and sensibilities. They mend what is broken, balance what is askew and maintain equilibrium until the time comes to mend and rebalance again. With Wind & Fire: Honoring the Divine Feminine and Masculine in Africana Religions, we consider the notion of gender as conceived and represented via Africana religious philosophy and practice. As we enter this discussion, one thing is clear: Africana traditions remind us that we all embody both masculine and feminine principles, and that respect for these dual energies is crucial to achieving spiritual wholeness and full integration of our multiple selves. We look forward to exploring this topic today and pray that the good feelings and conversations that begin here will continue long after the day is through.

With best wishes and sincere gratitude,

Funlayo E. Wood, PhD

Founding Director, African and Diasporic Religious Studies Association

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FEATURED ARTIST | STEPHEN HAMILTON Stephen Hamilton is an artist and arts educator living and

working in Boston Massachusetts.

Stephen’s Work incorporates both Western and African

techniques, blending figurative painting and drawing with

resist dyeing, weaving, and woodcarving. Each image is a

marriage between the

aesthetic perspectives and

artistry of both traditions. As a

Black American trained in

traditional west African

artforms, he treats the acts of

weaving, dyeing, and

woodcarving as ritualized acts

of reclamation. he uses

traditional techniques and

materials native to West Africa to reclaim ancestral knowledge dissociated from Africans in the Americas,

during the transatlantic slave trade. The work explores and heavily references the Black body in pre-colonial

African art history, creating visual connections between the past and the present. This forms a body of work,

which serves as a conceptual and visual bridge between the ancient and modern worlds. Through this, he

explores elements of black identity through time and space on its own terms.

Through visual comparison of shared

philosophies and aesthetics amongst

Black peoples, he seeks to describe a

complex and varied Black aesthetic.

These visual and philosophical

connections and cultural analyses

form his visual language. The pieces

created depict African thought and

culture as equal to, yet unique from,

its western analog. This work stands

in stark contrast to the pervasive

negative associations, which have

become synonymous with Black

culture. his work, therefore, bridges

dialogue between contemporary

Black cultures and the ancient African

world through an asset-based lens.

Hamilton’s Ndaiye and Fatoumata and Iya Mapo are painted on indigo cloth,

highlighting the intersection of various African art forms characteristic of his work

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 4

AFRICAN AND DIASPORIC RELIGIOUS STUDIES ASSOCIATION PRESENTS

WIND & FIRE

HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS

Times are Eastern Standard Time

Friday, April 17, 2020

9 am | Coffee Hour + Market Place Opens

10 am | Opening of the Day

Why We Gather Iya Dr. Funlayo E. Wood | Founding Director, African and Diasporic Religious Studies Association

Libation Awo Oluwole Ifakunle Adetutu Alagbede | Ile Omo Ope, New York, NY

Spirit Salutation in Song Nana Sula Spirit | Ile de Coin-Coin, New Orleans, LA

Meditation on the Moment

Iya Prof. Judyie Al-Bilali | University of Massachusetts, Amherst

10:30 am | Opening Plenary Address Dr. Kim Vaz-DeVille

Professor of Education and Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Xavier University, New Orleans

11:30 am | Panel 1 | The Divine Feminine and Mascuiline in Literature & the Visual Arts Chair: Manbo Dr. Kyrah Malika Daniels, Boston College

Elu: Indigo and Feminine power among the Yoruba (Nigeria - Yoruba) Stephen Hamilton, The Art of Stephen Hamilton

When Audre Found Afrekete: Tracing a Divine Femme(inine) Figure Through Africana Religions (Benin - Ewe/Fon & diasporas) Dr. Ashley Coleman Taylor, University of Texas, Austin

Director’s Notebook: Illuminating the Divine Feminine and Masculine through the William & Mary Theatre production of August Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean Iyanifa Prof. Artisia Omiyemi Green, William & Mary

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 5

12:30 pm | Lunch Break

1:30 pm | Keynote Address Baba John Mason

Yoruba Theological Archministry

3 pm | Panel 2 | Queer Religion & Sexuality of the Spirits Chair: Khytie K. Brown, Harvard University

The Queerness of Batuque (Brazil/Argentina - Batuque) Horacio Robles, Columbia University

Sexuality through the Eyes of the Òrìṣà: A Sacred Dance of Equipoise (Yorùbá diaspora) Dr. Liseli A. Fitzpatrick, Wellesley College

Vodou & The Black Androgynous Genius Project (Haiti - Vodou) Manbo Dr.Charlene Désir, Nova Southeastern University

4 pm | Break 4:15 pm | Panel 3 | Gender Erasures & Controversies Chair: Manbo Dr. Charlene Désir, Nova Southeastern University

Erasing Yemanjá: Religious Intolerance and the Divine Mother of Brazil (Brazil - Candomblé) Dr. Danielle Boaz, University of North Carolina, Charlotte

King Alpha and Queen Omega: The Integration of the Divine in the Persons of Emperor Haile Selassie and Empress Menen Asfaw of Ethiopia, Within the Rastafari Tradition (Jamaica - Rastafari) Dr. Anta Anthony Merritt, San Diego State University

Re-examining the Presence of the Divine Feminine and Masculine in Yoruba Traditional Myths and Ifa Ritual Objects (Yorùbá diaspora) Iyanifa Jo Anna Hunter, Black Madonna Press

Mamalawo? The Controversy over Women Practicing Ifa Divination (Nigeria and diaspora - Ifa) Dr. Ayodeji Ogunnaike, Bowdoin College

5:30 pm | Divine Feminine and Masculine in Motion: Practitioners Panel Moderator: Iya Dr. Funlayo E. Wood-Menzies, Center for Black Studies Research, UCSB

Afromystic E.P.: Experiencing Divine Love Through Queer & Trans Òrìṣà mythology and Yorùbá Spirituality (Nigeria and diaspora - Ifa-Orisa) Seyi Adebanjo, New York University

Muthas and Fathas in Hoodoo and Tarot (US - Hoodoo) N'ganga Makhosi aka Daizy Latifah

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Voice of the Mother: Life as a Female Akpon and Oriate in Training (US - Lukumi) Iyalorisa Amma Oloriwaa! Activating the Divine Feminine and Masculine: Orisha Movement as a Holistic Healing Practice (US - Lukumi) Baba Oludaré Bernard, Kiire Wellness

6:45 pm | Closing Remarks 7 pm - 9 pm | After Party Music by DJ Adrianne “Titi Talks” Bate Grab some food and drink from your kitchen and enjoy the sounds! Call up a friend you see in the mix, drop a message in the chat! Saturday, April 18, 2020 Africana Religions Film Screenings 11 am - 3 pm EST Join us for films on Africana religions, including Djimon Honsou's "In Search of Voodoo" and PBS's "Sacred Journeys: Osun-Osogbo" on the annual pilgrimage to the Osun festival in Nigeria. Hosted by Dr. Funlayo and Filmmaker Régine Romain. Included with Registration! You'll receive the link in a separate message before the films start Orisha Song and Movement with Kiire Wellness 3:30 pm - 5 pm EST Join Baba Oludare of Kiire Wellness for Orisha songs and movement! Excersice your mind, body, and spirit and have fun while you do it!Included with Registration! You'll receive the link in a separate message before the class starts. Donations lovingly accepted. Sunday, April 19 Orisa Prayer and Meditation with Iya Funlayo 10 am EST Join Iya Dr. Funlayo and the Ile Ase Ire Family for their weekly live Orisa Prayer and Meditation service. Find Out More Surprise Event! 12 Noon EST Pop into the link you receive and enjoy a special surprise event to close out the weekend together!

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 7

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KEYNOTE SPEAKER| BABA JOHN MASON

Baba John Mason is a leading internationally noted scholar, educator,

writer, poet, playwright, musician, photographer, Yoruba religious art

sculptor and installation artist, diviner and priest of Obatala initiated

in 1970. He is a graduate of the City College of New York and a

recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in Folklore (1999) and a New

York City Department of Cultural Affairs Award (2001).

Mason worked with the City University of New York’s Manpower

Program from 1969 – 75 and was a Music and Culture Instructor for

CUNY’s Center for Puerto Rican Studies and the Muse-Jazz School in

Brooklyn, among other locales. He has organized many community-

based outreach and educational activities – for the elderly and youth alike – in East Harlem and the Bedford

Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn and is the creator of the “Literacy Built through Creative Actions” Program

which has been implemented at various schools throughout New York City.

In 1997, Mason was invited to bring Omo ‘Nago, a percussion and choral group of master musicians, to

perform Sacred Yoruba Orisa Music at the Smithsonian Institute’s 1997 Festival of American Folklife held on

the National Mall in Washington, DC. In 1998 he formed the Mason-JAM-JA Band. With forty-eight years of

experience as a percussionist and poet, Mason turns his attention to composing and performing music that

draws on classic, traditional, West African religious and secular rhythms, song melodies and text to extend the

improvisational vocabulary of spirituals, blues, bebop, hardbop, Afro-Latin and Rap music. The band performs

many of Mason’s original compositions including some from his two-act blues, dance, drama Blues for Diana.

Mason-JAM-JA Band was formerly the house band at McDonalds Café – the oldest Black-owned restaurant in

Brooklyn – and has performed at many well-known venues such as the American Museum of Natural History,

the Museum for African Arts, the Studio Museum in Harlem, Yale University, the Brooklyn Academy of Music

Café and the Miami Art Museum.

Mason is the director of the Yoruba Theological Archiministry, a Brooklyn- based non-profit research center,

which he co-founded in 1973. For more than forty years, he has been involved I the intensive and extensive

study of all aspects of Yoruba culture in the Americas and West Africa. His thorough documentation of this

cultural movement throughout the American and the West African diaspora has led to his being considered

one of the leading authorities in the field and his research has spawned ten major books in the field of African

Studies in the Americas. His most notable published works include: In Praise of Our Mothers (2016),

Araaraara: Wondrous Inhabitor of Thunder (2012), Ironti Aponni Meji: Remembrance of Two Flatterers (2006),

Who’s Knocking on My Floor?: Esu Arts in the Americas (2003), Adura Fun Orisa: Prayers for Selected Heads

(2002), Idana Fun Orisa: Cooking for Selected Heads (1999), Beads, Body and Soul: Art and Light in the Yoruba

Universe (1998, with Henry John Drewal; Finalist, Herskovits Award of ASA, 1999 and ACASA Arnold Rubin

Award 2001), Olookun: Owner of Rivers and Seas (1996), the groundbreaking study, Orin Orisa: Songs for

Selected Heads (1992), Four New World Rituals (1985), Orisa: New World Black Gods (1985), and Ounje Fun

Orisa: Food for the Gods (1981, with Gary Edwards)

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PANELISTS & SPECIAL GUESTS

Seyi Adebanjo is a Queer Gender-Non-Conforming Nigerian MFA artist, who raises awareness around social issues through digital video, multimedia photography, ritual & writing workshops. Seyi’s work is the intersection of art, media, imagination, ritual and politics. Seyi was recently awarded a residency with The Laundromat Project, the BRIO Award and 1 of the 8 Exciting Filmmakers Shaking Up Hollywood by IndieWire. Seyi was nominated for 2020 Art Matters fellowship. Seyi’s project’s include:

Afromystic follows LGBTQ Yorùbá practitioners and priest/ess in Nigeria, Brazil & The United States, while reclaiming lost mythologies. I AM! We Are Here! illuminates the vitality, spirit & joy of Queer, Trans and Gender Non Conforming People of Color in the Bronx. Seyi’s powerful short Justice for Islan Nettles has screened on PBS Channel 13 and continues to screen globally along with the documentary Ọya: Something Happened On The Way To West Africa!

Oluwo Chief Oluwole Ifakunle Adetutu Alagbede, affectionately known as “the Babalawo of Harlem” is the Chief Priest of Ile Omo Ope Temple in New York City. He is a Traditional African Orisa Practitioner, professional performing artist, father, and master chess player. Awo Ifakunle attended Hunter College, studying community health and physical education and is the student of Professor Ogunwande Abimbola who is the Awise Agbaye (spokesman of all babalawo in the World). His Oluwo (officiator of Ifa ceremonies), and his master teacher is Chief Araba Malumo Ifatukemi Alagbede of Elejibo, Lagos, Nigeria in whose compound Awo Ifakunle was initiated to Obatala and Ifa over 20 years ago. Additionally, the Awo has been tutored by Chief Priest Awise of Osogbo Ifayemi Elebuibon on Ifa divination and chants of Ifa. Locally, Awo Ifakunle was the Godchild and student of both Oba Oseijeman Ofuntola Adefunmi I (iba e), who was the first King of Oyotunji African Village in South Carolina where he lived in for a time in the 1970s. Awo Ifakunle regularly lectures on Ifa-Orisa Tradition at Ile Eko Sango Oshun Milosa shrine in Trinidad and Tobago, at High Schools in

New York City and at Colleges and Universities including Harvard University, New York University, and Sara Lawrence College.

Join Us for a Film Screening Session Saturday Hosted by Dr. Funlayo and Filmmaker Régine Romain

Brooklyn to Benin | In Search of Voodoo | Sacred Journeys Link will arrive at 10:45 AM EST – Check your email

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 11

Dr. Danielle N. Boaz is a Stuart Hall Fellow at the Hutchins Center for African and African-American Research at Harvard University in 2019-2020. Dr. Boaz is also an Assistant Professor of Africana Studies in the area of social justice, human rights, and the law at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Dr. Boaz has a Ph.D. in history with a specialization in Africa, the African Diaspora, and the Caribbean; a J.D. with a concentration in International Law; and a LL.M. in Intercultural Human Rights. She is a licensed attorney in the State of Florida and the State of North Carolina.

Dr. Boaz’s research focuses on the relationship between race and religious freedom, with an emphasis on the historical and present day limitations on the right to practice African and African diaspora religions. She has published numerous articles and book chapters on this subject, exploring issues such as: the use of the term “voodoo” in U.S. court proceedings, the significance of ritual objects in the prosecution of Caribbean obeah cases, and police manipulation of Afro-Jamaican spiritual practices to obtain criminal confessions in Canada, among other things. Her first book, Banning Black Gods: African Diaspora Religions and the Law in the 21st Century, is forthcoming with Penn State University Press.

Khytie Brown is a Ph.D. candidate in the department of African and African American Studies at Harvard University with a primary field religion. She received her B.A. from Emory University in Sociology and Religion and her M.T.S from Harvard Divinity School with an area concentration in Religion and The Social Sciences. Her research interests include religious expression and cultural production in the Caribbean and Latin America, sensory epistemologies, gender and sexuality, religion and media, commodity culture, racialization, and the interplay between private religious discourses and public space. Khytie is a doctoral fellow in the Science, Religion and Culture program at Harvard University, a Global Religion Research Initiative award recipient, and a research consultant through the Center on Transnational Policing at Princeton University.

Dr. Ashley Coleman Taylor is an Assistant Professor of Religious Studies and Women’s and Gender Studies. As an interdisciplinary ethnographer, she specializes in the intersecting lived experiences of black embodiment, black genders and sexualities, and Africana religion in Puerto Rico and her hometown Atlanta, Georgia. She has been a Visiting Fellow at the James Weldon Johnson Institute at Emory University and a Lecturer in the Institute for Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Georgia State University. Her book, Majestad Negra: Race, Class, Gender and Religious Experience in the Puerto Rican Imaginary, is an intersectional black feminist approach to race, class, gender, and coloniality in Puerto Rico. The manuscript was a finalist for the University of Illinois/National Women’s Studies Association First Book Prize.

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 12

Manbo Dr. Kyrah Malika Daniels is Assistant Professor of Art History and African & African Diaspora Studies with a courtesy appointment in Theology at Boston College. Her research and teaching centers on Africana religions, sacred arts and material culture, race and visual culture, and ritual healing traditions in the Black Atlantic. As a 2019-2020 Getty/ACLS Postdoctoral Fellow in the History of Art, Daniels is working to complete her book manuscript (Art of the Healing Gods, in progress), a comparative religion project that examines religious artifacts used in healing ceremonies of Haiti and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Between 2009-2010, Daniels served as Junior Curator at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Following the earthquake of 2010, she worked in St. Raphael, Haiti, with Lakou Soley Academic and Cultural Arts Center, a grassroots organization that develops arts-based pedagogy. Her work has been published in the Journal for the American Academy of Religion, the Journal of Haitian Studies, and the Journal of Africana Religions. Daniels currently serves as Co-Vice President for KOSANBA, a Scholarly Association for the Study of Haitian Vodou as well as a Leadership Council Member for the African and Diasporic Religious Studies Association (ADRSA)."

Manbo Dr. Charlene Désir is professor at Nova Southeastern University and a Vodou priestess/manbo initiated in the Sosyete Nago Lakou in Jacmel, Haiti. She received her doctorate from Harvard University and her research focuses on the spiritual and psycho-social acculturation of disenfranchised children in the US and Haitian school systems. In addition, she co-founded T.E.N., Global, an empowerment network focused on upliftment and spiritual liberation. She was also the 2012 president of the academic association - Haitian Studies Association and is presently co-vice president of Kosanba – an academic association focused on the study of Haitian Vodou. Dr. Désir has worked as a healer, spiritual advisor, school psychologist, K-12 school counselor, school administrator, and professor.

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Dr. Liseli A. Fitzpatrick made history in May 2018 as the first Ph.D. in the Department of African American and African Studies (AAAS) at The Ohio State University. Dr. Fitzpatrick is a Trinidadian-scholar and professor in the field of African Diasporic cosmologies and sacred ontologies in the Department of Africana Studies at Wellesley College, MA. She earned her B.A. in Psychology (pre-Law) with a double-minor degree in AAAS and Visual Communications, and, subsequently, received her M.A. in AAAS at OSU. Her research foregrounds themes of Afro-cosmological thought and expressions, identity, the voluntary and involuntary movement of persons of African descent, and the pervasive effects of slavery and colonialism in the creation of the West. Her current project, “Sexuality through the Eyes of the Òrìṣa: An Exploration into Ifá/Òrìṣa and Sacred Sexualities"offers an expansive and universal pedagogical praxis for understanding human sexualities through Yorùbá cosmology and metaphysics. It is part of an ongoing quest to dismantle hegemonic and dichotomous constructs, and bring balance to the discourse on sexuality and gender. Through teaching, Fitzpatrick seeks to engender emancipatory change by presenting a non-hegemonic worldview through an African cosmological lens. She values her space in the classroom and emphasizes the pedagogical importance of teaching to enlighten and empower. Her other research interests include Afro-diasporic experiences and expressions, Caribbean culture, trans-Atlantic slavery and Ancient African kingdoms.

Iyalorisa Omiyẹmi (Artisia) Green is the Sharpe Associate Professor of Civic Renewal and Entrepreneurship of Theatre and Africana Studies and Director of the Program in Africana Studies at William & Mary. She is also a W. Taylor Reveley, III Interdisciplinary Faculty Fellow and a WMSURE Faculty Fellow. She is a director and dramaturg who searches for the cultural metalanguage of performance and literature, and in practice/production and publication, illuminates it as a life-giving, spirited, dynamic, and vital force that shapes reality. The larger aims of her scholarship are to contribute the development of a critical lexis which affirms the premise of Black Theatre as a performance strategy rooted in social and spiritual practices of the African Diaspora.

Jo Anna Hunter, Ìyánifá Omotinúwe, owner of Black Madonna Enterprises Publishing Company, has been involved in the study of Yorùbá Isese (traditionalism) and Lùkùmí Òrìsà religions for more than three decades. She is an Ìyálòrìsà of Aganjú and an Ìyánifá with an M.A. Degree in Cultural Sociology from the University of Louisville. She has lectured and written on the many healing aspects of Yorùbá Culture, and her experiences living and traveling in Africa, Cuba, Europe, Asia and Brazil. Ìyánifá Omotinúwe, is also the author of the groundbreaking book My Journey to Aganjú: The Òrìsà so Hard to Find.

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 14

N’ganga Makhosi Daisy Latifah aka The AfroMystic is a traditional Black Belt Rootworker and Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist out of Los Angeles, CA. Born into a family of Mississippi and South Carolina Natives, she received the veiled teachings of what we now call Hoodoo, an Afro-diasporic spiritual system created, cultivated, and maintained by kidnapped African people during the transatlantic slave trade. Through her work at The AfroMystic, she utilizes the African practices of ritual work, Ancestor veneration, divination, astrology, hypnotherapy and herbal medicine to help black people reclaim our rightful roles, destinies, and spaces under the sun.

Dr. Anta Anthony Merritt is a priest in the BoboShanti Order of Rastafari, and has practiced Rastafari since 1978. He serves as presiding priest for the California office of the Jamaica-based, African centered, BoboShanti Order of Rastafari. He holds the PhD in Interdisciplinary Studies, with a concentration in African and African Diaspora Studies. Merritt is a lecturer in the Africana Studies Dept. of San Diego State University, CA. His doctoral and on-going research centers on the Shashemene Community of Rastafari, in Shashemene, Ethiopia.

Dr. Ayodeji Ogunnaike is Assistant Professor of Africana Studies at Bowdoin College. His research focusses primarily on Yoruba oriṣa worship in Nigeria, but also addresses Islam in Africa, Christianity in Africa, and diaspora religions—Brazilian Candomblé in particular. Having studied Ifa divination with a high priest and diviner in Nigeria, he has a keen interest in indigenous African intellectual traditions and ways of knowing. His current book project, How Worship Becomes Religion, analyzes how the worship of traditional Yoruba deities originally differed greatly from Western notions of “religion” but eventually became the most widespread and celebrated indigenous African religion through contact with modernity

and mission Christianity.

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Individual, Family, & Community Well-Being

Doing What Must be Done on the Homefront

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 15

An Akpon (ceremonial singer of Orisa chants), Iya Oloriwaa! has worked with greats in many traditions, including KweYao Agyapon, Lazaro Ross, “Puntilla” Rios, Canute Bernard, Jr, Amelita Pedrosa, Felito Oviedo, Amma Mcken, Ola DeJean, Emilio Baretto, Skip Burney, Richard Byrd, Roman Diaz, and Pedrito Martinez. Composer of original Orisa songs, she has also performed and recorded with Emilio Baretto's Santisimo, Milton Cardona's Bembe, Women of the Calabash, and Roman Diaz’s Lo Da Fun Bata. She’s the mother of Iyalorisa Amma Whatt, Olorisa Kofi Bernard, and Olorisa Oludare Bernard. Amma and Oludare are world renowned Akpons and artists. Life has opened new doors for Iya. Under the tutelage of Oba Oriate Craig Brown OluoOtun and Oba Oriate Anthony Sanchez OdeTobi, she is an Iton/ Akose training in the religious study of Oba Oriate (officiant of Lukumi ritual). She is one of two African American women on this journey following in the footsteps of Timotea Latuan Albear Ayailewu, and other phenomenal female Oriate. Iya Oloriwaa! is a writer and entrepreneur of Brooklyn SkaRunch Hats. She is the founder and Alakoso (director) of Egbe Iwa Odo'kunrin*Egbe Iwa Odo'binrin (the society of young men and young women of character) Rites of Passage Program.

OluDaré has been dancing, singing and praying for Orisha since he could walk. Originally trained by his mother, Iyalorisha Amma Oloriwaa!, his Father Baba Canute Bernard Jr. Ibaye, and La Mora, the Prima Balerina of Ballet Folklórico Cutumba de Santiago, OluDaré has garnered a sacred understanding of the Orisha Dances. Always studying, and learning from his elders, OluDaré continues to bridge the gap between tradition and the youth of today by sharing his knowledge in public schools and universities. These dances were left behind to do more than simply entertain the masses. They were left behind to help heal African Descendant Peoples. He believes in learning Afro-holistic movement with the intention of healing and finding joy! He is a #RespiratoryActivist and believes that African Descendants especially need to practice intentional healing breath. Through Kìire Wellness, Oludaré brings this message and practice to the world in a tangible, online, family friendly format that teaches Orisha movement and singing, two forms of sacred ancestral respiratory practice.

Horacio Robles is originally from Costa Rica and is a 6th year PhD student in the Religion Department at Columbia University. He is writing his dissertation on the “coming out from the basement” of African-derived religions in New York and the process by which practitioners, himself included, seek to reclaim public space, make themselves visible, secure their often-challenged rights, and leave their mark on the wider public sphere. Horacio is a practitioner and initiate of Batuque, the Orisha tradition of the south of Brazil that is also widespread in Uruguay and Argentina. He is the only Batuque practitioner in the US he knows of so far. When Horacio arrived in New York several years ago, he also began practicing Haitian Vodou, and became an “houngan sou pwen” – a junior Vodou priest.

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 16

Sula Spirit is a Singer, Songwriter, Author, Entrepreneur, Artist, Producer, Birth Doula, Professor and Priestess of Light. She was initiated in Ghana, West Africa as a traditional healer in 2007 and has studied African Spiritual Traditions since 1985. In 2014, Sula Spirit authored and produced the Book & CD Project entitled Spirit of the Orisha – a Yoruba Song preservation project. Sula is currently a Professor of Sacred Music at the Ifa University in Washington, D.C. and is founding Priestess of the Temple of Light Ile de Coin-Coin - a Temple of power for the elevation of souls located in the Musicians Village. Sula holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree with distinguished honors in African Studies and English Literature from Rutgers University in New Jersey (1994). She has traveled extensively throughout Africa and the Caribbean and has been a volunteer with Operation

Crossroads Africa participating in community development projects on the Continent since 1991. In addition Sula is a Medicine Queen with the Mardi Gras Indian tribe Mandingo Warriors – Spirit of Fi-Yi-Yi. She most recently released her solo cd entitled "A Journey Within" which she produced and recorded in Tanzania, East Africa. Both Spirit of the Orisha and A Journey WIthin can be found on all digital platforms. www.sulaspirit.comSula is available for Spiritual services, house & business blessings, prayers & elevation. Light to all!

Régine Romain is an artist, educator, Visual Anthropologist, and the Founder and Director of the WAWaWa Diaspora Centre. Régine Romain has 20 years practice in creating, researching, teaching, and supporting diverse communities in engaging and co-creating projects that promote positive representations of their individual and collective identities. Through an extensive global network, Régine produces culturally transformative courses, curricula, workshops, salons, exhibits, festivals, and forums. She is the founder and director of the Urban PhotoPoets, Brooklyn Photo Salon, and the Brooklyn to Benin: A Vodou Pilgrimage projects. Romain’s work is in the permanent collection at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, NY. Her work has been exhibited at Teatro Nacional de Cuba, Cuba; UN Photography Society, NY; and the Charles Sumner Museum, DC. Her awards include NYSCA Folk Arts 2015 Apprenticeship, A.I.R. Gallery 2011-2012 Fellow, Brooklyn Arts Council Re-Grant, Fund For Teachers Travel Grant, the Trude Lash and Public Allies Fellowships.Régine Romain is a native Washingtonian, now living in Brooklyn, New York. She received her Bachelor of Science in International Studies from Bowie State University and acquired a Masters in Photography & Urban Culture from Goldsmiths, University of London.

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ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 17

Kim Vaz-Deville, Ph.D. is professor of education and the associate dean of the College

of Arts and Sciences at Xavier University of Louisiana. Her book, The Baby Dolls:

Breaking the Race and Gender Barriers of the New Orleans Mardi Gras Tradition was

published by Louisiana State University Press in 2013 and was the basis for a major

installation, “They Call Baby Doll: A Mardi Gras Tradition” at the Louisiana State

Museum’s Presbytere unit in 2013. It is the 2016 selection of the Young Leadership

Council of New Orleans’ One Book One New Orleans.

Vaz-Deville guest-curated with Ron Bechet, Department Head and Victor H. Labat

Endowed Professor of Art Painting, Drawing, and Community Art at Xavier University of

Louisiana, an art exhibit titled “Contemporary Artists Respond to the New Orleans Baby

Dolls” which showed work about and inspired by the tradition in Spring, 2015 at the

George and Leah McKenna Museum of African American Art in New Orleans. Normally

photographed on the streets of New Orleans during the ritual times of Mardi Gras, St.

Joseph’s night and Super Sunday, photographer Phillip Colwart invited maskers to take stage portraits. Vaz-Deville

curated these in a photography exhibit, “Philip Colwart’s Studio Portraits of the Baby Dolls of New Orleans”, on view

2015-2016 at the Shreve Memorial Public Library, in Shreveport, LA.

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ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 18

ABOUT THE FOUNDING DIRECTOR Iya Dr. Funlayo E. Wood is a scholar-practitioner of

African and Diasporic Religions, spiritual counselor, strategist, motivational speaker, and facilitator. A native New Yorker now residing in Santa Barbara as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Dr. Funlayo earned her PhD in African and African American Studies and Religion from Harvard University where her focus was Ifa-Orisa religion and Africana religious philosophy. Her book in progress, Obi: Death, Divination, and the Divine Feminine, will produce the first scholarly manuscript dedicated entirely to the kola nut (obi in Yoruba) and its varied conceptions and uses among Ifa-Orisa practitioners.

A strong believer in public scholarship, Dr. Funlayo is a frequent lecturer and was featured in the National Geographic Channel's "The Story of God with Morgan Freeman" (2017) and in the PBS documentary "Sacred Journeys: Osun-Osogbo" (2013). She has also served as a contributing scholar at State of Formation and as an expert witness in cases involving practitioners of Africana religions.

Dr. Funlayo is the founding director of the African and Diasporic Religious Studies Association (ADRSA), a scholarly association dedicated to advancing research in African and Diasporic religions. She is also the founder of Ile Ase Ire, an Ifa-Orisa temple and spiritual learning center where people of African descent worship, learn, grow, and connect with spirit through weekly Orisa Prayer and Meditation services and other offerings. She recently released her first meditation album, Orisa-Focal Meditation with iya Funlayo, Vol.1 which features guided meditations for the orisa enhanced with Afro-spiritual soundscapes.

An initiate of Obatala, Osun and Ifa, and South Carolina-descended Hoodoo, Dr. Funlayo relishes in contributing her voice as a scholar-practitioner and an advocate for indigenous religions. Her research on Africana and other indigenous religions has afforded her the opportunity travel extensively (a passion of hers) and to study with many gifted spiritual leaders and scholars in North and South America, Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean.

THE ADRSA LEADERSHIP COUNCIL

LISA OSUNLETI

BECKLEY-ROBERTS, PHD Assistant Professor of Music and Chair

of the Department of Music Jackson State University

KHYTIE K. BROWN

PhD Candidate in African and African American Studies and Religion

Harvard University

KYRAH M. DANIELS, PHD

Assistant Professor of Art History and African & African Diaspora Studies

(courtesy appointment in Theology) Boston College

ADRSA 2020 | WIND & FIRE: HONORING THE DIVINE FEMININE AND MASCULINE IN AFRICANA RELIGIONS | PAGE 19

CONFERENCE SPONSORS

The African & Diasporic Religious Studies Association (ADRSA) is an interdisciplinary consortium dedicated to supporting scholarship in African and Diasporic Religions. Founded at Harvard University in April 2012, the

ADRSA is committed to scholarly and community exchange with a particular focus on bringing underrepresented voices to the fore.

The Center for African and African American Studies (CAAAS) at SUNO works to preserve, promote, and protect the knowledge of Africa and the

Diaspora. SUNO, one of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), is home to the largest collection of Congo Art in the region.

The Congress of Santa Barbara (KOSANBA) is a scholarly organization dedicated to the study of Haitian Vodou. Imbued by a sense of collective wisdom and aware of the long, difficult and constant struggles and crises undergone by their homeland, the Founders—and others who might join

them—pledged to create a space where scholarship on Vodou can be augmented.

WaWaWa Diaspora Centre's mission is actively heal historic wounds and trauma related to the TransAtlantic Slave Trade through our inter-

generational arts, education, and tours programs.

Ase Ire is an Ifa-Orisa Temple and Spiritual Learning Center where you can learn, grow, and connect with spirit using African-centered principles and philosophies. Weekly community prayer and meditation services, monthly

lectures, and more!

Thank You for Joining Us!