Dancing Resistance is out now The new book on the histories, cultural roots and living knowledge of Afro-Caribbean dances.
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Knowledge Production
Researching culture. Writing knowledge. Sharing what movement carries.
Research is an essential part of my practice.
I investigate African and Afro-Caribbean dance, Carnival, Black diasporic cultures, cultural memory and embodied knowledge through reading, field research, embodied practice, observation, participation, documentation, conversation and writing.
My research is rooted in the belief that knowledge does not only exist in books or institutions. It also lives in bodies, communities, practices, memories, stories, rituals and everyday cultural experiences.
My role is to listen, read, document, question, connect and translate these different forms of knowledge into ways of sharing.
I research African and Afro-Caribbean dance practices as cultural forms connected to history, identity, community, resistance and contemporary Black life.
My work considers not only how dances move, but also the histories, people and cultural contexts that give them meaning.
Carnival is an important area of my research and practice.
Through fieldwork and participation across Caribbean Carnival contexts, I investigate Carnival as a living cultural practice shaped by history, African retentions, community, creativity, resistance and joy.
My research considers how Carnival carries cultural memory while continually evolving in contemporary contexts.
I am interested in how knowledge can be held and transmitted through the body.
Dance, gesture, rhythm, ritual and social practices can carry memories and histories that are not always documented through conventional archives.
My research asks how these forms of embodied knowledge can be recognised, documented, valued and transmitted.
I am interested in the relationships between Black communities and cultural practices across the Caribbean, Africa, Europe and the wider Black diaspora.
My work considers how movement, music, cultural practices and memory travel, transform and create connections across places and generations.
My research moves between reading, fieldwork, embodied practice, community knowledge and critical reflection.
I engage with academic research, books, archival materials, essays, oral histories and other forms of documentation to situate cultural practices within their wider historical and social contexts.
Reading allows me to connect embodied and community-based knowledge with existing scholarship, while also identifying gaps, tensions and questions that require further research.
I learn through participation and immersion, spending time within the contexts where cultural practices are lived, observing, participating, listening and documenting.
I use my own body and movement practice as a way of generating, experiencing and understanding knowledge.
I learn from practitioners, artists, elders, communities and cultural bearers, recognising lived experience and cultural transmission as important forms of knowledge.
I pay attention to movement, stories, rituals, environments and cultural practices, documenting what emerges through research and participation.
I bring together what I read, observe, experience and learn through writing, analysis and reflection.
This allows my research to move between the page, the archive, the field, the body, the community and the wider public.
Research is only one part of the process.
I translate and share what I learn through books, writing, educational content, talks, lectures, workshops, interviews, performances and cultural storytelling.
I am particularly interested in making research accessible beyond academic spaces, while maintaining the complexity and cultural context of the knowledge being shared.
Different formats create different ways for people to engage through reading, listening, watching, moving and experiencing.
Book · Research · Writing
My first book brings together embodied research, cultural memory and reflections on African and Afro-Caribbean dance.
It considers the body as a site of history and knowledge, while reflecting on the ways dance can carry memory, identity and resistance.
Field Research · African Retentions · Cultural Memory
An ongoing research project investigating cultural resistance in Martinique through African retentions, embodied practices and living cultural knowledge.
The project brings together reading, field research, participation, observation and documentation to consider how cultural memory survives, transforms and continues to be transmitted.
Fieldwork · Carnival · Embodied Research
My ongoing research through Caribbean Carnival examines Carnival as a living cultural practice and a space where history, identity, resistance, community and joy intersect.
My participation in Carnival across the Caribbean and London forms part of this continuing body of research.
Alongside longer-form research and publications, I create educational and critical content that makes African and Afro-Caribbean cultural histories and practices more accessible.
This includes writing, short-form educational content, talks, interviews and other forms of cultural storytelling.
I use these formats to ask questions, challenge simplified narratives and create space for deeper engagement with the cultures and histories behind the movement.
I speak and teach on subjects connected to Black dance, African and Afro-Caribbean cultures, Carnival, cultural memory, embodied knowledge and movement.
My sessions can take the form of:
I bring together research, lived experience and embodied knowledge to create sessions that are informative, critical and accessible.
My research continues to evolve through reading, fieldwork, writing, artistic practice, academic study and cultural exchange.
I am interested in creating stronger bridges between community knowledge, artistic practice and academic research, and in developing ways for embodied and culturally rooted knowledge to be recognised as valuable forms of knowledge production.
