Awo Sumah
Awo Sumah is an intellectual and feminist philosopher. As the creator of a public humanities art form known as School of Dark Divine Arts,
a platform part of Dark Divine Arts Inc., she is leading the way in bringing enlightenment and humanities to the digital age. She specializes in Feminine Aboriginal Studies and offers radical insights into histories of slavery over the longue durée. She is also an artist, editor, folkloric translator and critic. Her critical essays have been published on Borderlines (Journal of the Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East), New Alphabet School Blog, and SUNU: Journal of African Affairs, Critical Thought + Aesthetics. She focuses on the science and art of authentic African custom, bringing the truth about the intelligences and wisdom African ancestors had before the destruction brought on by colonialism and Christianity. Her poetry grows out of her feminine customs and can be read in the 4th edition of the New Alphabet School #CARING called, Letters to Joan (2020). She holds a doctorate in African Studies, which she earned at Columbia University’s Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies (MESAAS) Department in May 2022. Her dissertation monograph stands as the first and original interpretation - in ancestral terms - of Simon Kimbangu and Bangunza ancestral healers’ breaking of occult pig magic rituals in the wake of the First World War. Her work sits at the intersection of history, feminist anthropology, philosophy and folklore in Africa, and is entitled Kintwadi kia Bangunza: Simon Kimbangu in Belgian Congo (2022). It is also a first in the study of European occultism in Africa.
