Postgraduate research students

Research Summary

My research focuses on the exploration of Vodou, and other Afro-based religious traditions, highlighting how these traditions make and unmake certain identities across the diaspora, paying close attention to places like Brooklyn, New York.  My work seeks to connect Afro-diasporic religious communities, exploring their common threads rooted in the everyday rituals which form the basis of these practices.  In short, my interest lies in highlighting the permeable nature of Vodou, and how the often overlooked mundane daily practices often present themselves in cosmopolitan spaces, and what this means for the development of Vodou, and other Afro-based religious practices.  

Research Interests 

• Ritual Mounting
• Sacred Arts
• Spirits 
• Drumming 
• Lwa
• Divinination
• Saints

• Dr Diego Maria Malara
• Dr Rachel Douglas

Grants 

• Turks and Caicos National Scholar - 2015-2018
• James McCune Smith Scholarship - 2022-2026
• College of Arts and Graduate School, University of Glasgow - 2024 

Awards 

• David Ford Memorial Prize, University of Chester - 2018
• Emerging Scholar Award, KOSANBA, the Scholarly Association for the Study of Haitian Vodou - 2025

 

Conferences

• 2023: Rethinking Haitian Vodou: Everyday religiosity, modernity, and decolonisation, James McCune Smith Annual Conference, University of Glasgow – June (6-8).

• 2023: ‘Kreyòl pale, Kreyòl konprann’: an exploration of Kreyòl’s role in anti-colonial resistance, and identity making – the Centre for Imperial and Postcolonial Studies, University of Southampton – July (14). 

• 2023: Kalfou Danjere: Re-Imagining the Lakou Through social media – KOSANBA, the Scholarly Association for the Study of Haitian Vodou, Morehouse College– October (5-8).

• 2024: Konesans soti anba dlo, a wet ontological approach to understanding Ginen’s positionality in the shaping of Vodou knowledge, University of Yale – May (13-15).

• 2024: From Cécile Fatiman to Catherine Flon, Fanm rebèl se Poto Mitan, an exploration of Haiti’s founding mothers, University of Central Lancashire – July (10-12).  

• 2025: Fèy o, sovi lavi mwen, an exploration of Vodou in medicine through songs (Mizik Rasin), Edinburgh Centre for Medical Anthropology, University of Edinburgh – May (8-9).

• 2025: Reclaiming Neurodivergence Understanding through the Sacred Lens of Diasporic Black Spirituality, The Transatlantic Roundtable on Race and Religion, University of South Africa – July (7-11).

• 2025: Tanbou se pwofèt: Drums as Prophets, Heralds of Emancipatory Movements, and Agents of Reimagination – KOSANBA, the Scholarly Association for the Study of Haitian Vodou – Nova South Eastern University – August (21-23). 

 

Collaborative Project  

• Yoruba Sonic: An exploration of sounds in Yoruba cosmology. 

Guest Lecturing 

• An introduction to Vodou, University of Glasgow – October 2022.

• Vodou Iconography, University of Glasgow – November 2023. 

• From Bwa Kayiman to Batay Vètye, understanding Vodou’s positionality in emancipatory movements, University of Glasgow – November 2024. 

Invited Talks

• Boukman o, nan Bwa Kayiman, remembering the past to shape the future at Bwa Kay Iman – Gran Bwa, Bwa Kay Iman, Prospect Park – August 2025.

• Defans, understanding Vodou's reaction to harm, conflict, and the specific frameworks which legitimise the use of force, Criminology Working Lunch, University of Glasgow – May 2025.

• Vodou in the diaspora and the intractable contradictions of gender roles, Sociology Seminar, University of Glasgow – March 2025.

• Exploring Mama Lola’s Legacy, a contemporary analysis of Vodou in Brooklyn, CUNY Staten Island – October 2024.

• Lakou as emancipatory nexus, Scottish Pagan Federation – November 2023. 

 

Workshop 

• ‘Intersectional Vodou’, Future Directions in Sociology, University of Glasgow, United Kingdom.

 

Graduate Teaching Assistant

• Sociology 

Visiting Scholar 

• Visiting Scholar, CUNY Staten Island, New York City (May-October 2024)

 

Board Member 

• James McCune Smith Scholarship Steering Board Member - 2022-2023.
• Committee Member for Fèt Gede - 2022-2023. 

Membership 

• Haitian Studies Association.
• Society for Francophone Postcolonial Studies

Archives 

• Archival translator – Haitian Studies Institute, CUNY, Brooklyn College, New York. 

Conference Organising 

• James McCune Smith Annual Conference, University of Glasgow - 2022-2024
• Haitian Studies Association Annual Conference, CUNY, City Tech, New York - 2024