Kumina Queen

Nyasha Laing

Imogene “Queenie” Kennedy was a contemporary priestess in post-colonial Jamaica who catapulted her African spiritual practice into renown. But after centuries of erasure, what remains of the dance between the living and the dead?

In the wake of the loss of her mother, the filmmaker travels into the heart of Jamaican countryside to research kumina, an ancestral ritual. The ancient practice, she learns, is a driving force in Jamaica's culture and identity, yet its leaders have historically been discarded as witches and criminalized. Jamaica's post-colonial renaissance enabled Queenie to share her practice with the world. Today, artists and followers are reimagining kumina, even as the mysterious world of spirit possession reveals divergent pathways to freedom, healing, and transformation.