Lead Researcher: Lamine Sonko

For millennia, Guéwel cultural custodians of West Africa have sustained embodied knowledge systems that guide individuals in understanding themselves, their social relations, and their place within the world. These systems are maintained and transmitted through practices of music, rhythm, ritual, movement, and oral tradition, constituting living pathways toward ‘ko maat’, a state of balance, completeness, and ethical alignment that supports individual and collective wellbeing.

This project is a collaborative research initiative with Guéwel practitioners and elders to examine how knowledge is generated, embodied, and transmitted through ceremonial and artistic practice. By translating Guéwel epistemologies into contemporary scholarly language, while remaining grounded in Indigenous ontological and epistemological frameworks, the research examines how these practices operate as tools for mental and physical health and metaphysical knowledge production.

Through sustained practice-based inquiry and comparative analysis of practitioner experiences over time, the research aims to deepen understanding of how individuals navigate these knowledge pathways. In doing so, the project contributes to scholarship on embodied knowledge, contemplative practice, and Indigenous-led research methodologies, while supporting cultural continuity and ethical research practices. The project is led by Lamine Sonko, a research candidate at the Australian National University (ANU) and Honorary Fellow at University of Melbourne.