Bio:
Gladys Ijeoma Akunna is an award–winning researcher, scholar, and author with a pioneering spirit. Her innovative and enlightening research in her Africanized Dance/ Movement Therapy (DMT) model creatively and authentically blends relevant Western thoughts and scientific African indigenous knowledge about dance, movement, language symbols, psychology, healthcare, and the ahu nmandu, loosely translated in English as the human body, which she phenomenologically and practically applies from the African Igbo language as the ‘seen or visible ‘beauty of life’. Akunna is focused on equity, power relations, integration, healing, and healthcare (ile kata ahu), or the care of the ‘visible beauty’ of the Africanized (Black) body, plagued by trauma from troubling historical realities. Africanized DMT bridges vital gaps in global psychotherapy knowledge and practice from an enhanced, fascinatingly refreshing, and different perspective.

Gladys Ijeoma Akunna is presently an independent researcher in Philadelphia. She served as a visiting scholar at Drexel University and a 2025 artist-in-residence at the University of Pennsylvania. She was awarded an International Fellowship of the American Association of University Women (AAUW) in 2020.

Abstract:
The African Igbo philosophy of education is grounded in the visual and the performative, summed up in the saying, anaghi ano ofu ebe ekiri nmau, meaning that the masquerade is not watched from one spot, negating the dangers of a single perspective on knowledge, which should be meaningful, relatable, and broadly harnessed from vantage angles for purposeful utility. As an artist- in-residence at the University of Pennsylvania in 2025, I explored the immeasurable contributions of African and African American historical icons to Africanized DMT. They symbolize ‘visible bodies of evidence’ for appreciating the community's mental health and African-focused psychotherapy. The cultural and educational influences from my formative years and my roots in the United States enable me to bridge cultural history, ancient wisdom, and enduring principles, language, and body-care practices through Africanized DMT. In this research, I analyze the concepts of oppression and power in relation to the visible Africanized body and empowerment within Africanized DMT.