Founding Artistic Practitioner

Dr. d’bi.young anitafrika is an internationally celebrated dub poet, biomythicist, theatre-maker, and liberatory pedagogue whose work spans performance, scholarship, and arts leadership across four continents. Laureate of the 2026 Mayor’s Celebration of Cultural Life Award and the 2025 Johanna Metcalf Performing Arts Prize, they continue to shape contemporary theatre and performance training through their pioneering methodology, the Anitafrika Dub Praxis. Dr. anitafrika has authored twelve plays, released seven dub poetry albums, published four poetry collections, and headlined festivals and theatre seasons worldwide. Their contributions have been recognised with numerous honours, including three Dora Awards, the Canadian Poet of Honour Award, a Siminovitch Playwrights Prize Finalist, and a Global Leader in Theatre and Performance distinction from Arts Council England. Their groundbreaking PhD, Personhood, Practice & Pedagogy in Black Womxn Theatre, theorises Black womyn’s theatre-making and addresses critical research gaps in Canadian performance scholarship. A visionary practitioner-scholar, Dr. anitafrika has lectured at Addis Ababa University, London South Bank University, Stanislavski Theatre School in Poland, and the Sandberg Institute in the Netherlands. Founding Artistic Director of the Watah Black Theatre School and Spolrusie Press, and Principal Researcher of the Black Womyn in Theatre Archive, Dr. anitafrika is also co-editor of Free To Be More: Creative Activism in the Era of Black Lives Matter and is currently embarking upon a global tour of their critically acclaimed biomyth monodrama shx mami wata & the pxssywitch hunt.

*Image of d’bi.young anitafrika by Ocean Morisset