What Is HEWA?

Written By Dr. Shani OM

“Freedom is not a posture. It is a return.”

In a world where yoga has been commodified, contorted, and too often detached from its sacredness, HEWA emerges—not as a trend, but as a reclamation.

HEWA (pronounced hay-wah) is a soul-rooted movement form born at the intersection of breath, liberation, and cultural memory. It draws inspiration from ancient yogic principles while rooting itself unapologetically in Afrikan ancestral intelligence.

The name itself is Swahili for air—and that is exactly what HEWA gives us: room to breathe, space to return, and the invitation to unbind.

💨 Where It Comes From

Created by Dr. Shani OM—scholar, dancer, and trauma-informed guide—HEWA arose from decades of embodied research. Shaped by performance traditions, liberation theology, and Black feminist thought, it was birthed in response to a felt absence: a lack of space in mainstream yoga for Black bodies to move in wholeness, without performance, pretense, or posturing.

HEWA carries the spirit of yoga, but not its colonized shell. It reclaims breath as birthright, movement as medicine, and ritual as resistance.

🌀 What to Expect in a HEWA Practice

HEWA is not about “getting it right.” It’s about getting free.

Each session is a moving meditation—designed to harmonize the nervous system, awaken ancestral memory, and cultivate deep inner presence. You’ll experience:

  • Grounding breathwork to settle and center

  • Fluid, intuitive movement to unlock and express

  • Silence and sound to restore awareness

  • Cultural ritual elements that reconnect you to something larger than yourself

It is gentle, powerful, and wholly alive. Whether you’re new to movement or a longtime practitioner, HEWA meets you where you are—and reminds you of who you’ve always been.

🌱 Why It Matters Now

We are living in disembodied times. Trauma, technology, and societal expectations conspire to pull us away from our knowing.

HEWA helps us come home to the body—not as a project to fix, but as a sacred vessel to honor. It is a container for healing, a compass for inner truth, and a call to courageously reclaim what the world has tried to make us forget.

This is yoga that breathes Black.
That listens to ancestors.
That chooses liberation over imitation.

This is HEWA.
You are welcome here.

Dr. Shani OM

Shani Ojukwu Mantenso is an Uhuru woman and descendant of the planet’s original melanated people. She’s a wife & mother, a seeker & scholar, and a former elite gymnast & professional dancer. Shani earned a dual Bachelor of Arts degree from Lincoln University in Pennsylvania and holds two Master of Arts degrees, one in African History from North Carolina Central University and the other in African Languages & Literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dr. Ojukwu Mantenso received her Ph.D. from New York University in 2006 and had the honor of working as a college professor in New York City and Long Island, New York, for twelve years.

Currently, Dr. OM wears several hats. As well as co-founder & contributing author & publisher for TRPL BLCK PRSS publishing house and bookseller, Shani is a program director & mwalimu for the liberatory unschool The Uhuru Institute, the founder & Principal Movement Specialist for Hadiya Mind & Movement, an online yoga & holistic movement studio, and co-founder & co-director of Uhuru Sanctuary, a mobile care community designed expressly for the protection, responsibility, & residency of Black women, children, LGBTQI+ & disabled people, and vulnerable ecosystems & wildlife.

The author currently lives on wheels throughout the Americas with her spouse Rev. Oni OM and their animal companions Zimbabwe, Oya, & Zola, and plant pals Anubis, Vista, Trisha, I’m the Goddess Isis, and Seven Sisters.

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