Yoga Sankofa is taught from the Vhavenda breath tradition and the Akan Sankofa principle — trauma-informed, culturally rooted, and grounded in the Monday & Wednesday gathering at Bo Diddley Plaza.
“Sankofa — go back and fetch what was left behind. The wisdom our ancestors kept is the wisdom our bodies still remember.”
Sankofa is the Akan principle of returning to what is whole. Makeda teaches from this principle at Bo Diddley Plaza — drawing on the Vhavenda breath lineage of southern Africa, the somatic and trauma-informed teaching she trained in, and the free community practice that grounds everything. Every program — kids yoga, adult classes, retreats, and corporate wellness — carries the same roots.
The teachers and traditions Makeda draws from — the wells the curriculum at Bo Diddley Plaza is built on. Click any card to walk into the program that uses that lineage.
The Tshivenda-language lineage of southern Africa — breath, song, and grounded movement as a way of being in the body. This is the ancestral root of the practice. Kids sit closest to this lineage: their breath is unedited, their attention is whole.
Walk into Kids Yoga →The Akan principle that to move forward you must first return to what is whole — the wisdom our ancestors kept. Adult classes and the Sankofa Supporter membership are the container for this work, deepening practice and keeping the mission alive.
Walk into Adult Classes →The free community practice at the heart of Gainesville — the place where the teaching is grounded, every Monday and Wednesday at 9 AM. The same holding Makeda brings into workplaces: trauma-informed, breath-led, and built for how teams actually move.
Walk into Corporate Wellness →200-hour RYT and Registered Children’s Yoga (RCYT) training, layered with somatic and trauma-informed teaching principles. Retreats are the deepest container for this work — half-day to weekend immersions built for real restoration.
Walk into Retreats →Each strand above opens into a program page. Start with the one your body is asking for — the roots are the same.