A Cultural Accuracy Consultant focused on revitalizing cultural identity and ensuring accurate representation and diversity across various projects, emphasizing the rich history of Black, African, and Igbo cultures.
Who is Yvonne?
Yvonne Chioma Mbanefo
Chioma (pronounced Chee-yaw-mah)
Mbanefo (Pronounced Mm-bah-neigh-foh)
Yvonne Chioma Mbanefo is a multidisciplinary cultural consultant and historian specializing in relatable digital media, cultural heritage, and education. Specializing in Igbo, African, and Black cultures, she focuses on crafting engaging content that illuminates historical contexts, cultural integration and modern global interactions.
As an expert collaborator with media and corporate sectors, Yvonne's insightful consultations ensure accurate cultural representation and enhance diversity in a wide array of projects.
Her extensive portfolio includes notable work on the award-winning 18th-century Igboland feature film Equiano Stories, accent and dialect coaching for engaging productions at the BBC and National Theatre London, and impactful contributions to the SOAS University of London and Cambridge University's Re-entanglement project on decolonizing archives.
Celebrated as the author of the best-selling Igbo dictionary for children, Yvonne's expertise also shines through her TED Global talk, advocating for the preservation of African languages, enriching cultural identities and uniting diverse cultures.
Case Studies
Equiano.Stories
(Award winning Feature Film)
Equiano.stories is a biopic feature film about Olaudah Equiano, a self-emancipated slave who wrote "The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano." The film is presented as a self-recorded first-person account on Instagram Stories, using video, images & text. The story portrays the strength, resistance & tenacity of Africans during the Middle Passage to the New World.
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Black History Curriculum Design (Social Lessons)
The project created educational content for social media, pairing bite-sized Black history lessons with highlights from the Equiano film. These instant lessons, designed by scholars, provide historical & cultural context to specific parts of the film, allowing young people to learn various parts of black history and culture while they watch.
Re:Entanglements
(A Decolonization project)
The Re:Entanglements project examined colonial collections assembled by Northcote W. Thomas in Nigeria & Sierra Leone, 1909-1915. Seeking to understand the historical context & present significance of these archives, the project aims to explore their meaning for communities today & their latent possibilities.
Community Engagement
Equiano.Stories & Black History at The Breakfast Club
Yvonne Mbanefo & Dr. Kim L. Dulaney Speak On ‘Equiano Stories’, Black History, DuSable Museum and Social Learning at The Breakfast Club, an American syndicated radio show based in New York City.
Combatting the decline of African languages, at TED Global 2017
At TEDGlobal 2017, Yvonne was invited by TED Conferences to talk about the decline of African languages and the power of stories for language and culture preservation.