2025: The Jamaa Birth Village Cultural Heritage Center

July 11, 2025 / Okunsola M. Amadou

Jamaa Birth Village means family in the African language of Swahili. Come and go with me, on the humble beginnings and birthing of a village.

2025

In 2025, Jamaa Birth Village celebrates 10-years of service to the St. Louis Community and State of Missouri. In honor of a decade of visionary, groundbreaking and transformative Black Maternal Health care, service, advocacy and education, Jamaa Birth Village announces it’s formal expansion as “The Jamaa Birth Village Cultural Heritage Center”, set to open officially on October 26, 2025-the organizations 10th anniversary.

The Jamaa Birth Village Cultural Heritage Center is launching the nation’s first comprehensive initiative dedicated to restoring the visibility and power of African Indigenous midwifery through three groundbreaking programs envisioned, curated and led by Okunsola M. Amadou:

  • The African Indigenous Midwifery Museum™-A first-of-its-kind cultural space preserving and celebrating pre-colonial birthing practices, crafts, and midwife priestess histories.
  • The Black Midwifery Library & Research Institute™ – A sacred archive and study space dedicated to Black midwifery knowledge, scholarship, and media.
  • Okunsola’s School of Traditional Midwifery™ – Missouri’s first Black-founded midwifery school, training future midwives through holistic, community-based care.

This center directly addresses three critical areas of disparity:

Historical Erasure – Combatting the loss of Black midwifery knowledge due to global colonial practices and policies like the Flexner Report and Sheppard-Towner Act.

Educational Access – Filling the void left by Missouri’s lack of in-state midwifery education with a culturally affirming alternative.

Maternal Health Inequities – Creating community-rooted pathways to care that are trusted, affordable, and culturally congruent.

Through deep collaboration with elder midwives, researchers, museums, universities, and policymakers, we are reclaiming midwifery as both a healing practice and a cultural legacy.

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Okunsola M. Amadou

Okunsola M. Amadou, a Fulani-American Midwife, is the Founder and President of Jamaa Birth Village.

Brittany L. Conteh, professionally known as Priestess Okunsola M. Amadou, Folk Midwife™ and Birth Priestess™, is a pioneering midwife, educator, and preservationist dedicated to redefining the legacy of African Indigenous Midwifery and ensuring its rightful place in the cultural and historical record.

After leading the Jamaa Birth Village organization and midwifery clinic for over a decade and practicing as a Certified Professional Midwife, Okunsola is now transitioning from clinical practice to full-time cultural preservation, focusing on the documentation, protection, and advancement of her patent pending midwife designation paths of Folk Midwifery™ and Birth Priestess™ traditions-globally.

As the Founder & President of Jamaa Birth Village, Okunsola led groundbreaking efforts to transform Black Maternal Health in Missouri and beyond. Her achievements include:

Opening Missouri’s first Black-led midwifery clinic on Juneteenth 2020, after training with traditional midwives and fetish priestesses in Ghana (2013).

Becoming the First Black Certified Professional Midwife & First Black Registered CPM Preceptor in Missouri.

Certifying over 460 Black doulas, significantly closing the Black doula disparity gap in St. Louis and the State of Missouri.

Earning 24 awards for her contributions to Black Maternal Health.

Consulting hospitals, policymakers, and international organizations on equitable maternal care policies.

Receiving ten state/local proclamations, seven resolutions-including a Congressional Resolution for her work in birth justice.

As a Museum Studies scholar, Okunsola graduated from the University of Iowa Museum Studies Program May 2025, after completing an internship at the Missouri Historical Society where she launched a Missouri Midwife archive and pop-up exhibit.

Her leadership has not only expanded access to midwifery and doula services, but also challenged systemic inequities in maternal care, ensuring culturally centered and community-driven solutions.

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