U.S. religious freedom law was never built to protect Indigenous African traditions.

U.S. religious freedom frameworks were not designed with Indigenous African traditions in mind. As a result, descendants of chattel slavery who practice African Indigenous religions often fall outside legal protections that claim to guarantee religious freedom. Their spiritual practices are frequently dismissed as “culture” or “superstition,” leaving practitioners — especially Black practitioners — vulnerable to surveillance, stigma, and state intervention within secular institutions such as schools, child welfare systems, zoning boards, prisons, and health care settings. This session examines how anti-Blackness shapes whose religions are considered legitimate, drawing parallels between Indigenous land theft and the erasure of Indigenous African spiritual traditions.