Okeyo A. Jumal

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Author Okeyo Jumal was born and raised in Pasadena, California, a city set like a jewel in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains with the Arroyo Seco Creek running through. The rugged splendor of this environment was very impressionable on a young Ajamu growing up, foothills where years later he would often trek to find serenity from the hum of crowded neighborhoods just over the hill, and a place that would eventually become the primary setting for his historical novel, Spiritual Shackles.
 
Natural beauty aside, Pasadena, like most “Northern” cities, was void of the overt Jim Crow signs and attitudes of the old Confederacy, but the many times not so subtle “Northern” racism was right there. The 1896 Plessy v Ferguson Supreme Court Decision that legitimized segregation or apartheid in America was reversed in 1954, but the comfortable system wasn't about to crumble on its own, it needed some help. Caught up in the peoples and attitudes of these volatile days, which are at times nasty and bitter, and at times comical and mind-boggling, Ajamu Jumal is eyewitness to the eclectic mix of composite characters that makeup the pages of his novel.
      
After high school, Jumal attended Pasadena City College and Cal State Los Angeles before attending the University of California at Berkeley. From Berkeley he'd move on to spend a year traveling on the continent of Africa. Later, as teacher/tutor for minors in the cast of the light opera, Carmen Jones, he'd spend a year touring Europe. Back stateside, Jumal would help to found Omowale Ujamaa [children come home to familyhood] in Pasadena, a school based on many of the traditions he observed while visiting the continent of Africa.

Jumal attained his bachelor's degree in History and his master's degree in Educational Administration. As an educator, he has taught in and coordinated in the Headstart program, a job that he states without question was the most wonderful and satisfying he's ever had the pleasure of working in education. Jumal as also taught first thru sixth grades at elementary schools, taught middle and high school history, and has served as a middle and high school vice principal. Being the educator for all seasons or grades, Jumal has also taught classes on African history, current and ancient, at several Cal State Colleges.

In "Spiritual Shackles," Jumal's life experiences bleed onto the pages in vivid detail. Not just in the powerful writing and the meticulously researched histories, but in the storytelling. The gritty storytelling binds the novel together and grips tightly to the reader's imagination.

Jumal currently resides in Southern California with his wife, Phyllis. He enjoys jazz, officiating track and field, both teaching and playing chess, storytelling and traveling where he's most recently returned from trips to Bahia, Brazil and Belize.