Uploaded June 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
When Annie hands a child a High John the Conqueror root in the opening minutes of Sinners, most audiences don't know what they're seeing. Dr. Shelby Pumphrey does. An Assistant Professor of Africana and Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies at the University of Louisville who studies Black women and hoodoo practice, she watched that scene and recognized something that has been present in Black American culture since enslavement — a tradition of spiritual practice built specifically to help people survive conditions designed to break them. In this final episode, she explains the full depth of what Coogler put on screen: the mythology of High John, the practice of divination, the sacred and the sensual occupying the same space. The most spiritually grounded conversation in the series, and the one that makes you want to watch the film again. This episode is hosted by Dr. Brittney Frantece, Thurgood Marshall Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of African and African American Studies, Dartmouth College, and is produced by the Dartmouth Institute for Black Intellectual and Cultural Life in collaboration with the Dartmouth Media Production Group.
When Annie hands a child a High John the Conqueror root in the opening minutes of Sinners, most audiences don't know what they're seeing. Dr. Shelby Pumphrey does. An Assistant Professor of Africana and Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies at the University of Louisville who studies Black women and hoodoo practice, she watched that scene and recognized something that has been present in Black American culture since enslavement — a tradition of spiritual practice built specifically to help people survive conditions designed to break them. In this final episode, she explains the full depth of what Coogler put on screen: the mythology of High John, the practice of divination, the sacred and the sensual occupying the same space. The most spiritually grounded conversation in the series, and the one that makes you want to watch the film again. This episode is hosted by Dr. Brittney Frantece, Thurgood Marshall Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of African and African American Studies, Dartmouth College, and is produced by the Dartmouth Institute for Black Intellectual and Cultural Life in collaboration with the Dartmouth Media Production Group.
