Shirley is a writer, researcher and creative storyteller documenting art, music and culture from across the Black Atlantic. She seeks out the connective tissue that shapes both continent and diaspora, forged in the afterlives of slavery and colonialism. Her writing has taken her from London to Lagos, Kampala to Kinshasa, Kingston and back, covering postcolonial and popular culture and everything in-between.

Culturally on the pulse, her words have been featured in British Vogue, The Face, Huck, Mixmag, Skin Deep, TRENCH and Kohler Magazine.With footprints as a scholar, strategist, creative director, choreographer, copywriter and producer, her love for world-building is both kindled by, and indebted to, a long lineage of Black women who imagined, envisioned and bore witness before her — from Octavia E. Butler to Misha Green, Toni Morrison to Maryse Condé, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, Nikki Giovanni, June Jordan and many more.