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Transformative Travel

This is travel as transformation: intimate, intentional, and alive with discovery.

As a cultural anthropologist with decades of experience living, studying, and working with West African musicians, I guide small groups on transformative journeys to Guinea, Burkina Faso, the Gambia, and Morocco. These 8-day to 2-week retreats are designed for adventurous souls seeking intimate cultural exchange, artistic practice, and inner growth.

Since 2000, I have maintained deep relationships with griot musician families across West Africa—the Jobarteh, Dioubate, and Diabate lineages—which became the heart of my doctoral research and my 2021 book, Jeliya at the Crossroads. These longstanding connections allow our small groups of 8 to experience West African culture from the inside: staying with local families, learning traditional arts like balafon, djembe, and indigo dyeing from master teachers, cooking together, and participating in daily life.

Each day begins with yoga and meditation, followed by immersive activities—music lessons, art-making, village visits, cooking with host families, or hiking through the landscape. Evenings are reserved for reflection, journaling, and discussions on history and culture. Some days we contribute directly to community projects, helping with harvests or school construction, while every trip supports local artisans, teachers, and families.

Travel with different cultures offers something rare: they reflect a new version of ourselves back to us. When you encounter West African polyrhythmic music—where multiple time signatures dance together—or experience a culture that values presence over planning, immediate response over rehearsed answers, you begin to see your own cultural conditioning more clearly. This expanded awareness opens new possibilities for how you move through the world.

These retreats honor ecological consciousness—filtering water instead of buying plastic bottles, traveling overland when possible, choosing eco-conscious accommodations, and minimizing waste. We tread lightly while going deep.

Always an avid advocate for adventure, Lisa co-created a study abroad program in Serbia for the University of Alberta in 2015 called the Fieldschool for Ethnographic Sensibility. Click here to read more.

Lisa Feder
Lisa Feder
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Transformative Travel
Transformative Travel
Transformative Travel
Transformative Travel

PRAISE FOR LISA’S TRANSFORMATIVE TRAVEL EXPERIENCES

“I was a student on a field school in Belgrade, Serbia 2015. The program and time I spent working with Dr. Feder was one of the most memorable and impactful study abroad programs of my undergraduate degree. One area of particular importance to me was Dr. Feder’s introduction of meditation/reflection into a daily routine as part of ethnographic fieldwork. So much of research and classroom studies are focused on production, and there can be an enormous amount of stress that grows from this. By leading us through such reflective exercises Dr. Feder demonstrated that it was ok to take time for yourself; in fact, this could be the most beneficial part of one’s day.

Another aspect to Dr. Feder’s approach to teaching was in her encouragement for us as students to take risk. This is something that I find to be lacking in the formalized setting of a typical university classroom. Dr. Feder’s unwavering support meant that this controlled freedom not only helped in building the confidence I had in my own abilities to perform fieldwork in the future, but also gave me the courage to take risks in my writing and research. I am convinced that Dr. Feder’s encouragement has helped me transition from being a good student to one capable of performing serious academic research”

— Craig Farkesh Alberta, Canada 2015