Women's, Gender and Social Justice

Due to news of the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences not hosting an annual Congress this year, we decided as an association not to host an in-person event.

Join the Women’s, Gender and Social Justice Association and the Black Canadian Studies Association for a one-day event featuring a morning panel on Palestinian Justice Organizing at Canadian PSIs and an afternoon keynote with Robyn Maynard.

Friday, May 30, 2025
11:00am – 3:00pm
The 519 (519 Church St. Toronto)

Register on Eventbrite. Space is limited! Light refreshment will be available. 

We are waiving entry fees for students! 
For faculty to attend this one-day event, you must be either a member of WGSJ or BCSA.
To become a member of WGSJ, visit our website. 
To become a member of BCSA, please email bcsamembers@gmail.com

About the speakers:

Panelists:

Wafaa Hasan: Wafaa Hasan is a community-engaged researcher, author, and public speaker. Her academic research is based in decolonial, transnational feminist studies with a particular focus on anti-racist solidarity practices. She has published on topics such as Palestinian childhood in Canadian literature; Islamophobia; imperial feminisms; decolonial feminisms; critical pedagogies; anti-oppressive research methodologies; and global practices of resilience in displacement in Countering Displacements: The Creativity and Resilience of Indigenous and Refugee-ed Peoples (U of A Press, 2012). Her recent book chapter “Fragmented Bodies ‘Dancing on the Spot’: The Transnational Lives of Canadian Muslims and the Limits of Anti-Islamophobia Advocacy” was published in Systemic Islamophobia in Canada: A Research Agenda (2022) (named a Top 100 Book for 2023 in The Hill Times). Her latest co-authored piece called “An Inherently Decolonial Existence: Defining Palestinian Feminist Praxis” will be featured in the Sage Handbook of Decolonial Theory this summer. 

She recently received an award from the CrimSL Research Cluster for The Study of Racism and Inequality (CSRI) to support her research on Systemic and Institutional Anti-Palestinian Racism in Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area Public School System. She is also the 2025 recipient of the ASSU Ranjini (Rini) Ghosh Excellence in Teaching Award at the University of Toronto. 

https://www.wafaahasan.com/

Nadia Abu-Zarah: https://uniweb.uottawa.ca/view/profile/members/961?lang=en

Shams Seif: Shams Seif is an artist, writer, and academic, who is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Gender, Feminist, and Women’s Studies. She uses interdisciplinary methods, autoethnography and research-creation, to explore narratives of transgenerational resistance/resilience. Shams holds a Master of Arts in media production from Toronto Metropolitan University and has amassed considerable expertise in community building via her writing collective, The Poetry Passport. She is passionate about connecting theory to practice and building bridges between academia and the public.

Robyn Maynard is an author and scholar based in Toronto, where she holds the position of Assistant Professor of Black Feminisms in Canada at the University of Toronto-Scarborough in the Department of Historical and Cultural Studies. Her writing on borders, policing, abolition and Black feminism is taught widely in universities across Canada, the United States and Europe.

Maynard is the author of two books. Policing Black Lives: State violence in Canada from slavery to the present (Fernwood 2017) is a national bestseller, designated as one of the “best 100 books of 2017” by the Hill Times, listed in The Walrus‘s “best books of 2018,” shortlisted for an Atlantic Book Award, the Concordia University First Book Prize and the Mavis Gallant Prize for Non-fiction, and the winner of the 2017 Errol Sharpe Book Prize. In 2018 the book was published in French with Mémoire d’encrier, titled NoirEs sous surveillance. Esclavage, répression et violence d’État au Canada and won the 2019 Prix de libraires in the category of “essais.” Rehearsals for Living (Knopt/Haymarket, 2022) co-authored with Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, is a Toronto Star, Globe and Mail, and CBC National Bestseller, was shortlisted for a Governor General’s Award for literary non-fiction, a finalist for the Heritage Toronto Book Award and designated one of CBC’s “best Canadian non-fiction books of 2022” and the “best 100 books of 2022” by the Hill Times. Other awards include “2018 Author of the Year” from Montreal’s Black History Month and the Writers’ Trust Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQI* Emerging Writers.

Additional writing appears in Washington Post, World Policy Journal, the Toronto Star, TOPIA: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies, Canadian Woman Studies, Critical Ethnic Studies Journal, Scholar & Feminist Journal and numerous book anthologies.

Maynard contributed to the research and writing for the Defund the Police website and recently authored two toolkits: “Building the World We Want: A Roadmap to police-free futures in Canada” and “What is Prison Abolition in Canada?” With Pascale Diverlus, she co-hosted Building the World We Want, an abolitionist learning lab.

About the venue: https://www.the519.org/about/contact/

Check out additional events co-sponsored with the SSA. Details below:

We are not hosting our annual conference with #congressh for 2024. We decided as an association last year to take the year off and re-build our association, including a brand new name, updated by-laws, social media presence, website, and many more!

York University
May 29- June 1, 2023 | Toronto
Take Back the Future 

• Conference Fees
• Speed Mentoring sessions for graduate students and Junior faculty! 
• 2023 WGSRF Conference Proceedings to be Published in Atlantis
• Conference Program

Keynote address
Keynote Speaker: Roderick A. Ferguson
“Feminism, the Super-Patriarch, and the Task of the Twenty-First Century”

The Black writer Toni Cade Bambara argued that the question before all cultural workers ten years before the dawn of the twentieth century was “How to save the planet from the psychopaths?” This keynote address analyzes the figure of the super patriarch as a metaphor for the psychopathic relations that now threaten human and planetary life. Reading those relations as constituted by capitalist deregulation, nuclear proliferation, labor exploitation, imperial occupation, and so on, the presentation mobilizes insights from feminist theory, particularly its interest in the patriarchal foundations of modern agency, to interrogate the super patriarch and the relations they promote.

Conference Fees

These are our association fees for 2023. These are also listed on the congress website here. 

For Congress fees, please visit the Congress for the Social Sciences and Humanities website.

Speed Mentoring sessions for graduate students and Junior faculty! 

Facilitators: Ali Greey (Ph.D Candidate, University of Toronto) & Claire Carter (President of WGSRF and Professor, University of Regina)  

Join us for this year’s annual WGSRF Speed-Mentoring event. Graduate students and early career scholars will be paired with mentors affiliated with WGSRF.

The WGSRF Speed-Mentoring will run in-person May 30 (11:15 – 12:45 PM) and June 1st- (9:30- 11:00 AM)

Come prepared with questions – about publishing, job options inside and outside of academia, postdocs, navigating academic institutions, balancing family and work, or whatever it is you would like mentorship on! 

*** Pre-registration is required. To register, please email Ali Greey at wgsrf.speedmentoring@gmail.com by May 1, 2023. Please include the following information: 1) if you would like to sign up as mentor or mentee; 2) your availability: whether you can attend one or both sessions; and 3) areas of research or mentorship interest.

2023 WGSRF Conference Proceedings to be Published in Atlantis

For full author guidelines, please click here. Please see full CFP here.

Atlantis: Critical Studies in Gender, Culture and Social Justice will publish a special issue of proceedings from the 2023 WGSRF conference. We invite conference participants to consider submitting an extension of their conference papers and presentations, including full research papers, research notes, book reviews, and commentaries on the field of WGS.

Proceedings will be co-edited by Miglena Todorova, Daniella Robinson, and Krystal Kehoe MacLeod.

Members of Atlantis’ staff and Editorial Board will also attend the 2023 WGSRF conference We are pleased to be presenting two panels sessions and workshops on feminist publishing and the process of submitting your work for publication (abstracts below).

Further information and submissions guidelines will be posted in spring 2023 on the WGSRF website, in the conference program, and on the Atlantis website, Twitter, Instagram, and newsletter.

Atlantis presentations at the 2023 WGSRF Conference (May 29 – June 1)

1)  Soundbites and Pitches with the Atlantis Journal Editorial Team
In this interactive workshop, participants will spend one-on-one or small group time with members of the editorial team of Atlantis. Participants will be invited to discuss their in-progress articles, exchanges, commentaries, book reviews, creative writing and/or ideas for special issues. Members of the editorial team will offer guidance on submissions, discuss the journal’s scope and aims, and offer informal feedback on all ideas (including those that are half-baked). This workshop will be a fantastic opportunity for early career and graduate students looking for publishing mentorship that is specific to their research and writing. Those interested in submitting their conference presentation or reflections on the 2023 meeting of WGSRF to the special issue of Atlantis are (gently) encouraged to attend.
 
2) The History of the Atlantis Journal and Publishing for Gender Studies in the Future 
In this panel, editorial members of the Atlantis will discuss the history of publishing gender studies in (what is known colonially as) the Canadian context. The journal has been publishing feminist scholarship since 1975, and as we gear up for our 50-year anniversary in 2025, we are taking stock of our history and taking back our future. With an emphasis on becoming a sought-after publishing site for scholarship in the field of gender and women’s studies, panelists will reflect on Atlantis’ past with an eye toward what possibilities lay ahead. The panel will include sharing the feedback we gathered about the role of Atlantis in Canadian gender studies from WGSRF members in our March 2023 WGSRF membership event.

Program

WOMEN’S AND GENDER STUDIES ET RECHERCHES FÉMINISTES
CONGRESS – ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2022
DATES: May 13-16, 2022

Conference Program
 
This year our annual conference is being held in partnership with the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences. If you would like to attend please register here. An early-bird fee is available until March 31st. Our program is in the final stages of finalization — stay tuned to our social media for updates, or become a member of WGSRF to recieve regular email communications! 

Note: All individuals whose papers were accepted to present at the annual WGSRF conference in 2020 that was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic are automatically accepted at the WGSRF conference in 2021. We ask that you inform us whether or not you wish to be included in this year’s program before January 20^th 2021 at wgsrf2020@gmail.com 

Call for Papers
Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes
May 29^th-June 1^st 2021 (Virtual Conference)

Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Alberta

Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes (WGSRF) invites proposals for papers, panels, roundtables, workshops or other creative formats that consider the possibilities and limits of the kinds of intersectional, transnational and interdisciplinary conversations and collaborations that characterize the broad fields of feminist and women’s and gender studies. Congress 2021 will be a virtual conference, so please keep that in mind as you prepare your submission.

We invite proposals that consider the following themes that connect to the Congress themes from 2020 of Building Bridges and for 2021 “Norther Relations”:

Theme 1: “Building Bridges”: What kinds of bridges are scholars in women’s and gender studies creating through their research? What bridges are or could be possible, in particular, given the ongoing impact of the global pandemic? In what ways can and should women’s and gender studies theories and projects challenge and/or re-imagine disciplinary divides as well as divisions between academia and community organizations and groups, and across different regions / territories? How can women’s and gender studies knowledges foster bridges with different communities beyond and within academia (community organizations and/or networks), artists, activists, as well as across academia, locally and transnationally? Who has laid the groundwork for women’s and gender studies bridge-making, who supports / what types of work support these bridges, how are they being strengthened or reinforced, and how is bridge-making being challenged? How and in what ways do or can women’s and gender studies support and/or connect with contemporary societal issues and/or social movements, such as Black Lives Matter, the TRC calls for action, disability justice, and the #metoo movement?

Theme 2: “Women’s and Gender Studies Methodologies: (Moving) From Divides to Collaborations”

Whose experiences and stories inform women’s and gender studies methodologies and research? Whose experiences and stories are missing or absent? Universities and research institutions in Canada are predominantly based in the south, how can women’s and gender studies work with and foster collaboration and build stronger Northern relations? What are new ways of doing research that breakdown divides between researchers, communities, artists, and activists? How do or can women’s and gender studies methodologies bring together different groups and practices to reflect on which stories are shared and inform knowledge production, which ways of listening and sharing stories do we and should we prioritize, and how we can collaborate to make change – within society at large as well as within universities with respect to decolonization, anti-racism, and social justice?

Theme 3: Racism in Academia

In response to the anti-Black racism at Congress 2019, relentless anti-Black kilings and police violence, and the everyday experiences of racism within academic institutions in Canada, we invite papers, presentations, and panels that confront anti-Blackness. How can we call out racism within academia, collaborate, and build bridges at all levels? How can individuals, networks, and associations be supported in their efforts to address racism, including microaggressions, Indigenization policies without decolonization frameworks, and/or Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion strategies and accountability, and the toll of emotional labour? What strategies can Black, Indigenous, and racialized scholars utilize and share in order to navigate and make change within academic institutions? How do academic, community, and other institutional partnerships foster critical spaces from which to address and challenge racism? How can we draw on anti-racist, decolonize, postcolonial, and transnational theories to address specificities of the contemporary moment and forms of racism?

Theme 4: Open Call: We also welcome proposals outside of the above themes that explore topics in the field of Women’s and Gender Studies in all of its articulations. Panel sessions and workshops are typically scheduled to be 75 minutes in length, and papers are expected to be approximately 8 – 9 double-spaced pages, or 15 – 20 minutes, for individual submissions. If you are proposing a workshop, please indicate if the expected time frame is different from typical scheduling.

Please submit a proposal in French or English including a panel, roundtable or paper title as well as a paper abstract of 250 words or less. We highly encourage panel or roundtable proposals and for panel or roundtable proposals please include a brief abstract as well as individual paper abstracts. Please make sure to include your name and email contact information on the proposal—proposals will be anonymized before review. Authors will be informed once a decision has been made about their proposal. Please send any questions about the conference to wgsrf2020@gmail.com.

Please submit proposals to: wgsrf2020@gmail.com

Please note that membership in the WGSRF is necessary to submit a proposal.  Membership rates are priced on a sliding scale and can be viewed here: https://www.wgsrf.com/membership.html

Deadline for submission: January 20^th, 2021.

Note: All individuals whose papers were accepted to present at the annual WGSRF conference in 2020 that was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic are automatically accepted at the WGSRF conference in 2021. We ask that you inform us whether or not you wish to be included in this year’s program before January 20^th 2021 at wgsrf2020@gmail.com 

Call for Papers
Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes
May 29^th-June 1^st 2021 (Virtual Conference)

Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Alberta

Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes (WGSRF) invites proposals for papers, panels, roundtables, workshops or other creative formats that consider the possibilities and limits of the kinds of intersectional, transnational and interdisciplinary conversations and collaborations that characterize the broad fields of feminist and women’s and gender studies. Congress 2021 will be a virtual conference, so please keep that in mind as you prepare your submission.

We invite proposals that consider the following themes that connect to the Congress themes from 2020 of Building Bridges and for 2021 “Norther Relations”:

Theme 1: “Building Bridges”: What kinds of bridges are scholars in women’s and gender studies creating through their research? What bridges are or could be possible, in particular, given the ongoing impact of the global pandemic? In what ways can and should women’s and gender studies theories and projects challenge and/or re-imagine disciplinary divides as well as divisions between academia and community organizations and groups, and across different regions / territories? How can women’s and gender studies knowledges foster bridges with different communities beyond and within academia (community organizations and/or networks), artists, activists, as well as across academia, locally and transnationally? Who has laid the groundwork for women’s and gender studies bridge-making, who supports / what types of work support these bridges, how are they being strengthened or reinforced, and how is bridge-making being challenged? How and in what ways do or can women’s and gender studies support and/or connect with contemporary societal issues and/or social movements, such as Black Lives Matter, the TRC calls for action, disability justice, and the #metoo movement?

Theme 2: “Women’s and Gender Studies Methodologies: (Moving) From Divides to Collaborations”

Whose experiences and stories inform women’s and gender studies methodologies and research? Whose experiences and stories are missing or absent? Universities and research institutions in Canada are predominantly based in the south, how can women’s and gender studies work with and foster collaboration and build stronger Northern relations? What are new ways of doing research that breakdown divides between researchers, communities, artists, and activists? How do or can women’s and gender studies methodologies bring together different groups and practices to reflect on which stories are shared and inform knowledge production, which ways of listening and sharing stories do we and should we prioritize, and how we can collaborate to make change – within society at large as well as within universities with respect to decolonization, anti-racism, and social justice?

Theme 3: Racism in Academia

In response to the anti-Black racism at Congress 2019, relentless anti-Black kilings and police violence, and the everyday experiences of racism within academic institutions in Canada, we invite papers, presentations, and panels that confront anti-Blackness. How can we call out racism within academia, collaborate, and build bridges at all levels? How can individuals, networks, and associations be supported in their efforts to address racism, including microaggressions, Indigenization policies without decolonization frameworks, and/or Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion strategies and accountability, and the toll of emotional labour? What strategies can Black, Indigenous, and racialized scholars utilize and share in order to navigate and make change within academic institutions? How do academic, community, and other institutional partnerships foster critical spaces from which to address and challenge racism? How can we draw on anti-racist, decolonize, postcolonial, and transnational theories to address specificities of the contemporary moment and forms of racism?

Theme 4: Open Call: We also welcome proposals outside of the above themes that explore topics in the field of Women’s and Gender Studies in all of its articulations. Panel sessions and workshops are typically scheduled to be 75 minutes in length, and papers are expected to be approximately 8 – 9 double-spaced pages, or 15 – 20 minutes, for individual submissions. If you are proposing a workshop, please indicate if the expected time frame is different from typical scheduling.

Please submit a proposal in French or English including a panel, roundtable or paper title as well as a paper abstract of 250 words or less. We highly encourage panel or roundtable proposals and for panel or roundtable proposals please include a brief abstract as well as individual paper abstracts. Please make sure to include your name and email contact information on the proposal—proposals will be anonymized before review. Authors will be informed once a decision has been made about their proposal. Please send any questions about the conference to wgsrf2020@gmail.com.

Please submit proposals to: wgsrf2020@gmail.com

Please note that membership in the WGSRF is necessary to submit a proposal.  Membership rates are priced on a sliding scale and can be viewed here: https://www.wgsrf.com/membership.html

Deadline for submission: January 20^th, 2021.

Please see below and attached the call for papers for the 2019 WGSRFAnnual Conference at University of British Columbia. 

**PLEASE NOTE: The deadline for conference abstracts has been extended to January 14, 2019**. 

Conference Dates: June 2-4, 2019

Coordinators Meeting: June 1, 2019

Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes Call for Papers

Challenging Conversations

Congrés des sciences humaines/Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences 2019

June 2-4, 2019*  University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia

Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes (WGSRF) calls for papers that build on the general theme for this year’s Congress meeting: “Circles of Conversation.”  We invite proposals for papers, panels or workshops that consider the possibilities and limits of the kinds of intersectional, transnational and interdisciplinary circles of conversation that characterize the field of women’s, feminist and gender studies.

Please note that membership in the WGSRF is necessary to submit a proposal.  Please obtain or renew your membership before you submit.

Membership rates are very reasonable, are priced on a sliding scale, and can be viewed here: https://www.wgsrf.com/membership.html

We are interested in proposals that consider the following themes:

Theme 1: “Collaborative Conversations” What kinds of collaborative conversations or projects are fostered or supported by perspectives and methodologies in women’s and gender studies? How do they challenge traditional power structures in decision-making and collaborations inside and outside of the academy? How do feminist theorizing and practice shape how we speak and listen? How does interdisciplinarity affect the ability to generate important conversations? Where does feminist thinking and organizing happen, and what impact do spaces of conversation have on the direction of the field? When and how do collaborations succeed or fail? How have diverse conversations between Francophone and Anglophone communities in women’s and gender studies shaped and changed the field?

Theme 2: “Open Circles” What ways of knowing are activists, practitioners and scholars currently prioritizing in their work and collaborative projects? How are they engaging ways of knowing that highlight the importance of embodiment, affect, and ongoing critiques/experiences of settler colonialism?  How have scholars and activists from fields such as disability studies, critical race studies, queer studies, trans studies and Indigenous studies challenged models of progress, intersectionality and productivity in feminist research and organizing? How does recent work on trauma open up new understandings of healing and living? 

Theme 3: “Conversations across Borders” How do conversations simultaneously traverse and contest borders? What are the important issues being highlighted by transnational feminist practitioners, scholars and activists? How do the global expansion of neoliberalism, privatization, and digital technologies open up new spaces and new needs for transnational alliances? Which voices are heard and on what basis within these conversations? How are alliances built and communities connected in circular rather than top down ways?  How is women’s and gender studies engaging with interdisciplinary interest in history and archiving?

Theme 4:  Open Call:  We also welcome proposals outside of the above themes that explore topics in the field of Women’s and Gender Studies in all of its articulations. 

Panel sessions and workshops are 90 minutes in length, and papers are expected to be 15 minutes in length. 

Please submit a proposal in French or English including: 1. a panel, workshop, roundtable or paper title, 2. a paper abstract of 250 words or less, 3. Name, contact information and affiliation (such as institutional, community, independent). We highly encourage panel, workshop or roundtable proposals and for panel, workshop or roundtable proposals please include a brief general abstract as well as individual paper abstracts.  Proposals will be anonymized before review.  Authors will be informed in early February 2019 once a decision has been made about their proposal.

Deadline for submission: **January 14, 2019**.  Please send proposals by email only, in Word format to: wgsrfcongress2019@gmail.com.  Please direct all conference related questions to this email.  Thank you!

*The WGSRF conference takes place from June 2-4^th, with the annual WGSRF coordinators meeting taking place on June 1^st at UBC

Conference Program