Speakers
Thursday 8 October
Annie Pullen Sansfaçon – Keynote
Annie Pullen Sansfaçon, is a full professor at the School of Social Work at the Université de Montréal, and holds Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Partnership Research and Empowerment of Vulnerable Youth (CRC-ReParE). This chair succeeds her former tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Transgender Children and Their Families (CRC-ETF) and aims to produce empirical, intersectional knowledge on the dynamics of social exclusion and inclusion of vulnerable youth, notably trans and non-binary youth and youth who detransition.
From 2023 to 2025, she was appointed as an Associate Vice-rector for First Peoples Relations in the Vice-President’s Office for Strategic Planning and Communications, and since September 2025, she has served as Deputy Vice-rector at the Vice-President office for Global Engagement and First People at the University of Montreal. She co-founded and co-directed, until 2026, the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Intersectional Justice, Decolonisation and Equity (CRI-JaDE) and has lead the development of a large network of researchers and partner organizations invested in questions related to gender diverse youth in the province of Quebec and beyond.
In her career, she has authored over 220 publications, including 7 books, 43 book chapters, over 120 peer-reviewed journal articles, and has contributed to research programs totaling over $50M CAD in-funded projects. She has been an Honorary Research Associate at Stellenbosch University in South Africa since 2017, and was induced to the College of the Royal Society of Canada in 2023.
Image by Amélie Philibert, Université de Montréal
Friday 9 October
Michael Barron – Keynote
Dr Michael Barron is a social scientist, activist and human rights researcher whose work focuses on how communities pushed to the margins build power, sustain each other, and shape public policy. Over more than three decades, he has worked across civil society, government and international organisations on LGBTQ+ rights, youth policy and social inequality.
He is the author of How Ireland’s LGBTQ+ Youth Movement Was Built: Civil Society in the Pursuit of Social Justice, which traces how self-organised communities drove major changes in Irish law and policy, including in the areas of equality, education and social reform. His work centres community knowledge, collective action and narrative as forces that can shift public debate and create lasting change.
Michael has played a central role in some of Ireland’s most significant social change movements, including marriage equality, education reform and the removal of structural discrimination in schools. He has advised bodies such as the Council of Europe and has led work on strengthening collaboration between government, philanthropy and civil society.
His current work focuses on protecting and rebuilding community power in a more difficult climate, including the rise of far-right mobilisation, disinformation and increasing pressure on minority-led advocacy.