Living in a Liminal Space: The Experiences of French-Speaking 2SLGBTQQIA+ Manitobans

This webinar was part of the City of Winnipeg’s Awareness & Action Speaker Series on October 19, 2022.

French-speaking 2SLGBTQQIA+ Manitobans find themselves at the intersection of a double minority: they are both a sexual/gender, and Manitoba’s official language minority community. In 2020, the Collectif LGBTQ* du Manitoba initiated a first-of-its-kind in Western Canada research study, in collaboration with Université de Saint-Boniface, to garner a better understanding of those who make up this double minority, namely their sociodemographic profile, their experiences of discrimination and stigmatization, and their needs in terms of healthcare and social services. The resulting report, Living in a Liminal Space: the Experiences of French-Speaking 2SLGBTQQIA+ Manitobans (2021), by Kevin Prada, Danielle de Moissac, Ndeye Rokhaya Gueye, and the Collectif LGBTQ* du Manitoba, presents a first glimpse into the unique needs and experiences of this population, proposing key avenues for consideration both by decision makers and by the general public alike. The main author, Kevin Prada, will provide an overview of this study's key findings, as well as some avenues for discussion for the community of Winnipeg. A reflection on the notion of intersectionality will also be presented.

Biography:
Kevin Prada is a queer researcher and psychology honours student at the University of Manitoba, whose research focuses on marginalized populations, namely 2SLGBTQQIA+ and official language minority populations in Canada. Through the lens of intersectionality, he is investigating the compounding minority identities that affect each person's unique experiences and needs, to level systemic inequity and favour each person's wellbeing. He intends to pursue graduate studies in clinical psychology, aiming to serve queer youth and other marginalized populations in Winnipeg, in a trauma-informed clinical setting. Currently, his contributions to the literature include a novel analysis of the needs and experiences of discrimination of French-speaking 2SLGBTQQIA+ peoples in Manitoba (a first of its kind in Western Canada), research among official language minority communities, and also the mental health and risk-taking behaviours of postsecondary students.