Alexandre Baril (born 1979 in Granby, Quebec), is a Canadian researcher and writer and since 2018 an associate professor at the School of Social Work, at the University of Ottawa. His work, carried out from an intersectional perspective, is situated at the crossroads of gender, queer, trans, disability/crip/Mad studies, critical gerontology and critical suicidology. He has also published and researched sexual and gender diversity, bodily diversity ((dis)ability and health), and linguistic diversity.
Biography Baril attended the Université de Sherbrooke, earning a BA in philosophy with a minor in theology (2000–2003) as well as an MA in philosophy (2003–2005) from the Department of Philosophy and Applied Ethics. He received the highest distinction for his thesis, titled: Judith Butler and Postmodern Feminism: A Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis of a Controversial School of Thought,Baril, A. (2005)."Judith Butler et le féminisme postmoderne : analyse théorique et conceptuelle d'un courant controversé", Mémoire de maîtrise (Master's thesis), Université de Sherbrooke, 241 pages. and has since published many articles on Judith Butler's political philosophy based on this work. After completing his master's degree, Baril pursued a doctoral degree in philosophy (2006–2010) from the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) where he completed all program requirements other than the dissertation. He then went to the University of Ottawa to begin a second doctorate in women's studies (2010–2013) at the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies. His dissertation, titled: Bodily Normativity Under the Knife: (Re)thinking Intersectionality and Solidarities Between Feminist, Trans, and Disability Studies Through Transsexuality and TransabilityBaril, A. (2013). La normativité corporelle sous le bistouri, Thèse (Ph.D.), Institut d'études des femmes, Université d'Ottawa, 485 pages., Nov 13, 2013. earned him the highest distinction and the Pierre Laberge prize, awarded to the best dissertation in the humanities.
From 2014 to 2015, he secured a postdoctoral fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). He pursued his postdoctoral research in the United-States, at the City University of New York and at Wesleyan University. This research, conducted with sociologist Victoria Pitts-Taylor, focused on the sociology of the body and the sociology of social movements. During this period, Baril was appointed assistant professor at the University of Ottawa's School of Social Work in 2018, where he teaches and researches intersectionality and diversity, including gender, disability, and linguistic diversity. Several media outlets reported him as the first Francophone trans person hired by a Canadian university to teach gender and sexual diversity in French. Gagnon, C.-A. (2017). ''Défendre la diversité : Alexandre Baril'', Personnalité de la semaine Radio-Canada/Le Droit, Le Droit, 4 décembre.Vachet, B. (2017). Interviewé et cité dans l’article : ''Alexandre Baril trace la voie de la reconnaissance transgenre francophone'', #ONFR TFO 25 novembre.''Personnalité de la semaine Radio-Canada / Le Droit : Alexandre Baril'', Émission « Les matins d’ici », Interviewé par Philippe Marcoux, ICI Radio-Canada Première Ottawa-Gatineau, 4 décembre, (10 minutes).
Career
Baril is an activist and public speaker for the rights of trans people, people living with disabilities, and those with suicidal thoughts.Baril, A. (2018). "Les personnes suicidaires peuvent-elles parler? Théoriser l’oppression suicidiste à partir d’un modèle socio-subjectif du handicap", Numéro : Prise en charge du suicide : entre crime, troubles mentaux et droit à mourir, Criminologie, 51, 2, p. 189–212.Baril, A. (2018)."Hommes trans et handicapés : une analyse croisée du cisgenrisme et du capacitisme'', Numéro spécial : Sexualité et handicap : une approche par les sciences sociales, Genre, Sexualité & Société, 19, p. 1–26.Baril, A. (2017). ''The Somatechnologies of Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying Law: LGBTQ Discourses on Suicide and the Injunction to Live", Numéro : Sexuality in Canada, Somatechnics, 7, 2, p. 201–217.Baril, A. (2015). "Needing to Acquire a Physical Impairment/Disability: (Re)thinking the Connections Between Trans and Disability Studies Through Transability", Numéro : New Conversations in Feminist Disability Studies, Hypatia: Journal of Feminist Philosophy, 30, 1, p. 30–48. In media interviews, Baril has described the violence and discrimination experienced by trans and marginalized people.Baril, A. (2017). ''Interview avec Alexandre Baril'', Interview filmée dans le cadre de l’émission Les matins d’ici, Le Téléjournal Ottawa-Gatineau, Radio-Canada, 4 décembre 2017. He denounces the social inequalities endured by these communities and shares solutions to put an end to them.Baril, A. (2018). ''Société de l’aveu, cis-tème de l’aveu : Repenser le consentement à la lumière de la diffusion d’images intimes de personnes trans* dans les médias'', GLAD! Revue sur le langage, le genre, les sexualités, 5
The French-language neologisms he has translatied, coined and used (cisnormativité, cisgenrenormativité, transcapacité, suicidisme, etc.) represent contributions to many fields of study, including trans, gender, and (dis)ability studies, as well as critical suicidology. More specifically, Baril translated and was one of the first scholars to use terms such as cisgenderism, cissexism, cis privilege, and transfeminism in French.Espineira, Karine (2022). «Enjeux et tensions entre savoirs trans et savoirs sur les trans : Savoirs situés et injustices épistémiques», dans Thérèse Courau, Julie Jarty et Nathalie Lapeyre (dir.), Le genre des sciences. Approches épistémologiques et enjeux contemporains, Lormont, Les éditions du bord de l’eau, p. 121-132.Cloutier, Aimé (2018). Vers un matérialisme trans : conceptualiser ce que vivent les personnes trans, Université du Québec à Montréal, 160 pages. En ligne. <https://archipel.uqam.ca/11307/> He is credited by several scholars for having coined and conceptualized the term "transitude", inspired by (but different from) the notion of "transness" in English.Lavoie, Kévin (2024). «Travail social, diversité sexuelle et pluralité des genres», dans Daniel Turcotte, Jean-Pierre Deslauriers et Jean-Martin Deslauriers (dir.), Introduction au travail social, Québec, Presses de l’Université Laval, p. 389-401.
Awards In December 2017, Baril was awarded the title of Personality of the Week by Radio-Canada (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) for his involvement in the media after being hired by the University of Ottawa. As is mentioned in several interviews and articles,Baril, A. (2017). ''Trouble dans l’identité de genre : le transféminisme et la subversion de l’identité cisgenre. Une analyse de la sous-représentation des personnes trans* professeur-es dans les universités canadiennes'', Numéro : Le renouveau du féminisme dans la philosophie francophone : redécouverte et nouveaux horizons, Philosophiques : la revue de la Société de Philosophie du Québec, 44, 2, p. 285–317. Baril is the first trans person to be hired by a Canadian university to teach gender and sexual diversity in French.Baril, A. (2017). ''Briser le plafond de verre pour les personnes trans!'', Éditorial publié dans l’édition QC du HuffPost, The Huffington Post, 20 novembre.
In 2011, Baril received the Lana St-Cyr Award from the Aide aux transsexuels et transsexuelles du Québec (ATQ) in recognition of the major role he played in organizing the first trans protest in Quebec history on June 17, 2010, in Montreal. At the time, Baril was involved in PolitiQ-queer solidaire, an activist group fighting against all forms of heterosexist and cissexist oppression and exclusion in Quebec. Nearly 200 people gathered for the 2010 demonstration, which included community organizations advocating for the rights of trans people and leading public figures from legal, academic, and political sectors. The protesters demanded changes be made to Quebec's existing regulations requiring those seeking gender marker changes to their civil status to undergo forced sterilization, as well as more accessible ways of changing one's name.
Moreover, Baril has been awarded several other research awards such as the Francophone CDSA-ACEH (Canadian Disability Studies Association) Tanis Doe Award for Canadian Disability Study and Culture (2020) and the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion President’s Award at the University of Ottawa (2021). His most recent book,"Undoing Suicidism: A Trans, Queer, Crip Approach to Rethinking (Assisted) Suicide" has won two awards, the International Association of Autoethnography and Narrative Inquiry’s Outstanding Book Award (Honorable Mention) (2024) and the International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry (ICQI) Qualitative Book Award (2025).
In 2025, Baril was awarded the King Charles III Coronation Medal for his contributions to Canada through his academic research and his service to marginalized groups in Canada.
Research Baril is described as one of the first trans researchers in Canada to publish work on trans issues from a transactivist perspective in the French language. His first article on trans issues, published in 2009, is titled: Transsexualité et privilèges masculins : fiction ou réalité? (Transsexuality and Male Privilege: Fact or Fiction?).Baril, A. (2009). ''Transsexualité et privilèges masculins : fiction ou réalité?'', dans L. Chamberland, B. Frank et J.L. Ristock (dir.). Diversité sexuelle et constructions de genre, Québec, Presses de l’Université du Québec, p. 263-295. Nonetheless, obtaining his doctorate and over the span of his career thus far, Baril's research interests have expanded and he has published on a variety of topics such as disability, trans issues, queer theory, dementia and aging, and more recently, suicide. He is particularly known for having developed and translated (to French) concepts that theorize and address forms of injustice and oppression experienced by marginalized groups (disabled folks, trans folks, 2SLGBTQI+ folks, suicidal folks, etc.). His conceptual contributions are further defined and detailed in the sections below.