Last Updated: Nov 6, 2014

opening address

Rupaleem Bhuyan 
Associate Professor
Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work
University of Toronto


Rupaleem Bhuyan is an Associate Professor in the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work at the University of Toronto. Since 1991, Dr. Bhuyan has been part of the anti-violence movement in North America as a peer-rape prevention educator, domestic violence and sexual assault advocate, community educator and community-based researcher. She has worked closely with indigenous, immigrant and refugee communities with a commitment to anti-oppressive and decolonizing community organizing and advocacy.  

Dr. Bhuyan is currently the principal investigator for the Migrant Mothers Project, a participatory action research project that works with a network of anti-violence against women organizations, legal advocates, and immigrant women in Toronto. This project builds upon Dr. Bhuyan’s previous research that examines how violence against women service providers respond to women with different types of immigration status: a) in women's shelters in Toronto (2009-2010), b) in sexual assault and relationship violence programs across Kansas (2007-2008), and within community based organizations that support South Asian immigrants in different regions of the United States (2005-2006).

Dr. Bhuyan has authored and contributed to numerous publications that appear in a range of journals including: Journal of Interpersonal Violence, The Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare and The Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies. She has also authored book chapters in Goldring, Luin and Patricia Landolt (2013)(Eds). Producing and negotiating non-citizenship: Precarious legal status in Canada; Lettie Lockhart and Fran Davis (2010) (Eds) Domestic violence: Intersectionality and culturally competent practice ; and Shamita Das Dasgupta (2007) (Ed.) Body Evidence: Intimate Violence against South Asian Women in America.  

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