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Who We Are

Benji Nothwehr is a queer, trans, and disabled researcher. They are passionate about documenting and archiving activist movements and marginalized histories in order to challenge dominant historical narratives and create connection between historical movements and activists of today. Their work on this project has included researching histories of feminist activism at McGill University, interviewing student activists, digitizing student activist materials, and building the archive's database and website. They have also been involved with activism related to queer/trans issues and prison abolition.

Nina Morena is a PhD student in Communication Studies at McGill University. Her doctoral research explores the digital information practices of young people with metastatic breast cancer. She is particularly interested in intersections of gender and illness and how medical misinformation travels through platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. Her work on this project has included thematically organizing student activist interviews, assisting with locating archive materials, and co-authoring an article about the experiences and effects of student activism based on interview findings.

Kate Ellis is a queer, autistic researcher, who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Gender, Sexuality, Feminist, and Social Justice Studies at McGill University. They are currently working on their honours thesis, which focuses on the intersection between anti-autistic ableism and transphobia in materials created by UK pressure group Transgender Trend. They are also a former student journalist. Their work on the project has included compiling French-language materials, the development of internal procedures for the archive, and the creation of the governance structures page.

Emma Blackett has a PhD in Communications Studies at McGill University. She did undergraduate and masters degrees in Media Studies at the University of Auckland in Aotearoa/New Zealand, with research focusing on the intersections between whiteness, feminism, and right-wing politics. Working now with queer theory, affect theory, and psychoanalysis, she studies white feminist cultural production about climate crises in settler-colonial contexts. Her work on this project has included compiling and tagging archive materials, research on archive models, and building the glossary.

Catherine Plawutsky is a queer disabled researcher. She recently graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Gender, Sexuality, Feminist, and Social Justice Studies and Philosophy at McGill University. Their honours thesis looked at the protocols for responding to barriers to mobilization in student organization training manuals. Additionally, she has been involved in undergraduate publications as an editor, copyeditor, author, and, most recently, editor-in-chief of the feminist studies journal, Intersections. Their work on this project has included going through student press and organizations' materials for the archive, compiling metadata for each item, and writing internal documentation.


Carrie Rentschler is an Associate Professor in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies and an Associate Member of the Institute for Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies at McGill University.  She researches feminist movements, social media and mobile networking technologies, and the politics of response, witnessing, and care around gender violence. She is the author of Second Wounds: Victims’ Rights and the Media (Duke UP, 2011) and co-editor of Girlhood and the Politics of Place (Berghahn Books, 2016). This digital archive emerges from her work as principal investigator on a project on student activism against gender violence and histories of the student press and student media. She has overseen the historical, documentary and interview-based research for the project, and participates in all dimensions of its development. She is a former undergraduate and graduate student activist, and feminist anti-violence educator. 

The Feminist SNAP Archive emerged from research that we conducted as part of iMPACTS: Collaborations to Address Sexual Violence on Campus, a SSHRC-funded grant that seeks to investigate responses to campus sexual violence through partnerships in the fields of education, law, policy, arts, popular culture, and news and social media. The grant aims to produce evidence-based research, publications, workshops, and other interventions that will inform sustainable curriculum and policy change. More information can be found here.