Hélène Laperrière brings her nursing experience with Latin-American social movements, including with community-based organizations (women’s and sex workers’ associations, pastoral health-care workers, seamen’s club, coalition to fight AIDS, popular education) and with public and community health programs (leprosy and STBBI/AIDS prevention) in the states of Amazonas and Paraiba (Brazil), and with the relationship of multiethnic families to social services in Quebec (Canada). She completed postdoctoral studies in popular education in health at the Universidade Federal da Paraíba (Brazil, 2008). These engagements raised her consciousness of power verticality and internal colonization in international aid co-operation and globalization, as well as the methodological ambiguities of participatory approaches with civil society in public health. Professor Laperrière is co-ordinating the Niikaniganaw: All My Relations Indigenous research project, which aims to develop an Indigenous research perspective in the field. This project offers accessible, inclusive ceremonies for Indigenous people and those involved with them in an urban setting, in Ottawa-area sharing circles.
Professor Laperrière is accepting new students for thesis supervision.