Nayuk N. Mayuk is a non-binary queer feminist activist based in Turkey. Their work mainly focuses on shifting cis-heteropatriarchal narratives, creating safer and brave spaces for queers, weaving cross-border networks, and popularizing care practices among queer communities. Nayuk works as a community builder, coordinator, facilitator, researcher, and writer.
Nayuk began their activism journey as part of Lesbian Bisexual Feminists from 2015 to 2016. They acted as a community weaver for Les Universités d’Été Euroméditerranéennes des Homosexualités from 2016 to 2019. In 2020, Nayuk founded the Empowering Practices Initiative, which aims to make self-care and community care tools accessible to queer communities. They have been working independently and as part of civil society organizations for social transformation.
Traces of LBQ Movement in Turkey (2023) is a report Nayuk wrote for those who want to find out about current discussions and the history of the lesbian, bisexual, and queer movement in Turkey.
Rola Yasmine is a registered nurse and researcher living in Beirut and working on sexual politics, gender and reproductive justice, and movement building. Rola is also a Supervisory Board member for Mama Cash. Since 2014, Rola founded and has been the executive director of a non-profit called The A Project. The A Project works on advancing a queer feminist political discourse around sexual and reproductive health and rights, affirming agency and autonomy in sexuality politics and reproductive justice, while seeking alternatives to counteract medical patriarchy. Rola has a Master of Science degree in Sexual and Reproductive Health Research (2009) from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSTHM) in the UK and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (2007) from the American University of Beirut in Lebanon.
Dr. Angelique V. Nixon (she/her) is a Black queer feminist writer, artist, scholar, and activist. Born and raised in the Bahamas, she is currently based in Trinidad and Tobago. She is a sought-after speaker and facilitator on intersecting issues related to social and climate justice, migration, and sexual and LGBTQI+ rights, among others. She is a social justice educator, researcher, and community worker with over 20 years of experience and leadership in community-based organisations and teaching in academic institutions. Her research and creative work are available widely; she is author of two books – the poetry and art chapbook Saltwater Healing and the scholarly award-winning book Resisting Paradise: Tourism, Diaspora, and Sexuality in Caribbean Culture.
Angelique is a senior lecturer and researcher at the Institute for Gender and Development Studies (IGDS) at The University of the West Indies, St. Augustine. Her research and teaching areas include Caribbean and postcolonial studies, African diaspora literatures, gender and sexuality studies, tourism and diaspora studies, and transnational migrations. Angelique is very active in Caribbean movements for social justice and has developed several community-based projects to facilitate social change. Since 2009, Angelique has been co-director of the Caribbean IRN (a digital resource network on diverse genders and sexualities), which published two multi-media collections and organised digital archives/spaces to support Caribbean LGBTQI+ visibility and knowledge. Further since 2016, she has served as a working director of the feminist LGBTQI civil society (non-profit) organisation CAISO: Sex and Gender Justice in Trinidad and Tobago, where she spearheads operations, resource mobilisation, research, media, communications, and oversight of various programmes. Angelique is fiercely committed in all her work to intersectional queer feminist praxis, decolonial politics, climate and environmental justice, and Black liberation.
Paige Andrew is a queer Caribbean feminist from Trinidad and Tobago working toward sustainable social change through feminist practice and the co-creation of feminist realities alongside other members of the community at FRIDA, The Young Feminist Fund. She is a co-founder and past co-executive director at WE-Change, a LBQ women’s rights organisation based in Jamaica. Paige completed a MA in Communications and Development as a Fulbright Scholar (2018) at Ohio University and has conducted research on intimate partner violence within the LBTQ community in Jamaica, and queer representation in the media. Paige spends most of her time at work invested in disrupting systems towards funding movements in sustainable and joyful ways and much of the rest of her time exploring new cities and countries.
Eugenia Lopez Uribe is a queer feminist who has worked on sexual and reproductive rights of women and youth in rural and urban marginalized areas for more than 20 years. She holds an M.A. in Social and Political Studies from the National University (UNAM). She has worked with different institutions of the Mexican Ministry of Health, NGOs from the feminist and SRHR movements, academic, and international agencies. Eugenia was part of the funder group of abortion and youth advocates called Decidir (Choice: Youth Coalition for Sexual Citizenship). She was the executive director of the Mexican women’s rights organization Balance Promoción para el Desarrollo y Juventud A.C. for almost a decade.
She has extensive experience in community engagement with multiple groups, including young people, indigenous midwives, health promoters, women living with HIV, the LGBTQ community, human rights defenders, and communities affected by mining activities. She has been part of the Board of Fundación Arcoiris por el Respeto de la Diversidad Sexual (Mexico), an adviser for the Urgent Action Fund for Women of Latin America, and a member of ILGA. Eugenia is the Americas and Caribbean regional director at the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).
Renata is a Brazilian researcher and journalist focused on human rights, feminist philanthropy and social justice. She is an intersectional feminist interested in building trust relations and generous connections to shift the power. She has a transdisciplinary educational background – Gender Studies, Communication and Culture, History, Sociology – and experience with grantmaking and social justice philanthropy. She collaborates with networks and spaces for exchange and sharing about communication for rights, race, gender, territory, creative activism and social change. You can find some of her writing and ideas here: https://renatacompartilha.medium.com/
Gabriela has a bachelor’s degree in economics, specializing in Social and Community Economy. She then studied Management and Control of Public Policies, Comprehensive Sexual Education and is currently pursuing her master’s degree in Gender Studies and Policies. She co-leads GPESI, a group of youth promoters of comprehensive sexual education, and co-leads Libertate, a social organization that seeks to generate transformations in organizations with a focus on valuing diversity, disability, and gender perspective. At the same time, she is a teacher, part of the Frida Funds advisory committee, and fellow of the Open Society Foundations in its Young Feminists Program in 2019, and fellow of Yunus and Youth, rethinking an economic system with social, climate, and gender issues at the center.
Félix Endara is a New York-based bilingual creative professional who works in private philanthropy resourcing feminist movements around the world. As an independent filmmaker supporting the production and distribution of authentic and accountable storytelling, his films have screened at prestigious film festivals such as Berlinale, SXSW, DOC NYC, Outfest, and Mill Valley. Félix is Chair of the Board of Working Films, an organization that brings together documentary filmmakers and grassroots activists to advance social justice. He is also the Co-Chair of the Trans/Intersex Task Force within the Global Philanthropy Project, a membership organization of funders whose goal is to expand global philanthropic support to LGBTQI communities globally. He has served on selection committees for Art for Justice, Creative Capital, J.M. Kaplan Fund, National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures, and the Open Society Foundations, among many others. An alum of the Art of Leadership program at the Rockwood Leadership Institute, he is a current Hispanics in Philanthropy Lideres Fellow and an Impact Partners Producers Fellow. Félix has an M.A in Media Studies from the New School for Social Research.
Rebecca Nyuei has been actively engaged in advocating for LGBTIQ+ rights since 2014, with a particular focus on addressing discrimination and human rights violations against transgender women in Indonesia. In September 2019, she became a co-founder of Jaringan Transgender Indonesia (JTID), a national level coordination platform for the transgender community.
Currently, Becca is a full-time staff member for Free To Be Program across Southeast Asia countries at Humanis Foundation (Affiliated with Hivos), an international development organization. Previously, she worked for Sanggar Swara, Jakarta-based young transgender women organization. During this period, she successfully managed various programs, for instance, Transchool, an alternative school for transgender women. Lastly, she is intensely interested in sustainable development, economic empowerment, macro-social interventions, and impact measurement.
Rima Athar is a collaborative leader, facilitator, and educator committed to advancing the rights of women, girls, and 2SLGBTIQ+ people globally. For over 15 years, she has worked with community-led teams from all regions of the world, to propel advocacy efforts on issues of sexual and bodily autonomy, gender-based violence, labour rights, business and human rights, and more. This includes with the transnational solidarity network Women Living Under Muslim Laws (WLUML), the Association for Progressive Communications Women’s Rights Program (APC-WRP), and as the executive director of the Coalition for Sexual and Bodily Rights in Muslim Societies (CSBR).
More recently, Rima coordinated city-wide consultations that gathered over one thousand residents’ input to inform the City of Toronto’s forthcoming Gender Equity Strategy. She also facilitated the Toronto Strong Neighbourhoods Strategy Advisory Group’s community-based research on best practices for resident engagement in neighbourhood development.
Currently, Rima provides a range of support services to civic, social, and philanthropic organizations through her consulting practice. In her spare time, she enjoys going on adventures, hanging with her loved ones, swimming in the sea, and soaking up nature’s beauty.
