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Jeffrey McNeil-Seymour

Assistant Professor
EducationBSW, MSW
OfficeEPH-208F
Phone416-979-5000, ext. 556271
Areas of ExpertiseDecolonizing social work practice; Two-spirit sur-thrivance; Indigenous land-based and spiritual pedagogies

Weyk’tp! I am a band member at Tk’emlúps te Secwepemc First Nation and a fourth-generation English settler and two-spirit. I am the nominated family member to the Traditional Family Governance Council for the Stk'emlupsemc te Secwepemc Nation as well as a speaker for my nation, as designate from Secwepemc Matriarchs and grassroots peoples. At the Faculty of Education and Social Work, Thompson Rivers University, I had the opportunity to groom the fourth-year core-required course for program completion, Decolonizing Social Work Practice, with Secwepemc land-based and spiritual pedagogies.

I regularly contribute to the international two-spirit community through writing, art and most recently provided expert witness testimony in Iqaluit, Nunavut for the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Inquiry of Canada. Other activisms I believe in are that without healthy land and water and air we don’t have people - ABSOLUTELY not only does social work have to incorporate land and water defense into our practice - but so should every human in this place called Canada nurture what stewardship means in this age of reconciliation.

Teaching responsibilities:

  • Decolonizing Anti-Oppressive Practice in Social Work
  • Master's Research Practice Seminar for Social Work
  • Aboriginal Peoples and Social Work Practice

Teaching interests:

  • Decolonizing gender and sexuality
  • Land-based pedagogies
  • Group work

  • Decolonizing the social work classroom
  • Resiliency factors for two-spirit people
  • Intergenerational survivors to sur-thrivors

Research projects:

  • Currently working on completion of a CIHR grant on the implications of the resurgence of ancestral knowledges of Secwepemc Elders and Knowledge Keepers/Makers as they improve health outcomes
  • Preparing a SSHRC Catalyst Grant to bring two-spirit scholars and grassroots peoples together via SSHRC Connections Grant
  • Preparing my doctoral studies package for the University of Saskatchewan's land-based pedagogy

  • McNeil-Seymour, J. (2018). “Two-Spirit is Markedly Different than LGBTQ.” In, Who’s Land is it Anyways? A Manual for Decolonization. Edited by Nicole Schabus. BC Teachers Federation.
  • Saewyk, E., Mounsey, B., Clark, N., McNeil-Seymour, J., Brunanski, D., Tsuruda, S., Smith, A. (2017). Homeless and Street-Involved Indigenous LGBTQS Youth in British Columbia: Intersectionality, challenges, resilience, and cues for action.
  • Institute for Culturally Restorative Practice. (2016). Thematics of Indigenous Development – The Middle Years. Fort Frances, Ontario: Simard, E., McNeil-Seymour, J., F. Simard.
  • McNeil-Seymour, J. (2015). “Cross-dancing as culturally restorative practice.” In Gender and Sexual Diversity: Social Work Practice, Policy, Research and Pedagogy, edited by Brian J. O’Neill. Toronto: Canadian Scholars Press Inc.
  • McNeil-Seymour, J.  (2014). “Indigenizing the Gay Agenda: A Note on Cultural Relativism and Homonationalism from the Colonial Margins.”  In, The Gay Agenda: Creating Space, Identity, and Justice, edited by Gerald Walton.  New York: Peter Lang Publishing.


Selected Publications & Presentations: 

Two-Spirit Man/Two-Spirit Woman Call Home the Salmon w/Help

My second art piece for a national gallery debuted at Never Apart in Montreal, Quebec.

Videography was shot on drone and two stationary cameras. The exhibit breaks Traditionalist's rules of recording ceremony. Two-spirit youth are the most at risk and this taboo was broken out of necessity. Videos were submitted as evidence to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Inquiry of Canada.

  • UREAP, Thompson Rivers University ne Secwepemc’ulw, 2012