Andrea Doucet

Distinguished Professor, Sociology and Women’s and Gender Studies; Former Canada Research Chair in Gender, Work, and Care (2011-2025)

Office: STH 410
905-688-5550 x3150
[email protected]

Education:
PhD, Social and Political Sciences, Cambridge University
MA, International Development Studies, Norman School of International Relations, Carleton University
BA Political Science (Political Theory) York University

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Andrea Doucet is a Distinguished Professor in Sociology and the Centre for Women’s and Gender Studies, Honorary Professor at University College London (UCL), Adjunct Professor in Sociology at Carleton University and the University of Victoria, and a former Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Gender, Work, and Care (2011-2025). She is an interdisciplinary scholar and qualitative researcher whose work bridges critical sociology, feminist philosophies, feminist methodologies and epistemologies, political and social theories, and ecological theories and philosophies. She is a founding member of the Brock Social Justice Research Institute and a faculty affiliate with the Social Justice and Equity Studies program. She supervises graduate students in Critical Sociology and Social Justice and Equity Studies.

All of her work centers, in different ways, on varied dimensions of care — as everyday work and activities, care policies and services, connections between paid work and unpaid care work, care time, care as part of methodologies and epistemologies, ethics of care and justice, and interconnections between human and ecological caregiving and care receiving. Most of her writing, research, and mentoring focuses on re-thinking what care is in diverse contexts, how to measure care and care work, issues of care and human subjectivities, and what inclusive and integrated care/work policies might look like for diverse people, families, and communities.

Andrea regularly consults with governments and national and international organizations on care matters and writes Op Eds and essays for non-academic audiences. She is the co-coordinator of the International Network of Leave Policies and Research, a global think tank of social policy experts from over 50 countries; Project Director and Principal Investigator of the SSHRC Partnership program, Reimagining Care/Work Policies; and Director of the Research Studio for Narrative, Visual and Digital Methods. You can learn more about her work at andreadoucet.com

Research Interests

  • care and work policies, practices, and concepts;
  • care/work policies, especially parental leave and care leave policies;
  • qualitative research and qualitative data analysis
  • fathering and care;
  • genealogies of concepts;
  • responsible knowledge production;
  • feminist ecological ethico-onto-epistemologies;
  • reflexivity;
  • Listening Guide narrative analysis approach.

Selected Publications

Books published or in press

  • Gilligan, C., Mauthner, N., & Doucet, A. (In press, 2026). The Routledge International Handbook on The Listening Guide Method: A Feminist Relational Approach. London: Routledge. Delivery Date: July 1, 2025.
  • Doucet, A. and Moss, P. (In press, 2026). Care Leaves and Care Time for All: Towards Caring Democracies, Economies and Worlds. Policy Press.
  • McHugh, N. A. and Doucet, A. (Eds). (2021). Thinking Responsibly, Thinking Ecologically: The Legacies of Lorraine Code. New York: State University of New York (SUNY) Press.
  • Doucet, A. (2018). Do Men Mother? Fathering, Care, Parental Responsibilities (Second revised and expanded edition). Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
  • Siltanen J., and Doucet, A. (2017). Gender Relations in Canada: Intersectionalities and Social Change. Toronto: Oxford University Press.
  • Siltanen J., and Doucet, A. (2008). Gender Relations in Canada: Intersectionality and Beyond. Toronto: Oxford University Press.
  • Doucet, A. (2006). Do Men Mother? Fathering, Care and Domestic Responsibilities. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. (Awarded the John Porter Tradition of Excellence Book Award, from the Canadian Sociology Association).

Editor or co-editor of special issues (or thematic sections) of journals

  • Doucet, A. (2023). Time use studies, time, temporality, and measuring care. Time & Society, 32(4), 361–460.
  • Twamley, K., Doucet, A. and Schmidt, E.M. (2021). Relationality in family and intimate practices. Families, Relationships and Societies, 10(1).
  • Doucet, A., Dobrotic, I., Haas, L. and McKay, L. (2020). Assessing and measuring the impacts of parental leave policies: Intersectionality, policy entanglements, and conceptual and methodological complexities. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 40(5/6), 425–526.
  • Doucet, A. (2018). Canadian Review of Sociology: Special Issue on Canadian Visual Methodologies and Visual Sociology. 55(2), 163–165.
  • Cook, N., Doucet, A. and J. Rowsell (2017). Studies in Social Justice: Special issue on Visual Methodologies and Social Justice. 11(2), 187–346.
  • Doucet, A. and Siltanen, J. (Eds) (2017). Canadian Review of Sociology: Themed Section on Committing Sociology: Methodological and Epistemological Reflections. 54(3), 360–381.
  • Cattapan, A., Doucet, A., Lee, R. and McKay, L. (2016). Studies in Social Justice: Special Issue on Consuming Intimacies: Bodies, Labour, Care, and Social Justice. 10(2), 194–362.
  • Bezanson, K., Doucet, A. and Albanese, P. (2015). Canadian Review of Sociology: Themed Section on Critical feminist sociologies of families, work, and care. 52(2), 201–240.
  • Doucet, A., Edwards, R., and Furtsenberg, F. (2009) (Eds.) Annals of the Social and Political Sciences: Special issue on Fathering across Diversity and Adversity.

Recent journal articles (2016-2025)
* Indicates co-authorship with students, postdoctoral fellows, or community peer researchers.

  • Doucet, A., Jewell, E., and Falk, J. (2025). Deep Listening, Slow Relationships, World-making: Indigenous and Feminist Ecological Reflections on the Listening Guide and the Live Methods Manifesto. The Sociological Review (Special Issue on Live Methods Revisited), Online First.
  • Doucet, A. and Klostermann, J. (2024). What and how are we measuring when we research gendered divisions of domestic labour? Remaking the Household Portrait method into a Care/Work Portrait. Sociological Research Online, 29(1), 243-263. (Postdoctoral fellow).
  • *de Laat, K., Doucet, A., and Gerhardt, A. (2023). More than employment policies? Parental leaves, flexible work and fathers’ participation in unpaid care work. Community, Work & Family, 26(5), 562–584. (Student).
  • *Goddard-Durant, S., Doucet, A., Tizaa H., and Sieunarine, J.A. (2023) “I don’t have the energy”: Racial stress, young Black motherhood, and Canadian social policies. Canadian Review of Sociology, 60(4), 542–566.
    • Top 10% most viewed papers in 2023 by Canadian Review of Sociology.
  • Doucet, A. (2023). Care is not a tally sheet: Rethinking the field of Gender Divisions of Domestic Labour with care-centric conceptual narratives. Families, Relationships and Societies, 12(1), 10–30.
  • Kurowska, A., Barardehi, I., Fuller, S., Petts, R., Kaufman G., Doucet, A., et al. (2022). Familydemic cross country and gender dataset on work and family Outcomes during COVID-19 Pandemic. Scientific Data, 10(2).
  • Doucet, A. (2022). “Time is not time is not time”: A feminist ecological approach to clock time, process time, and care responsibilities, Time and Society, 32(4), 434–460.
  • *Goddard-Durant, S., Doucet, A., Tizaa H., and Sieunarine, J.A. (2022). A decolonizing, intersectional, Black feminist approach to young Black Caribbean-Canadian mothers’ resilience. Journal of Family Studies, 29(1), 1–21. (Postdoctoral fellow, student, peer researcher).
  • *Jewell, E., Doucet, A., Falk, J, and Hilston, K. (2022). “Looking after our own is what we do”: Urban Ontario Indigenous perspectives on juggling paid work and unpaid care work for adult family members. Wellbeing, Space & Society, 3(4). (Postdoctoral fellow, student, peer researcher).
  • Doucet, A. (2021). Socially inclusive parenting leaves and parental benefit entitlements: Rethinking care and work binaries. Social Inclusion, 9(2), 227–237.
  • Doucet, A. (2021). What does Rachel Carson have to do with family sociology and family policies? Ecological relational ontologies and crossing social imaginaries. Families, Relationships and Societies, 10(1), 11–31.
  • Doucet, A., and Armstrong, P. (2021). A conversation with Pat Armstrong about “Creative Teamwork: Developing Rapid Site-Switching Ethnography”. Families, Relationships and Societies, 10(1), 179–188.
  • *Goddard-Durant, S., Sieunarine, J.A. and Doucet, A. (2021). Decolonizing research with Black communities: Developing equitable and ethical relationships between stakeholders. Families, Relationships and Societies, 10(1), 189–196. (Postdoctoral fellow, student, peer researcher).
  • Jewell, E., Doucet, A., Falk, J., and Fyke, S. (2020). Social knowing, mental health, and the importance of Indigenous resources: A case study of Indigenous employment engagement in Southwestern Ontario. Canadian Review of Social Policy, 80, 1-25. (Postdoctoral fellow, student, peer researcher).
  • *Doucet, A., Mathieu, S., and McKay, L. (2020). Reconceptualizing parental leave benefits in COVID-19 Canada: From employment policy to care and social protection policy. Canadian Public Policy, 46(3), S272–S286. (Postdoctoral fellow).
  • *Mathieu, S. McKay, L. and Doucet, A. (2020). Parental leave and intra-regime differences in a liberal country: The case of four Canadian provinces. Canadian Journal of Sociology, 45(2), 169–194. (Postdoctoral fellow).
  • Doucet, A. and McKay, L. (2020). Fathering, parental leave, impacts, and gender equality: What/how are we measuring? International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 40(5/6), pp. 441–463.
  • Doucet, A. (2020). Father involvement, care, and breadwinning: Genealogies of concepts and revisioned conceptual narratives. Genealogy, 4(1), 1–17.
  • Doucet, A. (2018). ‘… Casting our lot with some ways of life and not others’: Epistemic reflexivity, diffraction, epistemic responsibilities. Canadian Review of Sociology (Committing Sociology thematic section on: “Value-Neutral and Value-Oriented Epistemologies of the Social: A Conversation Across Difference”). 55(2), 302–304.
  • Doucet, A. (2018). Decolonizing family photographs: Ecological imaginaries and non-representational ethnographies. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 47(6), 729–757.
  • McKay, L., Mathieu, S., and Doucet, A. (2016). Parental-leave rich and parental-leave poor? In/Equality in Canadian Labour-Market based Leave Policies. Journal of Industrial Relations, 58(4), 543–562. (Postdoctoral fellows).
  • Doucet, A. (2016). Is the stay-at-home dad (SAHD) a feminist concept? A genealogical, relational, and feminist critique. Sex Roles, 75(4), 4–14.

Recent book and handbook chapters (2016-2025)

  • Doucet, A. (2025). The who, what, and how of care in caring fatherhood: An ecological care ethics approach. In P. Eerole, H. Pirskanen, P. Romara-Balsas, and K. Twamley (Eds.)., Caring Fathers in the Global Context: Practices, Policies, and Children’s Perspectives. Springer.
  • Doucet, A., Jewell, E. and Watts, V. (2024). Indigenous and feminist ecological reflections on feminist care ethics: Encounters of care, absence, punctures, and offerings. In S. Bourgault, M. Fitzgerald, and F. Robinson (Eds.), Decentering Epistemologies and Challenging Privilege: Critical Care Ethics Perspectives. (pp. 109-127). New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press (equally co-authored).
  • Doucet, A., and Duvander, A.Z. (2022). Grappling with conceptual and methodological complexities in measuring parental leave designs and impacts. In I. Dobrotić, S. Blum, and A. Koslowski (Eds.), Research Handbook on Leave Policy. Edward Elgar.
  • Doucet. A., (2022) “Confront[ing] the suspicion” and “embodied embedded”: New materialism, relational ontologies, and fathering bodies. In U. Mellström and B. Pease (Eds.)., Beyond Anthropocentric Masculinities: Posthumanism, New Materialism and the Man Question (pp. 85–98). Routledge.
  • *Goddard-Durant, S., Doucet, A., Sieunarine, J.A., (2022). “If you’re going to work with Black people, you have to think about these things!” Fostering an ethical process in research with Black communities. In C. Burkholder, F. Aladajebi, and J. Schwab Cartas (Eds.), Leading and Listening to Community: Facilitating Qualitative, Arts-Based & Visual Research for Social Change. (pp. 17-32). Routledge. (Postdoctoral fellow and community-based researcher).
  • Doucet, A. (2021). A murex, an angel wing, the wider shore: An ecological and politico-ethico-onto-epistemological approach to narratives, stories, and testimonies. In N.A. McHugh and A. Doucet (Eds.), Thinking Responsibly, Thinking Ecologically: The Legacies of Lorraine Code. (pp. 93-128). State University of New York Press.
  • Code, L. with Doucet, A. and McHugh, N.A. (2021). “I am a part of all that I have met”: A conversation with Lorraine Code on “knowledge processes and the responsibilities of knowing”. In N.A. McHugh and A. Doucet (Eds.), Thinking Responsibly, Thinking Ecologically: The Legacies of Lorraine Code. (pp. 303-324). State University of New York Press.
  • *Doucet, A., McKay, L. and S. Mathieu (2019). Reimagining parental leave: A conceptual ‘thought experiment’. In P. Moss, A.Z. Duvander, and A. Koslowski (Eds.), Parental Leave and Beyond: Recent Developments, Current Issues, Future Directions (pp. 333–352). Bristol: Policy Press. (Postdoctoral fellows).
  • Doucet, A. (2018). Revisiting and remaking the Listening Guide: An ecological and ontological narrativity approach to analyzing fathering narratives. In A. Humble & E. Radina (Eds.), How Qualitative Data Analysis Happens: Moving Behind ‘Themes Emerged’. (pp. 80–94). London, UK: Taylor and Francis.
    • Book awarded the 2020 Anselm Strauss Award for Qualitative Family Research.
  • Doucet, A. (2018). Shorelines, seashells, and seeds: Feminist epistemologies, ecological thinking, and relational ontologies. In F. Dépelteau (Ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of Relational Sociology (pp. 375–392). London: Macmillan.
  • Doucet, A. (2018). Feminist epistemologies and ethics: Ecological thinking, situated knowledges, epistemic responsibilities. In R. Iphofen and M. Tolich (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research Ethics (pp. 73–88). London: Sage.

Op eds, research briefs, podcasts, publications for wider audiences (2016-2025)

Recent policy reports (2016-2025)

  • 2024 *Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay, L., Mathieu, S., Ragued, S., Thompson, K. and Tremblay, D.G. (2024) ‘Canada country note’, in Blum, S., Dobrotić, I., Kaufman, G., Koslowski, A. and Moss, P. (eds.) International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2024 (pp. 123-148).
  • 2023 *Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay, L., Mathieu, S., Ragued, S., Thompson, K. and Tremblay, D.G. (2023) ‘Canada country note’, in Blum, S., Dobrotić, I., Kaufman, G., Koslowski, A. and Moss, P. (eds.) International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2023 (pp. 155-182).
  • 2022 *Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay, L., Mathieu, S., Ragued, S., Thompson, K., and Tremblay, D.G. (2022). Canada country note. In Koslowski, A., Blum, S., Dobrotić, I., Kaufman, G., and Moss, P. (eds.) International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2022 (pp. 143-169).
  • 2021 Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay, L., and Tremblay, D.G. (2021). Canada country note. In Koslowski, A., Blum, S., Dobrotić, I., Kaufman, G., and Moss, P. (Eds.), International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2021 (pp. 143-175).
  • 2021 *Goddard-Durant, S., Doucet, A., Tizaa, H., Sieunarine, J.A., Moore, K. and Bobwa, P. (2022). “I Have Two Strikes Against Me – I’m Young and I’m Black”: A Report on the Experiences and Needs of Young Black Caribbean-Canadian Mothers in Toronto. Brock University. (Postdoctoral fellow, student, peer researcher).
  • 2020 Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay, L. and Tremblay, D.G. (2020). ‘Canada country note’, in Koslowski, A., Blum, S., Dobrotić, I., Macht, A. and Moss, P. (eds.) International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2020 (pp. 145-173).
  • 2019 Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay, L. and Tremblay, D.G. (2019). ‘Canada country note’, in Koslowski, A., Blum, S., Dobrotić, I., Macht, A. and Moss, P. (eds.) International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2019 (pp. 111-134).
  • 2018 *Jewel, E., Doucet, A., Falk, J., and Fyke, S. (2018). Indigenous employment engagement in Niagara: Social knowing, mental health, and the importance of Indigenous resources. Report to the Government of Ontario, Ontario Human Capital Research and Innovation Fund. (Postdoctoral fellow, student, peer researcher).
  • 2018 Doucet, A., Lero, D.S., McKay , L . and Tremblay, D.G. (2018). ‘Canada country note’, in Blum, S., Koslowski, A., Macht, A. and Moss, P. (eds.) International Review of Leave Policies and Research 2018 (pp. 90–110).
  • 2017 Doucet, A., Lero, D., McKay, L., and Tremblay, D.G. (2017). Parental leave policy and research: Canada. In S. Blum, A. Koslowski, and P. Moss (eds.), International Review of Leave Policies and Research (13th edition, revised) (pp. 86–105). London: Employment Relations Research.
  • 2016 Doucet, A., Lero, D., McKay, L., &and Tremblay, D.G. (2016). Parental leave policy and research: Canada. In A. Koslowski, S. Blum, and P. Moss (eds.), International Review of Leave Policies and Research (12th edition, revised) (pp. 78–92). London: Employment Relations Research.
  • 2016 Doucet, A. and McKay, L. (2016). “Les deux politiques de régimes parentaux du Canada: un argument en faveur du congé réservé aux pères”. Report commissioned by the Quebec government for the 10th anniversary of the Quebec Parental Leave Plan.
  • 2016 *Mathieu, S. McKay, L. and Doucet, A. 2016. “Politiques sociales, soutien au travail de soins et inégalités de classes”. Report commissioned by the Quebec government for the 10th anniversary of the Quebec Parental Leave Plan. (Postdoctoral fellows).

Recent and Current Teaching

Undergraduate Courses:

  • WGST 4P91 – Feminist Research Methods
  • WGST 3P91 – Contemporary Feminist Research Methodologies

Graduate Courses:

  • SOCI 5P02 – Research Design and Research Methodologies
  • SOCI 5P50 – Critical Approaches to Gender and Sexuality
  • SJES 5P50 – Families, Households and Social Justice

Graduate Student Supervision

I am interested in supervising graduate students on a wide range of topics related to care work, paid work, social policies supporting care and work, human and ecological care.

To date, I have supervised 22 MA students, 6 PhD students, 10 postdoctoral fellows, and have served as committee member on dozens of PhD and MA committees. I’ve also acted as an external examiner on 16 PhD theses.

Recent Media Engagements

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

Selected Video Presentations

2025 “‘Nothing Exists Alone’: 3 Lessons about Care from Ecologist Rachel Carson”, Big Ideas Video Talk, Work and Family Researchers Network Conference (presented in Montreal, June 2024; video released May 2025).

2021 *“Community-university research collaboration”, The Social Justice Research Institute’s Research Social Justice and Community Collaboration Research Symposium, Brock University, September 28, 2021. (With Eva Jewell and Jessica Falk).

2020 Expert testimony on issues of paid and unpaid work, Standing Committee of Women and Gender Equality Canada, December 10, 2020.

Research Awards

2025 Distinguished Professor (Brock University)
Brock University’s Distinguished Professor designation is a lifetime appointment recognizing outstanding achievement in each recipient’s academic discipline.

2025 Mirabelli-Glossop Award (The Vanier Institute of the Family)
The Mirabelli-Glossop Award for Distinguished Contribution acknowledges those who have made significant contributions to the national understanding of families and family wellbeing in Canada through their work, their research, or their service or support to families.

2022 Distinguished Research and Creative Activity Award (Brock University)
The Award for Distinguished Research and Creative Activity recognizes faculty in all disciplines whose distinguished research or creative activity demonstrates outstanding research achievements, contributions to the training of future researchers and strong performance in scholarly or creative performance.

2020 Faculty of Social Sciences Distinguished Researcher of the Year Award (Brock University)
This is awarded to one faculty member per year from the Faculty of Social Sciences as the top honour for research.

2008 Carleton University Research Achievement Award
This award recognizes outstanding research achievements and is awarded annually to one recipient across all faculties.