Saint Mary's

Dr. Allyn Walker

Assistant Professor

Email: allyn.walker@smu.ca

Personal Profile

• PhD, Criminal Justice, John Jay College/Graduate Centre, City University of New York
• MS, Social Work, Columbia University
• BA, Social Work, Cedar Crest College

Dr. Allyn Walker researches innovative ways to prevent harm in society, both at individual and systemic levels. Their work explores the complex relationships between stigma, mental health, and institutional harm, particularly within criminal legal, immigration, and mental health systems. Dr. Walker is especially interested in violence prevention and alternative methods of addressing harm outside of incarceration, such as through public health and transformative justice approaches. Their research challenges existing paradigms and promotes non-criminalizing interventions that address root causes of harm while supporting vulnerable populations.

Their areas of research are:

• Criminalization of marginalized communities
• Transformative justice 
• Violence prevention
• Institutional harm
• Mental health
• Public health
• Stigma

Selected Peer-Reviewed Publications

• Letourneau, E. J., Walker, A., Sun, Y., Nair, R., Assini-Meytin, L. C., Stuart, E. A., & McGinty, E. B. (In press). Associations between the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion and youth violent offense charges and adjudications from 2008-2018. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law.
• Walker, A., Petersen, A., Wodda, A., & Stephens, A. (2024). Why Don’t We Center Abolition in Queer Criminology? Crime & Delinquency.
• Walker, A. (2023). Transphobic Discourse and Moral Panic Convergence: A Content Analysis of My Hate Mail. Criminology.
• Panfil, V., Petersen, A., Walker, A., & Wodda, A. (2022). Similar Past, Different Future? How Feminist and Queer Criminological Pedagogy and Qualitative Methods Intersect and Diverge. Journal of Criminal Justice Education, 33(2), 193-211.
• Valcore, J., Fradella, H. F., Guadalupe-Diaz, X., Ball, M. J., Dwyer, A., DeJong, C., Walker, A. Wodda, A., & Worthen, M. G. (2021). Building an Intersectional and Trans-Inclusive Criminology: Responding to the Emergence of “Gender Critical” Perspectives in Feminist Criminology. Critical Criminology, 29(4), 687-706.
• Walker, A., Butters, R. P., & *Nichols, E. (2021). “I Would Report It Even If They Have Not Committed Anything”: Social Service Students’ Attitudes Toward Minor-Attracted People. Sexual Abuse, 31(4), 52-77.
• Walker, A., Valcore, J., Evans, B., & Stephens, A. (2021). Experiences of Trans Scholars in Criminology and Criminal Justice. Critical Criminology, 29(1), 37-56. doi:
• Walker, A., Kazemian, L., Lussier, P., & Na, C. (2020). The Role of Family Support in the Explanation of Patterns of Desistance Among Individuals Convicted of a Sexual Offense. Journal of Interpersonal Violence.