Dr Moisés Fernández-Cano

Moisés Fernández Cano is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow on the project AIDS Campaigning between the Global South and Western Europe since the 1980s at the University of Stirling (UK). He holds a PhD in History from the European University Institute in Florence, where his doctoral research examined dissident intimacies and sexual practices under Francoist Spain. He has been a Visiting Researcher at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (2022) and the University of Toronto (2023). His research focuses on sexual dissidence, archives, and memory. Recent publications include “El archivo que no cesa: cuando el expediente quiebra la pluma” in Memoria y Deseo (2025), edited by María Rosón, and “Beyond Chueca: Limitations of heritage-centered understandings of historical queer spatiality,” co-authored with Ignacio Elpidio Domínguez, in Huarte de San Juan (2025). He is also co-founder and President of MariCorners, an interdisciplinary platform fostering academic dialogue on LGBTQIA+ studies in Spain, and founder and organiser of Spain’s LGBTQIA+ History Month.

My research focuses on the global histories of HIV/AIDS and the transnational networks of activism and care since the 1980s. I investigate how local and international experiences of the epidemic intersect with broader questions of sexuality, mobility, and social inequality. Building on my earlier work on queer histories under authoritarian regimes, particularly in Francoist Spain, I explore how dissident sexualities were lived, regulated, and remembered. My methodological approach combines archival research, oral history, and spatial analysis to examine everyday intimacies, domesticity, and urban sociabilities. Across these projects, I am particularly interested in the politics of memory, the afterlives of archives, and the challenges of writing histories of marginalized sexualities from fragmented and often silenced sources.

I teach and supervise across undergraduate and graduate programs in history, social and cultural anthropology, and LGBTQIA+ studies. My courses and seminars focus on queer histories, dissident sexualities, archival research, and the methodological challenges of studying marginalized communities under authoritarian regimes. I integrate archival materials, oral histories, and performative approaches to engage students in critical and experiential learning. I have also contributed to international summer schools and workshops on queer research methods and am committed to fostering inclusive and interdisciplinary learning environments. In addition, I hold a Higher Education Teaching Certificate from the European University Institute, which informs my pedagogical practice.