David Rayside

David Morton Rayside (born 1947) is a Canadian academic and activist. He was a professor of political science at the University of Toronto until his retirement in 2013, and was the founding director of the university's Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies from 2004 to 2008.

Between 2017 and 2025, he produced a series of illustrated essays focused on the history of a small eastern Ontario community in Glengarry County. Included in these is a biography of Edith Rayside, a great aunt who distinguished herself as a leader of Canadian military nurses in the First World War. Other essays use stories about South Lancaster as vehicles for exploring larger themes in Canadian social and political history. This writing is available at www.davidrayside.ca

Publications A Small Town in Modern Times: Alexandria, Ontario , 1991 On the Fringe: Gays and Lesbians in Politics , 1998 Equity, Diversity, and Canadian Labour, ed. Gerald Hunt and David Rayside , 2007 Queer Inclusions, Continental Divisions: Public Recognition of Sexual Diversity in Canada and the United States , 2008 Faith, Politics, and Sexual Diversity in Canada and the United States, ed. David Rayside and Clyde Wilcox , 2011 Conservatism in Canada, ed. James Farney and David Rayside , 2013 Religion and Canadian Party Politics, by David Rayside, Jerald Sabin, and Paul E. Thomas , 2017 "Early Advocacy for the Public Recognition of Sexual Diversity," in The Oxford Handbook of Global LGBT and Sexual Diversity Politics, ed. Michael Bosia, Sandra McEvoy, and Momin Rahman 2020. "Parenting Rights in North America," in Global Encyclopedia of LGBT Politics and Policy, ed. Donald Haider-Markel , 2021 "Muslims and Sexual Diversity in North America," in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion, 2021 Three original essays in Queer/Muslim/Canadian, ed. Momin Rahman and Maryam Khan, 2024 "Edith Catherine Rayside," Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 17 (1940-1950), 2023