UVic launches the world's first Indigenous law degree
Feminist, artist, grandmother and embracer of disruption, Interim Dean of the Faculty of Law Dr. Val Napoleon is one of the most influential legal scholars in Canada. She is changing legal education and the lawscape of Canada as the co-founder of the Indigenous Law Degree Program.
The joint degree program builds upon our longstanding commitment to, and international reputation in, Indigenous law and Indigenous legal education.
The Indigenous Law Research Unit (ILRU)
ILRU, the only dedicated research centre on Indigenous law in Canada, is committed to the recovery and renaissance of Indigenous laws. It has formed partnerships with more than 40 Indigenous communities from coast to coast to coast, researching those peoples’ legal traditions in all their diverse forms and addressing the full scope of laws that any community requires to live peacefully and harmoniously in the world.
The Indigenous Legal Lodge: An invitation
A new Indigenous Legal Lodge will house the Indigenous Law program and ILRU, and will be a national forum for critical engagement, debate, learning, public education and partnership on Indigenous legal traditions and their use, refinement and reconstruction. The design will reflect and honour the long-standing relationships between the law school and local First Nations communities.
The leaders of these initiatives, Professors John Borrows and Val Napoleon, have been largely responsible for setting the agenda in understanding and engaging, with rigour and insight, Indigenous law. Their advice had a real impact on our deliberations within the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
- Senator Murray Sinclair, Chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation CommissionIn the news
UVic’s NCIL wins prestigious design award
Located on Lək̓ʷəŋən (Songhees and Esquimalt) territory, the National Centre for Indigenous Laws (NCIL) at UVic is still under construction but its architectural design is already winning awards.
Celebrating the construction of the NCIL
For more than a decade, Indigenous legal scholars, First Nations and the founders of the world’s-first Indigenous law degree program at UVic have worked to realize a National Centre for Indigenous...
Celebrating the construction of the NCIL
For more than a decade, Indigenous legal scholars, First Nations and the founders of the world’s-first Indigenous law degree program at UVic have worked to realize a National Centre for Indigenous...