Gillian Calder
Professor
Accepting graduate students
- Contact:
- Office: FRA 234 gcalder@uvic.ca 250-472-5127
- ORCID:
- 0000-0003-0750-5119
- Credentials:
- BA Hons (UBC), LLB (UBC), LLM (York)
- Area(s) of expertise:
- Constitutional law and theories, family law, feminist legal theories, critical legal and arts-based pedagogies, legal education, performance theories, law and theatre, queering law, law and emotions.
- Related links:
Biography
Gillian Calder is a Professor and a former Associate Dean, Academic and Student Relations. She has also served as the Acting Chair of Gender Studies in the Faculty of Humanities. She has been teaching constitutional law, family law, and related seminars from feminist, queer and anti-colonialist perspectives since July 2004. Gillian's research focuses on questions of legal imagination, theories of constitutional law, law's impact on understandings of the family, family formation, performativity and storytelling. In particular, she is keenly interested in critical legal pedagogies and the role creativity, ethical imagination and empathy should play in legal education. Her recent work has focused on law and emotion, where she weaves connections between teaching, embodiment and social location. In 2026 Gillian received the Harry Hickman Alumni Award in Teaching and Educational Leadership, the highest honour for teaching excellence at the University of Victoria.
Selected publications
Books
- Gillian Calder and Lori G. Beaman, eds., Polygamy’s Rights and Wrongs: Perspectives on Harm, Family and Law (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2014).
Book chapters
- Gillian Calder, “‘The Winter We Danced’: Emotion, Embodiment and Indigenous Legal Orders in the Canadian Constitutional Law Classroom” in Mallika Kaur and Lindsay M. Harris, eds., How to Account for Trauma and Emotions in Law Teaching (Northampton: Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd., 2024) pp. 74-90.
- Gillian Calder, “‘Whose Body is This?’ On the role of emotion in teaching and learning law” Bandes, Madeira, Temple and Kidd White, eds, Research Handbook on Law and Emotion (London: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2021), pp. 62-79.
- Gillian Calder, “Story-telling Motherhood with Katniss, Hermione, Tanya and the Warrior Cats, or Owls and Ravens Raising Wrens” in Karine Levasseur, Stephanie Paterson, and Lorna A. Turnbull, eds., Mothering and Welfare: Depriving, Surviving, Thriving (Bradford, On: Demeter Press, October 2020), pp. 259-273.
Journal articles
- Gillian Calder and Rebecca Johnson, “Frames, Fiends, Feelings and Family: Succession’s Affect and the Law School Classroom” (2024) 73(3) DePaul Law Review 805-824.
- Gillian Calder, “Legislating Emotion, Reading Grief: Bereavement Leave for Miscarriage and Stillbirth in New Zealand Law” (2022) 45(2) Dalhousie Law Journal 335-357.
- Gillian Calder, “Penguins and Polyamory: Using Law and Film to Explore the Essence of Marriage in Canadian Family Law” (2009) 21(1) Canadian Journal of Women and the Law 55-89.
- Elizabeth Adjin-Tettey, Gillian Calder, Angela Cameron, Maneesha Deckha, Rebecca Johnson, Hester Lessard, Maureen Maloney, Margot Young, “Postcards from the Edge (of Empire)” (2008) 17(1) Social and Legal Studies 5-38.
Other publications
- Gillian Calder, “Book Review: Lynda Collins, "How to Succeed (and Stay Human) in Law School: Pathways to Happiness and High Performance in the Study and Practice of Law” (2025) 36:2 Canadian Journal of Women and the Law, 112-117.
- Gillian Calder, “The ‘Granular and Quotidian, Dispersed and Tentacular’: Critical Reflections on CJLS. Special Issue 35(2) – On the Margins of Trans Legal Change” (2022). 11(1) feminists@law.
Special projects and other work
ReconciliationSyllabus, University of Victoria, Faculty of Law. Co-curated with Rebecca Johnson.
- ReconciliationSyllabus is a clearinghouse of education resources, pedagogical materials and storytelling, shared by educators across Canada, particularly in law schools, of the ways that have worked to include Call to Action #28 of the TRC in their teachings.
Marlee Kline Lecture on Social Justice, “The Importance of Creativity, Empathy and Imagination to Legal Education in Canada.”
- This lecture in memory of UBC Law Professor Marlee Kline’s contributions to social justice highlights an ongoing research project linking critical pedagogies and the key competencies of a legal education. February 27, 2025.
“Harry Potter and She Who Should Be Named: JK Rowling, Transphobia and Strategies of Resistance.”
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Panel discussion with Camas Books, University of Victoria, Faculty of Law, November 25, 2024. This talk given at UVic, and preserved as a podcast, looks at the questions raised by the transphobic views and actions of celebrated children’s author JK Rowling.
Media
- CBC On the Island. "Using Heated Rivalry to teach law at UVic." Interviewed by Kathryn Marlow. 2026.
- Times Colonist. Gillian Calder, “Everyone on UVic Campus Should be Vaccinated.” 2021.
- Policy Options. Gillian Calder and Ireh Iyioha, “What #JusticeForJoyce Should Mean for Policy Makers.” 2020.
- Times Colonist. Kathy Chan and Gillian Calder, “Law School Ruling Affects All of Us.” 2018.
- Times Colonist. Gillian Calder, “Assisted dying ruling is wise and compassionate.” 2015.
Recognition and awards
- 2026 First Year Class Teaching Award (shared with Anthony Ho).
- 2025 Harry Hickman Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching.
- 2015 Terry Wuester Graduating Class Teaching Excellence Award.
- 2013 Terry Wuester Graduating Class Teaching Excellence Award.
- 2012 First Year Class Teaching Award (shared with Gerry Ferguson).
- 2009 Terry Wuester Graduating Class Teaching Excellence Award.
- 2008 Terry Wuester Graduating Class Teaching Excellence Award (shared with John Kilcoyne).
Graduate supervision
Professor Calder is interested in supervising LLM and PhD students with creative interests in the role that constitutional law plays in regulating the family in Canada. She is also keenly interested in projects that centre innovating questions in critical legal education, including the use of arts-based pedagogies.