Rate My Professor Pooja Parmar

Pooja Parmar is an Associate Professor and holds the President’s Chair in Law and Indigeneity in a Global Context at the University of Victoria Faculty of Law. She earned a BA Honours from Panjab University in 1993, an LLB from Panjab University in 1996, an LLM from the University of British Columbia in 2006, and a PhD in Law from UBC in 2013. Prior to pursuing graduate studies, she practiced law in New Delhi for several years. Dr. Parmar joined the UVic Faculty of Law in 2015, after teaching positions at Carleton University, Osgoode Hall Law School, and UBC Faculty of Law. At UVic Law, she teaches courses in legal ethics and professionalism, property law, and international human rights law. Her academic trajectory reflects a commitment to interdisciplinary approaches in legal scholarship, informed by her professional experience and advanced training in legal theory and history.

Dr. Parmar’s research centers on Indigeneity, the legal profession, ethical lawyering, legal pluralism, legal history, and questions of legal epistemology in multi-juridical spaces. Her work explores intersections of law and colonialism, land, law and development, human rights to water, Indigenous claims, oral history, and lawyers as translators across legal worlds. Current projects include a SSHRC-funded study examining Indigenous laws as sources of ethical legal practice in British Columbia and a Global Affairs Canada-funded collaborative initiative on Indigenous laws and transpacific trade. Key publications include her book Indigeneity and Legal Pluralism in India: Claims, Histories, Meanings (Cambridge University Press, 2015; South Asian edition, 2016), and peer-reviewed articles such as “Reconciliation and Ethical Lawyering: Some Thoughts on Cultural Competence” (Canadian Bar Review, 2019), which earned the Canadian Association of Law Teachers Prize for Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (2020); “Lawyers in the ‘Slammer’ and in Hiding: The Pitfalls of Advocating for Unpopular Causes at the British Columbia Bar, 1900-1925” (Manitoba Law Journal, 2020); and “Revisiting the Human Right to Water” (Australian Feminist Law Journal, 2008). Among her honors are the President’s Chair (2023–2028), UVic Law Students Society First Year Class Teaching Award (2017), UBC Faculty of Law PhD Dissertation Prize (2012-2013), and Osgoode Society Legal History Prize (2008). She serves as Vice President of the Canadian Association for Legal Ethics, Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Asia Pacific Initiatives, and editorial board member of the Canadian Journal of Law & Society.