Daphne Gilbert

Daphne Gilbert is a Full Professor in the English Common Law program and a member of the Law Society of Ontario.  She specializes in teaching criminal and constitutional law, including courses in Criminal Law and Procedure, and Advanced Sexual Assault law.  She has also taught a course on Animals and the Law. Her research interests lie primarily in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, with a particular emphasis on equality rights, reproductive justice, medical assistance in dying (MAiD), sexual violence, and safe sport/abuse in sport. 

Her recent work considers best practices in codes of conduct that focus on sexual violence, with a particular emphasis on sexual violence and abuse in all levels of sport in Canada.  She has also written on the impact of conscience protections on access to contraception, abortion and MAiD.  She is a member of the legal team in two Charter challenges on MAiD in Canada that seek to end discriminatory practices.  She is a frequent commentator in the media on sexual violence and hockey, MAiD and abortion rights.

She joined the Faculty at University of Ottawa in 2000 after obtaining an LLM from Yale University as a Fulbright and SSHRC scholar and an LLB from the University of Manitoba. She clerked for Chief Justice Antonio Lamer at the Supreme Court of Canada and Mr. Justice Robertson at the Federal Court of Appeal.  She is Vice Chair of the Boards of Dying with Dignity Canada and Fòs Feminista Canada and past President of Women Help Women.

• Gilbert D., “Attesting to Fundamental Human Rights:  The Backlash against the Active Promotion of Equality in Canada”, (2020) 16 Journal of Law and Equality 1.
• Gilbert D. “Faith and/in Medicine:  Religious and Conscience Objections to MAiD”, (2020) 43:2 Dal LJ.
• Daphne Gilbert and Jena McGill, “Of Promise and Peril: The Court and Equality Rights”, (2017) 78 SCLR 2d 235.
• Gilbert, D. “Let Thy Conscience Be Thy Guide (but not My Guide): Physicians and the Duty to Refer” (2017) 10:2 McGill JL & Health 47.
• Daphne Gilbert and Vanessa Gruben, “Donor Unknown:  Assessing the Section 15 rights of Donor-Conceived Offspring”, (2011) 27 Canadian Journal of Family Law 247 (issue published in 2013).
• Rosemary Cairns Way and Daphne Gilbert, “Teaching Sexual Assault:  The Education of Canadian Law Students”: (2009-2010) 28 Canadian Woman Studies 67.
• Republished in:  Brenda Cranney and Sheila Molloy, Canadian Woman Studies:  An Introductory Reader, 3^rdEdition, Toronto:  Inanna Publications (2015).
• Gilbert, D. “The Silence of Section 15:  Searching for Equality at the Supreme Court of Canada in 2007”, (2008), 42 S.C.L.R. (2d) 497.
• Rosemary Cairns Way and Daphne Gilbert, “Resisting the Hidden Curriculum:  Teaching for Social Justice”, (2008) 2 CLEAR 1.
• Gilbert, D.  “Substance Without Form:  The Impact of Anonymity on Equality-Seeking Groups” (2006) 3 U.O.L.T.J.  225.
• Gilbert, D., I. Kerr & J. McGill, “The Medium and the Message: Personal Privacy and the Forced Marriage of Police and Telecommunications Providers” (2006) 54 Crim. L.Q. 469.
• Republished in:  L. Padmavathi, Internet Service Providers:  Law and Regulation (India:  Icfai University Press, 2007).
• Gilbert, D. & D. Majury, “Critical Comparisons:  The Supreme Court of Canada Dooms Section 15” (2006) 24 Windsor Y.B. Access Just. 111.
• Constance Backhouse, Doris Buss, Rosemary Cairns Way and Daphne Gilbert, “Remembering Favourite Feminist Legal Scholarship” 17:1 CJWL 243 (2005).
• Gilbert, D., “Unequaled:   L’Heureux-Dubé J.’s Vision of Equality and Section 15 of the Charter” (2003) 15 CJWL 1.
• Gilbert, D., “Time to Regroup:  New Opportunities for the Supreme Court and Section 15 of the Charter” (2003) 48 McGill L.J. 627.