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Episode 99: Indigenous Legal Principles: Wahkohtowin Lodge’s Insights on Addiction, Mental Health and Governance

More Themes – Jan 2025

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Episode 99: Indigenous Legal Principles: Wahkohtowin Lodge’s Insights on Addiction, Mental Health and Governance
Broadcast Date: January 16, 2025

 

SUMMARY

In this insightful conversation, host David Lazzam speaks with Gavin Cazon-Wilkes, a Legal Counsel with the Wahkohtowin Law and Governance Lodge. This episode highlights the Lodge’s methodologies for uncovering Indigenous legal principles, its efforts to address addiction and mental health, and its aspirations for advancing Indigenous-led governance. Through concrete examples, Gavin demonstrates how narrative tools are reshaping the legal landscape, offering a unique perspective on integrating traditional laws with contemporary challenges.

To further explore the discussion, don’t miss the upcoming CIAJ conference on Addiction, Mental Health, and the Law, happening February 3-5, 2025, in Toronto.

 

Guest

Host

  • David Lazzam, Articling Student, CIAJ

 

 

Let’s continue the discussion!

To further explore the discussion, join us at our conference on addiction, mental health and the law, to be held February 3-5, 2025 in Toronto.

Come discover the complex interactions between addiction, mental health issues and the legal system, with multidisciplinary experts and Indigenous knowledge keepers. This discussion will address current challenges while gaining a comprehensive perspective on the critical issues faced by courts, law enforcement, treatment providers, policymakers, as well as communities, families, and individuals.

Register now to make sure you don’t miss this unique event!

REGISTER FOR THE CONFERENCE

 

BIOGRAPHIES

  • Gavin Cazon-Wilkes, Legal Counsel & Senior Legal Researcher, Wahkohtowin Law and Governance Lodge, University of Alberta (Edmonton, AB)

Gavin is a Treaty 11, status band member of the Liidlii Kue First Nation located in Fort Simpson, from the Dehcho region of the Northwest Territories.

Gavin is passionate about family, the reclamation of a voice through educational environments, Indigenous advocacy, and Indigenous legal assertion.

In the legal academic setting, he has worked towards fair representation in this type of system to make meaningful change towards the expansion of opportunities, Indigenous legal implementation, and Indigenous legal preservation. He has had a seat on Indigenous committees, worked within varying Indigenous communities, currently with the Indigenous Alumni Advisory Committee, and previously as a first-year representative on the Indigenous Law Students’ Association (ILSA) (2020/21), ILSA Representative on the Law Students’ Association (2021/22), and Chair of ILSA (2022/23).

Now Gavin is Legal Counsel with the Wahkohtowin Law and Governance Lodge, and seeks to develop a career in Indigenous law, self-governance, negotiation, Indigenizing colonial Western common law, and legal advocacy and assertion through a multi-juridical approach.

  • David Lazzam, articling student, CIAJ

David is CIAJ’s 2024-25 articling student, having recently graduated from the University of Ottawa Common Law program. He previously obtained a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Political Studies from Queen’s University. While in law school, he conducted legal research pertaining to law reform for groups such as the Ottawa-Ecojustice Environmental Law Clinic and the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, and served as the Canadian Bureau Chief of the international legal news site JURIST.

RELATED DOCUMENTATION

Website Ι Wahkohtowin Law and Governance Lodge: https://www.ualberta.ca/en/wahkohtowin/index.html

Resources Ι CIAJ’s 2024 Indigenous Justice System: A Knowledge Sharing Symposium: https://ciaj-icaj.ca/en/library/papers-and-articles/specialized-seminars/#goto-2024-indigenous-justice-system-symposium

 

In All Fairness is a Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice podcast channel welcoming representatives from the legal community and exploring how we can all contribute to improving the administration of justice in Canada. Legal professionals will benefit from informed discussions on key issues, essential knowledge and insights to strengthen their practice.

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