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Biography

Dr. Sarah Riley Case is an Assistant Professor whose research and teaching focus on slavery and the law, Critical Race Theory, Black life, Third World Approaches to International Law, (TWAIL),Ìýcolonialisms, arts, and governing the natural world.

Before joining Â鶹Çø, she was a Fulbright Visiting Researcher at Harvard Law School’s Institute for Global Law and Policy. She served as a Special Advisor to the UN Independent Expert on Human Rights and International Solidarity. She taught as well at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law and at Osgoode Hall Law School.

Dr. Riley Case’s work crosses over law, history, conceptions of justice,Ìýrepresentations of nature,Ìýand the arts. HerÌýpublications includeÌýÌýÌý(AJIL Unbound), where she explores overlapping Caribbean reparations claims for slavery, colonialism and climate change; andÌý‘’ with Frédéric Mégret (forthcoming in Mohsen al Attar, Ata Hindi and Claire Smith, eds.,ÌýEmancipating International Law: Confronting the Violence of Racialized Boundaries), which addresses how subaltern appeals toÌýjus cogensÌýnorms, such as slavery, genocide and apartheid, are sidelined due to racial stratifications.

Other recent publications includeÌý‘’Ìý(Critical Legal Thinking), a textual and photographic conversation about dehumanization, the natural world, and praxes of being human in light of racial capitalism with Marie Petersmann and Juliana M. Streva;Ìý‘’,ÌýwhereÌýshe explores the Black radical tradition, historical erasure,Ìýportraiture,Ìýand theÌýpolitics of recognition in international law’s narrativesÌýabout women (in Immi Tallgren, ed.,ÌýPortraits of Women International Law New Names and Forgotten Faces?);Ìýand ‘’ with Nataleah Hunter-Young (Canadian Art), which puts ten Black women poets, scholars, artists, and activists in conversation. Ìý

She was awarded the Canadian Association of Law Teachers scholarly paper award for her article,ÌýÌý(Canadian Journal of Law and Society), where she considers qualities of protest, including Black presence, practicing care, and calling for abolition, inspired by Black feminism.

Sarah Riley Case collaborates with people working toward racial and ecological justice in the UN system, academic communities, and legal clinics. She has received awards and honours from the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, SSHRC,ÌýTransnational Environmental LawÌýjournal,ÌýCanadian Association of Law Teachers,Ìýand the American Society of International Law, among others.

Her artistic practice, specifically her photography, is often featured in her publications and those of others.

Education

• SJD, University of Toronto
• LLM, Â鶹Çø Faculty of Law
• Member of the Ontario Bar
• JD, Osgoode Hall Law School
• BA, Â鶹Çø and Université Paris-Sorbonne

Past Employment

• Boulton Fellow, Â鶹Çø, Faculty of Law
• Task Force on Legal Aid Ontario Modernization, Black Legal Action Centre
• Executive, Black Canadian Studies AssociationÌý
• Adjunct Professor, University of Toronto Faculty of Law
• Adjunct Professor, Osgoode Hall Law School
• Fulbright Visiting Researcher, Harvard Law School
• Special Advisor, UN Independent Expert on Human Rights and International Solidarity
• Visiting Academic, Melbourne Law School
• Counsel, Law Commission of Ontario
• Project Officer and Legal Specialist, International Development Law Organization
• Equity Advisory Group, Law Society of Ontario
• Board of Governors, Canadian Association of Black Lawyers
• Associate Lawyer, Koskie Minsky LLP
• Judicial Law Clerk, Ontario Superior Court of Justice

Areas of Interest

Colonialisms, legal history, international and domestic law formations, Black Studies, Critical Race Theory, queer theory, Third World Approaches to International Law, Indigenous legal orders, radicalism and law reform, the natural world, arts.

Publications

• The Inhuman as RefusalÌý(with Marie Petersmann and Juliana M. Streva) (2024) Critical Legal Thinking
• The Colour of Jus CogensÌý(with Frédéric Mégret) in Mohsen al Attar, Ata Hindi and Claire Smith, eds,ÌýEmancipating International Law: Confronting the Violence of Racialized BoundariesÌý(OUP, forthcoming)
• To Protest for Black Life during the Pandemic: Resistance and Freedom in a Settler StateÌý(2024) 38:3 Canadian Journal of Law and Society 316Ìý(awarded the CALT Scholarly Paper Prize)
• Looking to the Horizon: The Meanings of Reparations for Unbearable CrisesÌý(2023) 117 AJIL Unbound 49
• Homelands of Mary Ann ShaddÌýinÌýImmi Tallgren, ed,ÌýPortraits of Women International Law New Names and Forgotten Faces?Ìý(OUP, 2023) (book awarded the Certificate of Merit for a Preeminent Contribution to Creative Scholarship from the American Society of International Law)
• Redressing Historical Responsibility for the Unjust Precarities of Climate Change in the PresentÌý(with Julia Dehm) in Benoit Mayer and Alexander Zahar, eds,ÌýDebating Climate LawÌý(CUP, 2021)
• Thoughts of LiberationÌý(with Nataleah Hunter-Young)ÌýCanadian ArtÌý(June 17, 2020)