Aboriginal Law & Indigenous Laws

'Will the Circle be Unbroken?' explores and confronts the potential and pitfalls of restorative justice. Drawing on their shared experiences working with Indigenous communities, Jane Dickson-Gilmore and Carol LaPrairie examine the outcomes of restorative justice projects, paying special attention to such prominent programs as conferencing, sentencing circles, and healing circles. They also look to Indigenous justice reforms in other countries, comparing and contrasting Canadian reforms with the restorative efforts in New Zealand, Australia, and the United States.

Home Fire is a 37 minute documentary film that explores family violence and restorative justice from an Indigenous perspective. Featuring commentary from Elders, community leaders, and members of the justice system, Home Fire examines the colonization of Canada, historic trauma, the western justice system and grassroots healing programs in Indigenous communities.

In the summer of 1722, on the eve of a conference between the Five Nations of the Iroquois and British-American colonists, two colonial fur traders brutally attacked an Indigenous hunter in colonial Pennsylvania. Frantic efforts to resolve the case created a contest between Native American forms of justice, centered on community, forgiveness, and reparations, and an ideology of harsh reprisal, based on British law, that called for the killers' execution. Eustace reconstructs the crime and its aftermath, taking readers into the worlds of Euro-Americans and Indigenous peoples in this formative period.