Heather Castleden (she/her), PhD

President’s Impact Chair in Transformative Governance for Planetary Health

Professor, School of Public Administration, University of Victoria

Research Director, Health Environments and Communities (HEC) Lab (2009-Present)

Co-Director, Archipelagos of Indigenous-led Resurgence for Planetary Health (2024-2027)

Canada Research Chair (2016-2021) and Fulbright Scholar in Social Sciences (2021-2022)

Elected Member, The Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists, and Scientists (2021-2028)

Heather Castleden is a white researcher, with English and Scottish ancestry. She now lives and works in the traditional territories of the lək̓ʷəŋən speaking peoples of the Esquimalt and the Songhees Nations – and the SENĆOŦEN speaking peoples of the W̱SÁNEĆ First Nations. She acknowledges, respects, and has a deep appreciation for their close and continuing relationship to the land and waters surrounding us and she is committed to a lifelong learning process of how to be a good guest in this territory. Dr Castleden commits to practices that address Indigenous-specific structural, systemic, and everyday violences of colonialism and racism. She is also committed to supporting Indigenous rights, resurgence, and self-determination.

Trained as a geographer, Dr Castleden brings leadership expertise in community-led, participatory research and works in solidarity with Indigenous Peoples on their priority health and environment issues. For nearly two decades she has been leading projects around water, renewable energy, environmental, and climate justice. Her research group  (HEC Lab) is committed to research that intersects with places, peoples, and power using creative, participatory, and decolonizing approaches. Dr Castleden is a Full Professor at the University of Victoria where she holds the Impact Chair in Transformative Governance for Planetary Health.