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Heather Castleden is a broadly trained community-engaged geographer and educator; she has spent two decades doing participatory research with Indigenous peoples across the country on their priorities that align with her scholarly and applied expertise in environment, health, social justice, and decolonization.

Heather’s ancestral roots are mainly Scottish and English. As a white settler scholar, having lived in multiple Indigenous territories and having received teaching from many generous and patient Indigenous Elders and Knowledge-Keepers, Heather is grateful to live and work (as an uninvited guest) in Lkwungen territories.

She is deeply appreciative of the spirit of the land and water around her and recognizes that living in this place, and all the other places she has lived across this country, has only been made possible by the settler colonization of her ancestors and other Europeans and the ongoing (white) settler colonial state of Canada.

Given this reality, and her own complicity as a white settler—and as a human geographer—her research primarily focuses on the politics of knowledge production in Indigenous environment, health and social justice activism. Heather has also developed concentrations in responsible and relational Indigenous research ethics and decolonizing settler colonialism in the academy.

Heather’s PhD in Human Geography is from the University of Alberta (2007). She held two postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Victoria.

Heather began her tenure-track appointment in 2009 at Dalhousie University in the School for Resource and Environmental Studies. She earned tenure and was promoted to associate professor in 2013 while at Dalhousie. In 2014, she joined Queen’s University as an associate professor with a joint appointment between the Department of Geography and Planning and the Department of Public Health Sciences. Queen’s University nominated Heather for a Tier II Canada Research Chair (CRC).

She received the CRC in 2016, concentrating on "Reconciling Relations for Health, Environments and Communities"’. Her CRC was renewed earlier this year. She was also awarded a prestigious Fulbright Canada Research Chair in Social Sciences, to be held at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa in the Departments of Geography and Political Sciences.

Heather is the Director of the Health, Environments, and Communities Research Lab (HEC Lab, a thriving community of trainees and associate researchers. In recognition of her contributions, she was inducted to the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars, Artists, and Scientists in 2021 for a 7-year term.

Heather has over a hundred peer-reviewed and scholarly publications (in high impact journals like The Lancet-Planetary Health, Social Science & Medicine, Environmental Reviews, Health and Place, Energy Research and Social Science, and Antipode). She holds multiple competitive grants from CIHR, SSHRC and other funding agencies.

At the University of Victoria, Heather will be developing the Transformation Lab, in close collaboration with CIRCLE. The Transformation Lab will support the forthcoming activities of the Impact Chair in Transformative Governance for Planetary Health. Heather is continuing her research in support of Indigenous leadership in energy autonomy and decolonizing energy in Canada through A SHARED Future. She has started a new project on Indigenous-led Resurgence for Planetary Health as well as several other ongoing projects detailed on the HEC Lab’s website.

She will be developing new collaborations, research projects and initiatives that align with the UVIC Strategic Research Plan, particularly concerning sustainability, the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Heather is particularly interested in increased land-based learning opportunities for UVIC students through the co-developing programs with Indigenous knowledge-holders, particularly in Songhees, Esquimalt and WSÁNEĆ Territories and the broader Coast Salish, Nuu-chah-nulth and Kwakwakaw’akw Territories.

Heather sits on the Editorial Boards of Social Science and Medicine and Environmental Reviews. She was a member of the Inaugural Steering Committee for WISER: Women and Inclusivity in Sustainable Energy Research Network, an international network of women academics in the field of clean, low–carbon and sustainable energy research.

Heather is the proud momma and biggest fan of two amazing young adults, Dylan and Jordan. She is also a fan of students, open minds, critical thinkers, anti-racist education and action, truth and healing, gender equity and diversity and climate action, as well as sandy beaches, rainforests, prairies, clean water, lemonade and pecan pie and she is excited to hear from you if you share any of these interests!