Dr. Myrna Dawson

Dr. Dawson is Director of the Centre for the Study of Social and Legal Responses to Violence (www.violenceresearch.ca), Academic Research Associate at the Centre for Research and Education on Violence Against Women and Children and Co-Investigator and member of the executive for the Canadian Observatory on the Justice System Response to Intimate Partner Violence. Her research focuses on trends and patterns in violence as well as social and legal responses to violent victimization with particular emphasis on intimate partner violence and homicide. The author of numerous publications and reports, Dr. Dawson is co-author of Violence Against Women in Canada: Research and Policy Perspectives (Oxford University Press, 2011) and guest editor of the recent special issue ‘Fatality and Death Reviews’ in the international journal Homicide Studies. Dr. Dawson also co-authored the 2004 background paper upon which Canada’s first domestic violence death review committee was built and she currently sits as a member of the Ontario committee. Among various ongoing projects, some of her research examines the prevention potential of recommendations for change that arise out of domestic homicide death reviews as well as the impact of geography on social and criminal justice and violence prevention for victims and perpetrators of violence. She has published and lectured internationally across various disciplines and sectors.