Tawow, welcome to a new phase of the ReconciliACTION blog!

Image: L-R Hadley Friedland, Hero Laird, Siobhan Washburn, Casey Caines. Generated with Open AI's Chat GPT November 2025.

by Hadley Friedland

Tawow! The Wahkohtowin Law and Governance Lodge welcomes past and new readers to the ReconciliACTION YEG Blog. 

This award-winning blog was previously the home of the University of Alberta Faculty of Law’s “Law and Social Media” Project. The Law and Social Media Project came to an end in April 2025, and the Wahkohtowin Lodge has taken on stewardship of the blog. We are grateful to be able to continue offering access to past blogs, and hope to use this forum to share new updates and ideas. 

Law and Social Media was an innovative course designed by Professor Moin Yahya. In addition to other legal subjects, for eight years, from 2017 to 2025, consecutive teams of four Indigenous and non-Indigenous law students blogged weekly about Truth and Reconciliation in Canada. Professor Yahya led the course, eventually inviting Professor Hadley Friedland, then Professor Tamara Baldhead Pearl, subject matter experts on Indigenous and Aboriginal law, to co-teach.  

Fun fact: Four of our legal counsel and legal researchers are Law and Social Media alumni from law school, so they have already contributed to the ReconciliACTION blog! 

The Wahkohtowin Lodge is a research unit housed in the Faculty of Law, dedicated to upholding Indigenous laws through community-directed research. The Lodge was developed in response to community requests, in the spirit of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Call to Action #50, which calls for Indigenous law institutes. 

The TRC Final Report states: 

“[Indigenous] Peoples must be able to recover, learn, and practice their own, distinct, legal traditions.” – TRC Final Report, at 206.

“Establishing Respectful Relations […] requires the Revitalization of Indigenous Laws.” –  TRC Final Report, at 213.

And as the Supreme Court of Canada recently emphasized: 

“[R]econciliation is a long term project. It will not be accomplished in a single sacred moment, but rather through a continuous transformation of relationships and a braiding together of distinct legal traditions and the sources of power that exist”: Reference re An Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families, para. 90. 

We think the ReconciliACTION blog braids into the Wahkohtowin Lodge's goal of contributing to building respectful relations between legal traditions and jurisdictions in Canada. What do you think? 

In the months ahead, we hope to continue to add to the conversation started through the ReconciliACTION YEG Blog. Stay tuned for more! 

We want to hear from you! Email us at wlgl@ualberta.ca or drop us a line in the comments about what you would like to see.