Panel explores connections between Critical Race and Disability Theory

Rabia Belt is a legal historian whose scholarship focuses on disability and citizenship. Her scholarship ranges from cultural analysis of disability in media, to contemporary issues facing voters with disability, to the historical treatment of disabled Americans. She is currently writing a book titled, “Disabling Democracy in America: Disability, Citizenship, Suffrage, and the Law, 1819-1920.” In 2015, the American Society of Legal History named her a Kathryn T. Preyer Scholar for her paper, “Ballots for Bullets? The Disenfranchisement of Civil War Veterans.”

Professor Belt is also an advocate for people with disabilities. In 2016, President Obama named her as a Councilmember to the National Council on Disability, the independent federal agency that advises the President, Congress, and other federal agencies regarding policies and practices that affect people with disabilities. Additionally, she serves as a member of the Board of Directors for the Disability Rights Bar Association.

Prior to joining the Stanford Law faculty, she was a Visiting Assistant Professor and Research Academic Fellow at Georgetown University Law Center. Earlier in her career, she was a summer associate at Preston, Gates & Ellis, LLP, a parliamentary intern with the South African Human Rights Commission, and a research intern at the Office of the Monitor for Pigford v. Glickman & Brewington v. Glickman. She received her JD from the University of Michigan Law School in 2009 and her Ph.D. in American Studies from the University of Michigan in 2015.

Professor Gustafson’s research and scholarship is interdisciplinary and explores the role of law in remedying inequality—and in reinforcing inequality. Her research over the last decade focused on the expanding administrative overlap between the welfare and criminal justice systems, as well as the experiences of those individuals and families caught in those systems. Her current research explores the history of law in regulating African American families and in regulating labor among poor people of various ethnic backgrounds.

Jyoti Nanda is an Associate Professor of Law at Golden Gate University (GGU) School of Law where she teaches Criminal Law, Evidence, and Juvenile Law. Her research and writing is at the intersections of gender, race, disability, education, and juvenile justice. She seeks to make meaningful doctrinal interventions in disability and criminal law. Professor Nanda is currently involved in an education project to address the knowledge gaps about the justice system for youth in the Los Angeles delinquency system that she plans to scale statewide. The American Bar Association (ABA) nominated Nanda in 2016 to serve as the Reporter for the forthcoming ABA Juvenile Justice National Standards. She taught at UCLA for 16 years. Prior to joining the faculty at UCLA School of Law, Nanda was awarded a Skadden Fellowship to work as a staff attorney in civil rights at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational, Fund. Inc. (LDF). Born in Nairobi, she is a proud immigrant and the daughter of parents who were refugees and immigrants from Pakistan/India and Kenya.

Camille Nelson has long been an outstanding member of the legal community. Prior to her appointment as Dean of the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa | William S. Richardson School of Law Dean Nelson served as Dean of American University Washington College of Law (“WCL”). Prior to her appointment at WCL, she was the first woman and person of color to serve as Dean of Suffolk University Law School in Boston. She was also a Professor of Law at Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University, a Dean’s Scholar in Residence and Visiting Professor of Law at Washington University in St. Louis School of Law, and a Professor of Law at Saint Louis University School of Law. She has taught Contracts, Criminal Law, Torts, Critical Race Theory, Comparative Criminal Law, Transnational Law, Criminal Procedure, and Professional Responsibility. Prior to entering academia, Dean Nelson was a litigator at McCarthy Tétrault (a large Canadian law firm), and clerked for Justice Iacobucci of the Supreme Court of Canada.

Dean Nelson’s scholarship focuses on the intersection of critical race theory and cultural studies, with particular emphasis on health law, criminal law and procedure, and comparative law. She has published many impactful articles, chapters, and essays that have appeared in publications such as the Berkeley Journal of Criminal Law, Yale Journal of Law & Feminism, New York University Review of Law & Social Change. She recently served as a co-editor of the Journal of Legal Education of the Association of American Law Schools.

Her scholarship and leadership in higher education has been recognized through a variety of awards and honors. She was recently named among the Top 35 Women in Higher Education by Diverse Issues in Higher Education magazine, and was listed as one of the “Most Influential People in Legal Education” by the National Jurist. Dean Nelson also received the Paul Robeson Distinguished Alumni Award from the Black Law Students Association of Columbia Law School in 2017. In recognition of her leadership in diversity and inclusion, Suffolk University Law School’s annual diversity award has been named in her honor. During her time at Saint Louis University School of Law, she was recognized as both Professor of the year and with a Faculty Excellence Award.

Recently, her professional service engagements include serving on the Executive and Steering Committees of the Association of American Law Schools, the board of the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System, the board of the Law School Survey of Student Engagement (LSSSE), the President’s Advisory Network on Global Legal Education for the Law School Admissions Council, the board of the Avasant Foundation (with a mission to improve lives and communities by empowering youth in emerging economies through education, employment and entrepreneurship), and the Overseers’ Committee to Visit Harvard Law School. Nelson completed a three-year term on the American Bar Association Center for Innovation, where she chaired the Fellowship Committee. Dean Nelson has previously been appointed to the Senator Warren and Senator Markey Advisory Committee on Massachusetts Judicial Nominations.

Dean Nelson holds a B.A. with high distinction from the University of Toronto in Administration, a magna cum laude law degree from the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law, and an LL.M. from Columbia Law School.