Emily van der Meulen

Dr. Emily van der Meulen is a Professor in the Department of Criminology at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), Faculty of Arts. She holds a PhD in Women’s Studies from York University (2009) and has held postdoctoral fellowships at St. Michael’s Hospital and the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs. Her work focuses on gendered surveillance, prison health, sex work criminalization, and anti-human trafficking policies. She has conducted groundbreaking research on carceral syringe distribution, CCTV surveillance impacts, and migrant sex workers’ healthcare access.

Her research employs community-based methodologies and addresses systemic issues like drug law enforcement’s moral injury, stigma in prison needle exchange programs, and therapeutic alignments between police and public health agencies. She has been awarded TMU’s Faculty of Arts Scholarly Award three times (2013, 2019, 2022). Collaborations include the HIV Legal Network, PASAN, and Butterfly. She teaches courses like Qualitative Research Methods and Gender, Sexuality, and the Law.

Her publications critically examine carceral systems, drug policies, and the intersections of law and harm reduction. Current projects include analysis of Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program labor exploitation narratives and the political framing of trafficking discourses.