{{Short description|New Zealand law professor}} {{Use dmy dates|date=March 2024}} {{Use New Zealand English|date=February 2018}} {{Infobox scientist | name = Jacinta Ruru | honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=NZL|MNZM|FRSNZ|size=100%}} | image = Jacinta Ruru MNZM (cropped).jpg | image_size = | alt = | caption = Ruru in 2022 | birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1974}} | birth_place = Kalgoorlie, Australia | death_date = <!-- {{Death date and age|YYYY|MM|DD|YYYY|MM|DD}} (death date then birth date) --> | death_place = | fields = Indigenous law | workplaces = University of Otago | patrons = | alma_mater = University of Victoria | thesis1_title = Settling Indigenous place: reconciling legal fictions in governing Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand's national parks. | thesis1_url = http://voyager.library.uvic.ca/vwebv/holdingsInfo?bibId=2664131 | thesis1_year = 2012 | doctoral_advisor = John Borrows | academic_advisors = | doctoral_students = | notable_students = | known_for = | author_abbrev_bot = | author_abbrev_zoo = | influences = | influenced = | awards = | signature = <!--(filename only)--> | signature_alt = | website = {{URL|http://www.otago.ac.nz/law/staff/jacinta_ruru.html}} | footnotes = | spouse = | children = }}

'''Jacinta Arianna Ruru''' {{post-nominals|country=NZL|MNZM|FRSNZ}} (born 1974) is an established New Zealand academic and the first Māori professor of law.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.fulbright.org.nz/news/news-articles/first-maori-law-professor-a-proud-fulbrighter/ |title=First Māori law Professor a proud Fulbrighter |date=30 May 2016 |publisher=Fulbright.org.nz |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref> Ruru is currently the Deputy Vice-Chancellor Māori at the University of Otago.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Team |first=Senior Leadership |date=2024-03-26 |title=Distinguished Professor Jacinta Ruru |url=https://www.otago.ac.nz/council/committees/committees/slt/professor-jacinta-ruru |access-date=2025-02-27 |website=www.otago.ac.nz |language=en}}</ref>

==Academic career==

Ruru completed a Master's at the University of Otago in 2001, with a thesis on the Treaty of Waitangi and national parks in New Zealand.<ref>{{cite thesis |last=Ruru |first=Jacinta |year=2001 |type=Masters thesis |title=Te Tiriti o Waitangi and the management of national parks in New Zealand |publisher=OUR Archive, University of Otago |hdl=10523/3199 |url=https://ourarchive.otago.ac.nz/handle/10523/3199}}</ref> After a 2012 Fulbright-funded PhD at the University of Victoria in Canada, Ruru returned to New Zealand and the University of Otago, rising to full professor in 2016.<ref>{{cite web |last=Gibb |first=John |url=https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/prof-ruru-shedding-her-unease |title=Prof Ruru shedding her 'unease' &#124; Otago Daily Times Online News |publisher=Odt.co.nz |date=13 September 2016 |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref>

Ruru's research centres on indigenous peoples' (primarily Māori in New Zealand and First Nations in Canada) legal relations with land and water, from a measured and moderate perspective.<ref>{{cite web |first=Kathleen |last=Calderwood |url=http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/sundayextra/new-zealand-granting-rivers-and-forests-same-rights-as-citizens/7816456 |title=Why New Zealand is granting a river the same rights as a citizen |publisher=ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) |website=abc.net.au |date=8 September 2016 |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|first=Bryant |last=Rousseau |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/14/world/what-in-the-world/in-new-zealand-lands-and-rivers-can-be-people-legally-speaking.html |title=In New Zealand, Lands and Rivers Can Be People (Legally Speaking) |work=The New York Times |date=13 July 2016 |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Robert T.F. Downes |date=2024-07-09 |title=Natural Dialectics: Māori & Sioux Ecosophy Encounters the Rule of Law |url=https://scholarworks.arcadia.edu/agsjournal/vol9/iss1/2/ |journal=The Journal of International Relations, Peace Studies, and Development |volume=9 |issue=1 |pages=7 |issn=2429-2133}}</ref> She is the co-director of Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga (NPM) the New Zealand's Māori Centre of Research Excellence (CoRE).<ref>{{Cite web |title=Ko Wai Mātou {{!}} About Us |url=https://www.maramatanga.ac.nz/index.php/about |access-date=22 January 2023 |website=Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |title=Indigenous peoples and the state : international perspectives on the Treaty of Waitangi |date=2019 |others=Mark Hickford, Carwyn Jones |isbn=978-0-367-89544-0 |location=London |oclc=1124338401}}</ref>

== Recognition == In addition to winning the Prime Minister's supreme award for tertiary teaching,<ref>{{cite web |last=Gibb |first=John |url=https://www.odt.co.nz/news/campus/university-of-otago/otagos-ruru-wins-top-award |title=Otago's Ruru wins top award &#124; Otago Daily Times Online News |publisher=Odt.co.nz |date=18 August 2016 |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref> Ruru has also been made a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11736157 |title=Royal Society tackling diversity issues |newspaper=The New Zealand Herald |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Gibb |first=John |url=https://www.odt.co.nz/news/campus/university-of-otago/four-new-royal-society-fellows |title=Four new Royal Society fellows &#124; Otago Daily Times Online News |publisher=Odt.co.nz |date=29 October 2016 |access-date=19 February 2018}}</ref> In 2017, Ruru was selected as one of the Royal Society Te Apārangi's "150 women in 150 words", celebrating the contributions of women to knowledge in New Zealand.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Jacinta Ruru|url=https://www.royalsociety.org.nz/150th-anniversary/150-women-in-150-words/1968-2017/jacinta-ruru/|access-date=11 May 2021|website=Royal Society Te Apārangi}}</ref> In the same year she was invited to give the 10th Shirley Smith Memorial Address. Her speech was "First laws: tikanga Māori in / and the law".<ref>{{Cite web|last=Jacinta|first=Ruru|title=First laws: tikanga Māori in / and the law|url=https://maorilawreview.co.nz/2018/09/first-laws-tikanga-maori-in-and-the-law/|access-date=24 November 2021|website=Māori Law Review|language=en-US}}</ref>

In October 2019, Ruru was appointed one of seven inaugural sesquicentennial distinguished chairs, or {{Transliteration|mi|poutoko taiea}}, at Otago University.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/campus/university-of-otago/universitys-prestigious-poutoko-taiea-initiative-recognises|title=University's prestigious poutoko taiea initiative recognises leading scholars|last=Gibb|first=John|date=1 October 2019|website=Otago Daily Times |language=en|access-date=8 October 2019}}</ref>

In 2019–20 Ruru was on the panel that wrote the influential report He Puapua.

In the 2022 New Year Honours, Ruru was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to Māori and the law, and later that year received the University of Otago's Distinguished Research Medal.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/new-year-honours-the-full-list-of-2022/EOKFR77H542D647EWBSCHNSBKI/ |title=New Year Honours: the full list of 2022 |date=31 December 2021 |work=New Zealand Herald |access-date=31 December 2021}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Jacobs |first=Maxine |date=18 September 2022 |title=Māori legal scholar takes out top research award |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/pou-tiaki/300690384/mori-legal-scholar-takes-out-top-research-award |access-date=20 September 2022 |website=Stuff |language=en}}</ref>

== Selected works == * Ruru, Jacinta. (2004). "A politically fuelled tsunami: the foreshore/seabed controversy in Aotearoa Me Te Wai Pounamu/New Zealand." ''The Journal of the Polynesian Society'' '''113''', no. 1: 57–72. * Miler, Robert J., and Jacinta Ruru. (2008). "An Indigenous Lens into Comparative Law: The Doctrine of Discovery in the United States and New Zealand." ''West Virginia Law Review'' '''111''': 849. * Ruru, Jacinta. (2009). ''The legal voice of Māori in freshwater governance: a literature review''. Landcare Research, New Zealand. * Abbott, Mick, and Jacinta Ruru, eds. (2010). ''Beyond the scene: Landscape and identity in Aotearoa New Zealand''. Otago University Press. * Ruru, Jacinta. (2004). "Indigenous peoples' ownership and management of mountains: The Aotearoa/New Zealand experience." ''Indigenous Law Journal'' '''3''': 111–137. *Ruru, Jacinta, and Linda Waimarie Nikora, eds. (2021). ''Ngā Kete Mātauranga: Māori scholars at the research interface.'' Otago University Press. ISBN 978-1-98-859255-8

==Personal life== Ruru was born in Kalgoorlie, Australia where her parents were living at the time.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Husband |first=Dale |date=2016-09-03 |title=Jacinta Ruru: Our legal system is still too deaf to the Māori voice |url=https://e-tangata.co.nz/korero/jacinta-ruru-our-legal-system-is-still-too-deaf-to-the-maori-voice/ |access-date=2025-01-22 |website=E-Tangata |language=en-NZ}}</ref> Through her father she is of Raukawa, Ngāti Ranginui, and Ngāti Maniapoto descent. Her mother is Pākehā and was brought up in New Plymouth, and her maternal grandmother was Australian.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Husband |first=Dale |date=2016-09-03 |title=Jacinta Ruru: Our legal system is still too deaf to the Māori voice |url=https://e-tangata.co.nz/korero/jacinta-ruru-our-legal-system-is-still-too-deaf-to-the-maori-voice/ |access-date=2025-01-22 |website=E-Tangata |language=en-NZ}}</ref>

==References== {{reflist|30em}}

==External links== * {{LinkedIn page|in/jacinta-ruru-2589112a}} * [https://e-tangata.co.nz/korero/jacinta-ruru-our-legal-system-is-still-too-deaf-to-the-maori-voice/ E-tangata interview]<!-- find VAIF details at https://viaf.org/viaf/search --> <!-- find ORCID details at https://orcid.org--> {{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ruru, Jacinta}} Category:Living people Category:New Zealand women academics Category:Ngāti Raukawa people Category:Ngāti Ranginui people Category:Ngāti Maniapoto people Category:University of Victoria alumni Category:Academic staff of the University of Otago Category:Victoria University of Wellington alumni Category:University of Otago alumni Category:21st-century New Zealand lawyers Category:1974 births Category:New Zealand Māori academics Category:New Zealand Māori women academics Category:Members of the New Zealand Order of Merit Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of New Zealand