Albany Law School

​S.J.D., Harvard Law School (candidate)
LL.M., Harvard Law School (waived on admission to S.J.D.)
LL.M., Gothenburg University, Sweden 

Visiting Assistant Professor 2006 - 2007
Associate Professor: 2007 - present (currently on research leave)
Visiting Professor: UMass School of Law 2011-2012

Prof. Grahn-Farley was the Harvard Law School Gammon Fellow (awarded for high academic achievement at Harvard Law School), the Godfrey Lecturer at the University of Maine School of Law, Visiting Scholar with the Boston College Graduate Department of Sociology, Andrew Mellon Postdoctoral  Fellow (Residential) with the Redress and Reparations Group at the Humanities Research Institute of the University of California, and an Undergraduate Faculty Advisor with the Harvard University Department of English. 

She has served on the National Board of Save the Children - Sweden, the world’s leading international child rights organization. 

She is a much sought after public speaker and her academic work has appeared in a number of books and academic journals.  These include: Feminist Perspectives on Contemporary International Law: Between Resistance and Compliance (Sari Kouvo and Zoe Pearson eds., Hart Press: forthcoming 2011); Critical Race Feminism, 2nd edition (Adrien Wing ed., NYU Press: 2003); Michigan Journal of International Law; New York University Review of Law & Social Change; Boston College Third World Law Journal; Law and Literature; Brooklyn Journal of International Law; DePaul Law Review; Cardozo Women's Law Journal; University of Miami Law Review; Journal of Gender, Race & Justice; and Transnational Law & Contemporary Problems.  

Prof. Grahn-Farley’s current project is at the intersection of human rights, international child rights, and United States constitutional law. 

In addition to International Law, International Child Rights, and Constitutional Law, her teaching interests also include: Human Rights, International Organizations, American and Scandinavian Jurisprudence, Feminist Legal Theory and Nordic Feminism, Postcolonial Theory, Law & Literature, The Law of the Welfare State, and Family Law.

Courses: International Law, Legal Theory, Constitutional Law, Women & The Law, International Child Rights and International Organizations.

​The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Forgotten History of the White House Children’s Conferences, 1909-1971,  20 Transnational Law and Contemporary Problems 307 (2011)

The Politics of Inevitability, in FEMINIST PERSPECTIVES ON CONTEMPORARY INTERNATIONAL LAW: BETWEEN RESISTANCE AND COMPLIANCE? (Sari Kouvo and Zoe Pearson, editors, Hart Press: 2011)

WAR, COMMERCE, AND INTERNATIONAL LAW (Book Review) 38 (no. 1)  International Journal of Legal Information 106 (2010)

The Child Perspective in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (Introduction) Symposium: The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and NY State Law, 12 New York City Law Review 431  (2009)

Neutral Law & Eurocentric Law Making: A Post-colonial Analysis of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 43 Brooklyn Journal of International Law 1 (2008)

Race & Class: More than a Liberal Paradox, Symposium: ClassCrits 56 Buffalo Law Review 935 (2008)

Urgent Times, (Foreword) Symposium: Harvard Law School Symposium on Teaching from the Left, 31 New York University Review of Law & Social Change 435 (2007)

An Essay for Professor Ruth-Arlene W. Howe of Boston College Law School, Festschrift for Prof. Ruth-Arlene W. Howe,  26 Boston College Third World Law Journal 1 (2006)

Astrid and Me, 17 Law and Literature 269 (2005)

The Master Norm: On the Question of Redressing Slavery, Symposium: Race as Proxy in Law & Society, 53 DePaul Law Review 1215 (2004)

The Ideology of Genus & the Ghost of Heidegger, 29 Brooklyn Journal of International Law 1 (2003)

To Do Feminist Legal Theory, (Introduction) Symposium: Feminist Legal Theory 9 Cardozo Women's Law Journal 197 (2003)

A Theory of Child Rights, Symposium: Beyond Right and Reason: Pierre Schlag, the Critique of Normativity, and the ENCHANTMENT OF REASON, 57 University of Miami Law Review 867 (2003)

(a)   An Open Letter to Pierre Schlag, Symposium: Beyond Right and Reason: Pierre Schlag, the Critique of Normativity, and the ENCHANTMENT OF REASON 57 University of Miami Law Review 755 (2003)

(b) Reprinted in CRITICAL RACE FEMINISM, 2nd edition (Adrien Wing, ed., NYU Press: 2003)

A Ghost is Haunting Europe, 24 Michigan Journal of International Law 169 (2002)

A Child Perspective on Juvenile Justice System, Symposium: The Law’s Treatment of the Disadvantaged: The Politics of the American Drug War, 6 Journal of Gender, Race & Justice 297 (2002)

Crossing Borders, (Introduction) Symposium: International Child Rights at Home and Abroad: A Symposium on the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, 30 Capital University Law Review 657 (2002)

The Law Room: Hyperrealist Jurisprudence & Postmodern Politics, Symposium: Mary Jo Frug’s Postmodern Feminist Legal Manifesto Ten Years Later: Transgressing Borders: Women's Bodies, Identities and Families, 36 New England Law Review 29 (2001)

Not for Sale!  Race & Gender Identity in Post-Colonial Europe, 17 New York Law School Journal of Human Rights 271 (2000)

​The Possibilities of a Child Rights
Social Movement in the United States of America
The Children’s Convention at 21:
Is Child Rights Come of Age?
University of Ulster
Derry, Northern Ireland
18 June 2010

Keynote Address
Child Trafficking and The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
University of Minnesota School of Law
2 April 2010

Child Rights in the United States
University of Iowa Law School
5 March 2010

More than a Liberal Paradox:
The role of the welfare state
LatCrit, Washington D.C.
3 October 2009

Neutral Law and Eurocentric Law Making
Selected as as one of the “New Voices in Human Rights”
Association of American Law Schools
Annual Meeting, San Diego
7 January 2009

Rape and Agency in Times of War
Vanderbilt University         
23 October 2008                                                 

Lawyer, Liar: Presentation as part of panel on Lying, Deception & the Pretext Problem
Association for the Study of Law, Culture & the Humanities
10th Annual Conference:
Georgetown University Law Center
Washington, DC
23-24 March 2007

The Urgency of Time
Opening Address
Teaching from the Left
Harvard Law School
11-12 March 2006

The Future of International Child Rights
Globalization and Marginalisation: Implementing Human Rights: International Symposium
Gothenburg University Center for Human Rights
14-16 June 2004

Memories of Slavery
DePaul University School of Law
DePaul Law Review Symposium:
Emerging Issues in Race and the Law
Chicago, Illinois
9-10 March 2004

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
DePaul University School of Law
Faculty Colloquium
Chicago, Illinois
13 May 2004

International Feminist Legal Theory: Opening Address
Gothenburg University School of Law 
International Comparative Jurisprudence Conference                                                 
Gothenburg, Sweden
7-9 July 2003

The Ideology of Genus                                                                                      
Duke University, Law & Sexuality Seminar
Invited by Prof. Jerome M. Culp
Durham, North Carolina
4 November 2002

The Motion of Rights       
University of North London      
Critical Legal Conference in London (United Kingdom)
6-8 September 2002

International Child Rights       
Gothenburg University Human Rights Seminar
Gothenburg, Sweden
15 May 2002   

Juvenile Justice & International Norms     
Western Law Teachers / People of Color Conference   
Half Moon Bay, California
24 March 2002

Scandinavian Feminism       
Golden Gate University School of Law Public Lecture    
San Francisco, California
17 March 2002

Gösta Berling’s Saga: Law & Literature     
University of San Francisco School of Law Faculty Colloquium
San Francisco, California
5 March 2002

Rights in Motion        
University of Miami School of Law     
Miami Law Review Symposium
Miami, Florida
23 February 2002

Race & Gender in Postcolonial Europe     
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law    
Jurisprudence series organized by Prof. Peter Goodrich
New York, New York
12 February 2002

Localized Disruption: A Liberation Strategy   
New England School of Law      
New England Law Review Symposium
31 March 2001

Child Labor        
Amnesty International Northeast Regional Conference
Panel on Labor, Human Rights, and Business
Boston University
13 November 1999

A History of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child  
Harvard University Child Rights Working Group
Harvard University Center for Population and Development Studies
4 November 1999

Not for Sale!         
Birkbeck College, Department of Law (University of London)  
Critical Legal Conference.
London, England
19 September 1999