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Karen (Kim) Ashby (aka Luton)

Kim Ashby, Lecturer

MA, Sociology, Western University

Kim Luton is a criminologist whose focus is on social justice and inequality issues, in our society, at the local level, and the national level. Over the years, Ashby has engaged in praxis in her volunteer work dealing with at-risk youth (especially girls) and at-risk women. In each of her classes, Ashby encourages, through community participation requirements, the active involvement of her students in their own ‘praxis’. Ashby spearheads Western University's participation in Wrongful Conviction Day each October, bringing in an ‘exonoree’ to speak to the Western community about the factors contributing to an innocent person being declared guilty. She is currently working on a new course – “I Am Not For Sale” – a human trafficking course which will explore the complex multiplicity of issues surrounding the trafficking of peoples around the world, and especially in Canada (London).

Areas of Specialization

  • Criminology;
  • Wrongful convictions;
  • Human Trafficking;
  • Sociology of deviance;
  • Women and crime;
  • Serial killers

News

head in silhouette, looking out a prison window from a darkened room

Into the Shadows: Western to host exonerated speaker

prison bars with darkness behind them

Bringing wrongful convictions out of the shadows