University of Toronto Rescinds Folk Singer Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Honorary Law Degree

The University of Toronto has revoked an honorary Doctor of Laws degree awarded to folk singer and indigenous rights activist Buffy Sainte-Marie after a university committee recommended rescinding the honour.

The university said the Standing Committee on Recognition came to a resolution on revoking the degree in April, after receiving a petition on the issue in 2025, and the Governing Council approved the motion on May 13.

The committee’s unanimous decision on the revocation was forwarded on May 4 to the Governing Council, who approved it on May 13, the university said.

The conferment of the degree in 2019 drew renewed scrutiny following a 2023 CBC investigation that examined Sainte-Marie’s public claims of indigenous ancestry. The investigation reported that Sainte-Marie was born in Massachusetts to parents described in records as white, while she publicly identified as Cree and said she was adopted into a Cree family on the Piapot First Nation in Saskatchewan.

Sainte-Marie rose to prominence in the 1960s folk music scene with politically charged songs such as “Universal Soldier,” which became an anti-war anthem during the Vietnam era. She built her career in Canada and the United States, blending folk, rock, and indigenous themes while also working extensively in education and advocacy.

Over her decades-long career, she won an Academy Award for co-writing “Up Where We Belong” for the film “An Officer and a Gentleman,” earned multiple Juno Awards, and received the Polaris Music Prize for her 2015 album “Power in the Blood.” She was also appointed to the Order of Canada and received numerous honorary degrees from Canadian universities.

Following the CBC report, a number of her awards and honours were rescinded, including her Order of Canada, multiple Juno Awards, her Canadian Music Hall of Fame induction, and a Polaris Music Prize, all of which were terminated in 2025.

Sainte-Marie had been conferred honorary degrees by 15 universities.

Two universities have since rescinded the honorary degrees they had awarded her—Dalhousie University in 2025 and the University of Toronto in 2026.

Honorary degree revocations in Canada are rare and are typically made following formal governance reviews.

Sainte-Marie is among a small number of individuals whose honorary degrees have been revoked by the University of Toronto since it established its formal recognition review committee in 2023.

Buffy Sainte-Marie’s management team did not respond to a request for comment.

The Canadian Press contributed to this report.