It is Fair Dealing Week, an annual celebration of section 29 of Canada’s Copyright Act, aka fair dealing. Fair Dealing Week celebrates the important contribution the fair dealing right makes to public interest and innovation in our country, reminding users of the rights they hold under the Copyright Act.
As a refresher, here is a summary of fair dealing:
Fair dealing for the purpose of research, private study, education, parody, satire, criticism, review, or news reporting does not infringe copyright. Under these purposes and if the dealing is fair, no permission is required from the creator of the work, nor is it required to pay them a royalty.
Fair dealing is not only an exception to copyright, but it is also considered a user’s right, one that encourages reduced barriers to accessing copyright-protected works, which in turn serves an overall benefit to intellectual good. Fair dealing may allow you to copy a portion of a work for important cancer research or use a popular fictional character in a parody skit or to quote important political speeches for a news story. What may come as a surprise is fair dealing is also important in upholding and safeguarding a Charter right - the freedom of expression.
In Canada, freedom of expression is protected as a fundamental freedom under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms*. The purpose freedom of expression serves is to:
“[...] promote the search for and attainment of truth, participation in social and political decision-making and the opportunity for individual self-fulfillment through expression.”
- The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
What is the relationship between fair dealing and freedom of expression?
While copyright is an important tool to encourage innovation and creativity, it has also been used as a way to silence or censor freedom of expression. This has been demonstrated in instances such as:
Fair dealing is a crucial element within the Copyright Act and, as Michael Geist notes, “an essential safeguard for freedom of expression since it is available as a user’s right without need for permission from the copyright owner.” It is a safeguard that allows democratic societies to thrive - encouraging meaningful engagement with copyright-protected materials, critiquing and questioning powerful voices, and upholding the importance of maintaining the interests of the public within the copyright regime.
“Fair [dealing] is critical to political and cultural life. If permission were required every time a document is copied for personal use, or a quote or image is incorporated into a new work, the costs and logistical difficulties of finding owners, seeking licenses, and paying for them would cripple our ability to share ideas. Education would be severely hampered if teachers had to get permission for every article or picture they copy for classroom use. And copyright owners could censor speech by denying permission to anyone whose views they disliked.”
- Marjorie Heins and Tricia Beckles (Brennan Center for Justice, NYU School of Law)
Join MRU Library in celebrating Fair Dealing Week and show off your knowledge by taking our Instagram quiz, checking out a book from our display on Floor 2, or learn more at our upcoming workshop “Undergraduate Research & Copyright” on Feb. 27.
*Of course, there are limitations to this freedom, such as hate speech, obscenity, and defamation.
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