Catherine Bigley McGovern

Senior IP Teaching Fellow

Dr. Catherine Bigley McGovern holds bachelor’s degrees in theater arts and education from Hunter College, New York; a master’s in arts and communications from the University of South Dakota, Vermillion; a doctorate in education from the University of South Dakota, Vermillion; and JD and LLM degrees from The John Marshall School of Law, Chicago.

Dr. McGovern researches in the areas of copyright law; protection of folklore; mediation in the return of Nazi-confiscated Jewish-owned art; the return of human remains and lastly in the role of the mini-grant to women’s arts organizations.

She is active in several arts organizations and is the membership chair of the Cultural Property Committee of the International Bar Association. She is a founder of Mediarts, a mediation practice focused on the resolution of arts issues through mediation.

Dr. McGovern has been a Visiting Scholar at the University of Tasmania School of Law, Australia. More recently, she has returned from teaching International Entertainment Law at Handong International Law School, Pohang, Korea.

She has been a Visiting Professor at UNH School of Law’s Franklin Pierce Center for Intellectual Property. Dr. McGovern is an invited speaker in the New England area. In addition, she co-created and organized with her husband, Professor Peter J. McGovern and the Department of Cultural Resources State of New Hampshire, the Art, Culture and Law Conference held yearly at the University of New Hampshire School of Law.