Jennifer Abbott

Jennifer Abbott (born January 8, 1965) is a Sundance and Genie award-winning film director, writer, editor, producer and sound designer who specializes in social justice and environmental documentaries.

Born in Montreal, Quebec, Abbott studied political science with a particular interest in radical political thought, women's studies and deep ecology at McGill University. She attended law school briefly before she quit to go to Emily Carr University of Art and Design where she studied for a few years before deciding to teach herself what she needed to know to become a filmmaker. Years later, she would teach at that same university.

Abbott splits her time between Vancouver and the Gulf Islands on Canada's West Coast where she lived for many years on a renewable energy permaculture farm. She is the mother of three including twin daughters and a practicing Zen Buddhist. She is the sister of journalist Heather Abbott, the great, great-granddaughter of the first Canadian born Prime Minister of Canada John Abbott and the great, great-grandniece of Maude Abbott, one of Canada's first women doctors who had to challenge Bishop's University's men-only policy to be permitted to attend medical school, graduating in 1894. She is the cousin of actors Christopher Plummer and Amanda Plummer and the great, great-granddaughter of R. S. Williams & Sons musical instrument makers.

Source: Wikidata , August 2023