Alumni Spotlight: Jennifer Ananda

Many of Jennifer Ananda’s interests are deeply entrenched in social work. Her life experiences weave into her career. 

Ananda is a first-generation college student, majoring in film and English as an undergraduate student at KU, where she participated in feminist activism and volunteered at a local domestic violence shelter.

“As someone who witnessed and experienced a lot of trauma as a young person, I went through my teenage years very angry and looking for a way to leave the world in a better place than I found it,” Ananda said.

She decided to focus that energy when she returned to KU.

Ananda earned a law degree and a Master of Social Work in 2010 through KU’s joint J.D./MSW program. She felt that a social welfare education was necessary for her law degree to be as useful as she wanted it to be.

“I also think that social workers need to know the law because they are so intrinsically entwined,” Ananda said.

After graduating, Ananda had her own private legal practice and then provided legal representation throughout the state at the Kansas Coalition Against Sexual and Domestic Violence, eventually doing Title IX work at KU and then Emporia State University. She also taught as an adjunct in the Bachelor of Social Work and MSW program at KU. During this time, Ananda also served on the Lawrence City Commission and was Mayor of Lawrence in 2020.

“All of these roles were influenced by the experience I had in the dual degree program,” Ananda said.

Now Ananda is pursuing a PhD at the KU School of Social Welfare. Her dissertation research explores the intersection of technology, sex and queerness through a theory-building project that focuses on liminality and technology as location. Specifically, she is interested in ensuring that social science theory effectively accounts for the deeply entrenched role that technology has in young people’s lives.

Ananda is interested in developing an understanding of the role technology has in shaping culture and culture’s role in technological development. She also hopes that her research will help individuals and communities more effectively educate young people about how to have healthy sexual and other intimate relationships.

Ananda said it’s important for anyone interested in the PhD program to have the capacity to engage with the program to get the most out of it. The program is set up to help someone who is a lifelong learner.

“Are you interested in research? Is there a question you want to answer that is just nagging at you? Having an inquisitive mind is important,” Ananda said. 

Ananda does not know how she plans to apply her degree and experience once she's completed the program, but she hopes to continue to pursue her interests through academics or other continued research opportunities, and she hopes that she will leave this world better than she found it