PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Catherine D'Ignazio

Catherine D'Ignazio is a researcher whose work connects data science and artificial intelligence with feminist and civic questions. She earned an MS at the MIT Media Lab in 2014 after a BA in international relations at Tufts and an MFA at Maine College of Art; she also worked in software development and taught at RISD and Emerson before joining MIT in 2020. She and Lauren Klein published Data Feminism in 2020, and the book won the Modern Language Association's 2022 Prize for Collaborative, Bibliographical, or Archival Scholarship. In 2024, she earned tenure at MIT and published Counting Feminicide, which describes grassroots data activists documenting gender-related killings; it was also named a winner in the American Book Fest's 2024 Best Book Awards for Women's Studies/Women's Issues. By 2025, her lab's machine-learning classifier helped human-rights activists screen feminicide news; as of October 2026, she is an associate professor at MIT and directs the Data + Feminism Lab.

Works
152
Citations
3,594
h-index
26

Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 19 October 2026.

Timeline

  1. 2014

    An MIT Media Lab master's

    She earns an MS from the MIT Media Lab in 2014, after a BA in international relations from Tufts and an MFA from Maine College of Art. She also works as a software developer in the private sector.

  2. 2014–2018

    Breast pump hackathons

    She co-organizes Make the Breast Pump Not Suck in 2014 and 2018. Hundreds of participants develop technologies and policies for postpartum health and infant feeding.

  3. By 2020

    Teaching at RISD and Emerson

    She starts teaching as a lecturer in the Digital + Media graduate program at Rhode Island School of Design and becomes an assistant professor of data visualization and civic media in Emerson College's journalism department. In 2020, she joins MIT's faculty as an assistant professor.

  4. 2020

    Data Feminism

    With Lauren Klein, she publishes Data Feminism in 2020. The book examines how everyday data reflects the civic society from which it emerges.

  5. 2022

    An MLA scholarship prize

    Data Feminism wins the Modern Language Association Prize for Collaborative, Bibliographical, or Archival Scholarship in 2022.

  6. 2024

    Counting Feminicide

    In 2024, she publishes Counting Feminicide: Data Feminism in Action about grassroots data activists who document gender-related killings. MIT awards her tenure in 2024, and the book and D'Ignazio are named winners of the American Book Fest's Best Book Awards in the Women's Studies/Women's Issues category. A book club around the book draws over 600 English-, Spanish-, and Portuguese-speaking participants.

  7. By 2025

    Machine learning for activists

    By 2025, her lab's participatory machine-learning classifier scans online news for feminicide cases and sends qualifying stories to human-rights activists through a web dashboard and notification system.

  8. As of October 2026

    Directing the Data + Feminism Lab

    As of October 2026, she is an associate professor of urban science and planning in MIT's Department of Urban Studies and Planning and directs the Data + Feminism Lab.

Career

  1. Since 2020Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyAssistant Professor
  2. Until 2020Rhode Island School of DesignLecturer
  3. 2016–2020Emerson CollegeAssistant Professor of Data Visualization and Civic Media

Education

  1. 2014Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyMS
  2. Tufts UniversityBA
  3. Maine College of ArtMFA

From the biography and OpenAlex affiliations (the years of papers that list the organization), so some years are approximate.

Most-cited works

  1. Data Feminism2020 · The MIT Press eBooks · 1,719 citations
  2. Creative data literacy2017 · Information Design Journal · 140 citations
  3. A Feminist HCI Approach to Designing Postpartum Technologies2016 · CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · 127 citations
  4. DataBasic: Design Principles, Tools and Activities for Data Literacy Learners2016 · The Journal of Community Informatics · 119 citations
  5. Feminist Data Visualization2016 · 119 citations

From OpenAlex, as of 19 October 2026.

  1. Universities had a net outflow of 846 moves in AI careersIncludes Catherine D'Ignazio. Our estimates of university and company career flows and median h-index, with institutional examples.
  2. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Our estimates of where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led, from education records in cited biographies.
  3. Google had the most people shaping AI every year from 2014 to 2025Includes Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Our estimates of which organizations employed the most people shaping AI from 1961 to 2025, with a year-by-year chart.
  4. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Our estimates of combined and median h-index at AI organizations, using current affiliations and OpenAlex records.

Colleagues

People with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Catherine D'Ignazio yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. A data designer driven to collaborate with communities news.mit.edu. Checked 18 October 2026.
  2. Four DUSP Community Authored Books Honored dusp.mit.edu. Checked 18 October 2026.
  3. Counting Feminicide Explores a New Type of Data Science dusp.mit.edu. Checked 18 October 2026.
  4. Highlights from the ‘Counting Feminicide with Catherine D’Ignazio’ Book Club datapopalliance.org. Checked 18 October 2026.
  5. MIT professor uses machine learning to expose crimes against women hbs.edu. Checked 18 October 2026.
  6. Catherine D'Ignazio dusp.mit.edu. Checked 18 October 2026.