Natasha Ansari

Natasha Ansari is a PhD student in MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning and co-author of A Microcredit Alternative in South Asia (Routledge, 2018). Her research investigates the relationship between profound intellectual disability and urban informality as a lens for reimagining just cities. She examines how dominant, individualized models of autonomy are challenged by profound disability and how alternative ethics of care and interdependence emerge in living environments not strictly defined by property regimes and territorial boundaries. Her work draws on ethnography, participatory and collaborative methods, and disability justice frameworks to center the knowledge of caregivers and people with complex communication needs. Her current fieldwork is based in Slovo Park, an informal settlement in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Natasha works across policy research, design, and advocacy on questions of social justice and international development. She received her MCP from MIT and her BA in Economics from Mount Holyoke College and grew up in Karachi, Pakistan.