Ashanka Kumari is a student-focused teacher-scholar, first-generation student, and child of immigrant parents whose work centers graduate student professionalization and the hidden curriculum, multimodal composition and pedagogy, and the intersections among identity studies, digital literacies, and popular culture.

Kumari works as an Associate Professor, Doctoral Program Coordinator, and Interim Assistant Department Head at East Texas A&M University (formerly Texas A&M University-Commerce). She also serves as the Reviews section co-editor at Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy, and Associate Copy Editor at enculturation: a journal of rhetoric, writing and culture as well as several local, national, and international committees.

She was the inaugural faculty recipient of the 2023 Inclusive Excellence Champion award and a 2023 Barrus Teaching Award recipient at Texas A&M University-Commerce. Her work can be found in numerous scholarly journals and edited collections as well as her co-edited collection Mobility Work in Composition. 

Ashanka Kumari