Ashwin is an ethnographer of Internet infrastructure, studying the technologies and technical communities involved in the operation of the global Internet. He is interested in how the Internet is built and maintained in everyday practice; and how the cultures of the Internet’s technical communities circulate and are re-articulated across Global South and Global North in the process of operating the Internet.

He joined the Department of Digital Humanities in September 2019. He holds a Ph.D. in Information Management and Systems from the UC Berkeley School of Information. Prior to his doctoral work, he spent a decade as a programmer and technical architect in companies such as Adobe Systems and Sun Microsystems.

You can find more information about him at sanmathi.org/ashwin.

Research Interests and PhD Supervision

• Everyday practices of Internet governance
• Cybersecurity cultures
• Critical perspectives on networked technologies
• Comparative and relational studies of technical cultures across Global South and Global North

Ashwin welcomes applications from potential PhD students interested in studying these topics.

For more details, please see his full research profile. 

Teaching

Ashwin teaches on the technological and political-economic conditions for the production of global digital infrastructures, with a focus on social practice and ethnographic methods.