Danielle Nadeau (2025)

Danielle J. Nadeau, M.A., J.D. is a Canadian Ph.D. student in Anthropology at the University of Connecticut, where she studies how algorithmic tools are reshaping legal decision-making in the United States. Her dissertation, Judged by Numbers: How Algorithms Are Quietly Rewriting the Courts, investigates how judges engage with risk assessment tools used at both the pretrial and sentencing stages. Through ethnographic fieldwork across three regions of Kentucky, Danielle examines how these systems influence discretion, fairness, and institutional legitimacy at a critical moment in the evolution of legal technology.

Her research bridges legal analysis, anthropology, human rights, and science and technology studies to inform national conversations about automation, rights, and accountability. Although these tools are not fully AI-powered, they rely on predictive infrastructures that are transforming courtroom practice and foreshadow deeper technological integration. Danielle’s work is supported by the National Institute of Social Sciences, the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute, and the Department of Anthropology at UConn. She holds a J.D. from the University of Kentucky, an M.A. in Public Issues Anthropology from the University of Waterloo, and has clerked at both the trial and appellate levels. Through this interdisciplinary work, Danielle is committed to advancing justice through research that centers on equity, transparency, and the human realities behind legal infrastructure.