Thaatchaayini Kananatu is a Senior Lecturer in Global Studies at the School of Arts and Social Sciences, Monash University Malaysia. Her research focuses on sociolegal studies; law, politics and society; human rights and criminal justice in the Global South.

Dr. Kananatu is the author of Minorities, rights and the law in Malaysia (Routledge, 2020) and has co-edited two significant collections: Vulnerable groups in Malaysia (De Gruyter, 2020) with Sharon G. M. Koh and Gender and sexuality justice in Asia (Springer, 2020) with Joseph N. Goh and Sharon A. Bong. Her recent work includes "From the ghetto to the gallows: rights, race, class, and drug crimes in Malaysia" in W.-C. Chan, M. Sato, & M. Hor (Eds.), Capital drug laws in Asia (Cambridge University Press, 2025) and "Framing death penalty politics in Malaysia" (2022) 11(3) International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy 57.

As a Fellow of Eleos Justice, she contributes to critical research on capital punishment in the Asian region. She is currently Co-Investigator on the British Academy ODA Challenge-Oriented Research Grant 2024 for the project "Penal pandemic: strengthening future pandemic preparedness in Southeast Asian prisons" and Co-investigator for the Monash Warwick Alliance Education Grant 2024-2025 on "Decolonising the social sciences." Her past collaborative work includes the project "Drug offences and the death penalty in Malaysia: fair trial rights and ramifications" (2019), conducted with the Monash Anti-Death Penalty Clinic and the Anti-Death Penalty Asia Network (ADPAN).

• Socio-legal studies
• Law, politics, society and space
• Human rights
• Criminal justice

• AMU3575 Taskforce: Responding to global challenges (Semester 1)
• AMU2020 International human rights (Semester 2)