NeEddra James is a critical theorist, investigative journalist, and multimedia producer whose work traces how asymmetrical power dynamics format governance, embodiment, and the conditions of everyday life

She is the developer of Ontological Recursion Analysis (ORA), a methodology for revealing how asymmetrical power dynamics naturalize themselves through recursive self-validation.

Her reporting and research span federal surveillance infrastructure, algorithmic governance, health justice, cultural production, and the political economy of carceral systems. Her investigative work on Palantir Technologies’ federal contracts documents how ontology software locks federal agencies in operational dependencies that route around constitutional protections.

She is the host and executive producer of The Radio Show on KALX 90.7 FM — a biweekly political news analysis show that breaks open the biggest political stories with local organizers, researchers, and public figures to understand not just what happened, but why it matters.

Her journalism on grief tech, immigration enforcement, deregulation and perimenopausal ADHD has aired on KALW 91.7 FM and KALX 90.7 FM.

NeEddra holds an MA in History of Consciousness from UC Santa Cruz, where she studied with Angela Y. Davis, Donna Haraway, and Gina Dent, and is completing her MJ in Audio Production at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. She is a Ford Foundation Fellow and Mellon Mays Fellow.

Her book, The Cost of Being: A Metabolic Critique of Sovereignty in the Age of Machine Learning, is in progress.