About

Anna Madelyn Hennessey, PhD

I am a writer, scholar, editor and artist based in San Francisco, CA, and have published widely for academic and broader audiences. Much of my writing, which includes two books (Imagery, Ritual and Birth and Visualizing Birth), is devoted to the topics of birth, rebirth, and pregnancy in philosophy, art, and the humanities. I am also the principal artist of the Rebirth Tunnel Immersive Art Installation project, which has received grants from the Henry Luce Foundation and the American Academy of Religion; and the Founder and Director of the Society for the Study of Pregnancy and Birth (SSPRB), an intellectual hub for scholars in the arts, humanities, and social sciences who research pregnancy and birth in their fields.

In 2026-2027, I am excited to be part of a full-time residency team with the University of California, San Francisco’s Spiritual Care and Clinical Pastoral Education program and will therefore be devoting much of my time to hospital work. This meaningful period in my life is teaching me the skills necessary to become a Humanist Chaplain.

My academic background is in Religious Studies with specialization in Chinese philosophy and religion (PhD, UC Santa Barbara), Art History with a focus on critical theory (MA, UC Santa Barbara) and Philosophy and Language (BA, double major, New York University).

A longtime San Franciscan, I play the fiddle as part of an Irish music group in the city. My husband Toni and I live in the Lower Haight and are raising our two children, Kieran and Montserrat. We are occasionally in Catalonia, which is where Toni is from and his family lives, and are also members of San Francisco’s United Irish Cultural Center (UICC), which is our connection to my Irish American heritage. We live our lives close to the cultures of Ireland and Catalonia.

Anna Hennessey, PhD