Brenna earned a BA (Hons.) in South Asian Studies and History from the University of Toronto in 1996, going on to obtain her LLB from UBC in 1999. After completing her law degree, Brenna clerked with the Honourable Madam Justice Ryan in the BC Court of Appeal, completing her articles with Arvay Finlay in Victoria. She began her PhD at the Birkbeck School of Law, University of London in 2001, the recipient of numerous graduate scholarships, and graduated in 2007. 

Prior to joining Allard Law, Brenna was a Reader in Law and Critical Theory at SOAS, University of London, where she had been on faculty since 2013. Prior to her appointment at SOAS, she held faculty positions at the Queen Mary School of Law, Kent Law School and the University of Reading Law School. She has also held visiting appointments at L’École des hautes études en science sociales (Paris) and the Stellenbosch University Faculty of Law (South Africa). 

Brenna’s research and teaching lie within the fields of property studies and legal theory, spanning the disciplines of property law, critical theory, colonial history and critical race feminism. Her book Colonial Lives of Property: Law Land and Racial Regimes of Ownership was published in 2018 with Duke University Press. She has published widely in various leading academic journals. She is regularly invited to deliver plenary and keynote addresses at academic venues around the globe, and in a variety of disciplinary and interdisciplinary settings.