Roberta Jo grew up in Helsinki, Finland. She is the second of four children to Raymond Jo., an aerospace engineer, and Anna Agnes, a homemaker. She earned a bachelor's degree in computer science and economics from Duke University.
Between college and graduate school, Alek switched from literature to anthropology. Despite an increase in the number of interdisciplinary initiatives bridging the two professions, this was a substantial shift. He had to refocus himself from the archive to the field throughout the first few years of his PhD program.
