As of October 2019, she was a PhD candidate in the Women & Gender Studies Institute at the Faculty of Arts & Science at the University of Toronto.
[3] Benaway has said, ″I guess I can't tell the difference between living and writing, the social and the political, the body and the voice, the binary and the limitlessness of my heart.
[11] Scholar of LGBT and Two-Spirit Indigenous literatures Lisa Tatonetti described Benaway's work as "aesthetically beautiful" and wrote of Benaway's Passage that "while an incredibly personal book from a self-described feminist confessional poet, Passage, in its lyric beauty, its bravery, and its testament to survival and rebirth, is a gift to readers as well.
"[12] The peer assessment committee for the Governor General's Literary Awards described Holy Wild as "lyrical rhythmic and fierce.
[7] In 2019, Benaway's essay "A Body Like a Home" won a gold medal in the 42nd National Magazine Awards in the Personal Journalism category.