Joanna was born and grew up in the Bronx. She gained a BA in English from Cornell University (1957), and an MFA from Yale University School of Drama (1960).

She subsequently taught at Cornell University, the State University of New York, and at the University of Colorado at Boulder before becoming professor of English at the University of Washington, Seattle.

Joanna is well known for her strongly feminist science fiction, exemplified by the novel The Female Man (1975). Her short stories have been collected in The Zanzibar Cat (1983). She has won the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Locus Poll Award, the James Tiptree Jr Award and the SF Chronicle Award.