I am a cultural anthropologist specialising in the ethnographic, political, and historical study of upland peoples in Southeast Asia. To date I have worked primarily with the Higaunon Lumad of northern Mindanao, but I am keenly interested in all the Lumad groups. My long-term goal is to delve further into the comparable experiences of other upland groups elsewhere in Southeast Asia, such as the Iban and other Dayak groups of Borneo.
The cultural and historical intersections of religion, politics, and identity, especially the ways in which minority “tribal” peoples interact with state power, whether in peace or violence, are what interest me most. My current field research project is about the evolution of Higaunon political organization, including a study of oral histories pertaining to the development of the datu as an indigenous figure of authority and law.
However, my most recent published work was archival and ethnohistorical, studying the extensive colonial-era cooperation between Iberian missionaries and the ancestors of today’s Lumad. In my (first) book, A Mountain of Difference: The Lumad in Early Colonial Mindanao (Ithaca: Cornell SEAP, 2013), I write about the cultural imprint of colonialism on what are still widely regarded as “pre-colonial” Lumad traditions. I still have many unprocessed materials from the Spanish archives – for any students who might be interested in archival work.