About

I am a medical anthropologist and health sociologist specialising in interdisciplinary ethnographic research exploring the experiences of health, illness and care for structurally vulnerable communities. I especially focus on chronic conditions, disability studies, and ageing to contribute new insights on gender, care, global public health, and wellbeing. My research adopts a comparative methodological approach to combine these areas to explore the relationship between chronic health conditions and practices of care in people’s local moral worlds. I have been the Secretary of the Society for Medical Anthropology (American Anthropological Association) since November 2022.

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My work is interdisciplinary and collaborative: I work with academic colleagues and community and health organisations to inform policy development and legislation. My research spans a range of areas and disciplines in addition to anthropology and sociology, including global health, health services research, rehabilitation, disability studies, neuropsychology, and critical social psychology. 

I am strongly committed to capacity-building for junior scholars in Australia and internationally. Each year, I run Feminist Ethnographic and Participatory Research training, delivering a short course in Qualitative and Mixed Methods approaches. This includes my anthropological field school in Malaysia (which I designed with Bruce Missingham). In my role as Senior Visiting Fellow at UNU-IIGH, I deliver training and workshops for local health and social policy researchers.​