B.A. Amherst
M.A.; Ph.D. University of Arizona

I have taught Anthropology and African Studies at Colby since 1994. My teaching and research interests focus on analyzing power dynamics that produce and maintain inequality, racism and violence, as well as activist and community efforts for social change. I have studied these issues in southern Somalia, South Africa, and the U.S. My work has been supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Rockefeller Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, American Council of Learned Societies, the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the School of Advanced Research, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Migration and Borders. The Somali civil war sent millions of Somalis across borders as refugees, precipitating one of the largest refugee movements at the time. For the past two decades I have studied how borders, nationalisms, statecraft, neoliberalism, and militarism shape mobilities and migratory routes. Some of this work has been ethnographic and focused on the trajectories and experiences of Somalis I have known since the late 1980s, as in Making Refuge: Somali Bantu Refugees and Lewiston, Maine and some analyzes structural and systemic dimensions at the global level, as in my current book project, Militarized Global Apartheid.
Visual Anthropology. In addition to teaching and writing op-eds, I’m acutely interested in exploring ways to bring anthropological critiques to broader audiences through visual registers, such as websites, films, and most especially art exhibitions, as in my fall 2018 project Making Migration Visible: Traces, Tracks, Pathways at Portland’s Institute of Contemporary Art, co-curated with artist Julie Poitras Santos and funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. The exhibition is accompanied by a wide range of events about migration, mobility, and border crossings hosted by partner organizations, such as performances, exhibitions, films, lectures, community conversations, and poetry readings.
Security, Militarism and Militarization.As discourses of security and risk continue to feed militarization, anthropologists need to be attentive to their effects. My edited series at Duke University Press, Global Insecurities, showcases ethnographic work on security and insecurity, and I continue to work with the Network of Concerned Anthropologists to critically analyze and challenge militarism and militarization.
Click on this link to read the pledge against anthropological involvement in covert intelligence work: Pledge
Public Anthropology. Anthropology is a discipline of profound importance in a globalized world. Demonstrating anthropology's critical insights on contemporary issues is the central project of three coedited books with anthropologist Hugh Gusterson (George Washington University). The Insecure American (University of California Press, 2009), Why America's Top Pundits are Wrong (University of California Press, 2005), and Life by Algorithms: How Roboprocesses are Reshaping our World (forthcoming from University of Chicago Press).