My doctoral research focused on identity, difference and belonging on the island of Corsica.
The resulting book (Corsican Fragments Indiana UP 2010) and a range of associated publications explored a number of interrelated themes: the historical politics of knowledge and mystery surrounding the island of Corsica and its emergence as a potent ‘internal other’ for France; the contemporary intersection between materiality, languages and senses of place on the island; the ways in which intimations of alterity and relatedness arise from everyday micro-interactions in village space; the politics and poetics of hospitality; dynamics of identity, racism and republicanism in contemporary France.
In the course of this work, I also became interested in methodological questions concerning comparison and the way places and concepts intersect in anthropology.