Profile

My ongoing research engagements lie in two main areas: immigrant rights and health equity. In a recent co-edited volume (with Whitney Duncan, University of Northern Colorado), Accompaniment with Im/migrant Communities: Engaged Ethnography (University of Arizona Press, 2024), I outline an approach to engaged ethnography with im/migrant communities using the framework of accompaniment. I am also working on a new book project examining social movements for immigrant inclusion, tentatively titled: State of Welcome: Contested Histories of a 'Sanctuary' State. My first ethnographic monograph, Care Across Generations: Solidarity and Sacrifice in Transnational Families (Stanford University Press, 2017), argues that intergenerational caregiving in transnational families is central to the ways in which Nicaraguan families face political-economic and gendered constraints by fostering solidarity across borders and over generations. My scholarly work has been published in many academic journals, including The Journal of Refugee Studies, Migration and Society, Medical Anthropology, and the Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology (many of these publications can be found on my website). I am actively involved in professional service that aligns with my values for equity and inclusion, including serving on the UO Dreamers Working Group Steering Committee and on the Steering Committee for the Anthropologists Action Network for Immigrants and Refugees. I also hold appointed roles on the Oregon Health Authority Health Equity Committee and the Lane County Board of Health Public Health Advisory Committee and collaborate with the Community Partnerships Program of my local health department. As a mentor, I seek to use the relationships I have with community and professional organizations to open opportunities for my students, many of whom go on to careers in non-profit organizations, immigration legal advocacy, and international health and development work. 

Areas of Interest: Transnational migration; Immigrant rights and justice; Social movements; Public health and health equity; Global mental health; medical & psychiatric anthropology; humanitarianism and solidarity; gender, care, and caregiving; Nicaragua, México, Latin America.