During 1974-2015 my research was concentrated on the ethnography of (Austronesian) North Mekeo peoples of the Central Province of PNG. My publications focused on traditional and changing patterns of social organization, religion and cosmology, myth, personhood, gender, chieftainship, commoditization, land tenure, and Christian conversion. Intermittently over the years, I undertook several comparative studies of Mekeo with the Trobriand Islanders as classically described by Malinowski, Weiner and others. Beginning in 2006 with annual 2-3 month visits, I refocused my field and archival research on Trobrian culture and society based at Omarakana village - home of the Paramount Chief, Daniel Pulayasi - investigating inigenous and changing patterns of personhood, agency and exchange in contexts of kula, sexuaslity and reproduction, magic, gambling, gardening, commodification, Christian conversion, and chiefly leadership. These studies have resulted in a major critique and reinterpretation of the canonical view of the Trobriands that has had a uniquely substantial impact on social anthropology theory and method.

From the start, I have been strongly influenced theoretically by British and French social anthropology. My work falls generally within the parameters of structuralism and the New Melanesian Ethnography closely associated with writings by Marilyn Strathern, Roy Wagner, Alfred Gell, among others. From that perspective, I have engaged in critical debates with numerous anthropological luminaries including Malinowski, Marshall Sahlins, Colin Turnbull, Louis Dumont, Annette Weiner, Andrew Strathern, Joel Robbins, and others. Several of those discussions focused upon novel comparative examinations of Hindu Asian, Mbuti, ancient Hawaiian, Urapmin as well as Trobriand ethnography. From that perspective also, I have investigated the analytical parallels between British and French anthropology and chaos theory of the natural sciences.

Career Highlights

Ethnographic research: North Mekeo (4 years on 13 fieldtrips 1974-2009), Roro (3 months 2005-2006); Trobriands (28 months 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2018).

Major research grants: NIGMS (1970-1978), NIH (1993-1994), Wenner-Gren (1994-1995, 2005-2007, 2009-2012), New Zealand Royal Society/Marsden Fund (1999-2004), Australian Research Council/Discovery (2009-2012); Elected Fellow, Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (2004); 2008 Curl Prize for Best Essay, Royal Anthropological Institute; 2009 Osmundsen Initiative Award, Wenner-Gren Foundation.