My initial research focused on the relation between ethnicity and nationalism and the symbolics of moral and cultural orthodoxies governing the politics of exclusion in nation building projects. By focusing on the New World context of Trinidad I explore the viability of an alternative space for a postcolonial national imaginary that is independent of Europe. I examine the disruptive/enabling and conservative possibilities embodied in ideologies of mixture such as creolization especially as they relate to those of South Asian descent in the Caribbean. Theoretically, I am interested in epistemological issues having to do with the articulation of "theoretical concepts" with lay and political discursive forms and I am working toward an interdisciplinary perspective on the question of historical consciousness-put simply, I'm interested to know why some thoughts are thinkable but not others at certain historical junctures.

My present research attempts to theorize between the specifics of my New World empirical field location and the epistemologies and methodologies governing the discipline of anthropology itself especially in relation to its master trope, culture and to its conventions of evidence. Within this inquiry, the interface between history and anthropology conceived both as epistemology and methodology intrigues me. Another research project explores the articulation of ethnic studies with postcolonial studies. My current field research project is on the symbolics of the "dougla" (those of mixed African and Indian ancestry in Trinidad) in the national imaginary in Trinidad.