I am an anthropologist fascinated by how people use surgical medicine to understand and intervene in gender. From population-based research about “normal” and “abnormal” sexual desire to the intimate spaces of the operating room, my work explores the ways that ideals about masculinity and femininity shape our understanding of the “good bodies” crafted by medical practice. And, at the same time, it shows how an insatiable demand for gender consolidating medicine continues to drive medical innovation.

My most recent book, The Matter of Motherhood (Beacon Press, 2026), critically explores the emerging practice of uterine transplantation — the first ever organ transplanted to improve a recipient’s gender-specific quality of life. It is a transplant for women because it improves their lives as women. There is a lot to unpack. It’s worth a read.

I am Associate Professor in the School of Anthropology at the University of Arizona, where I am also a faculty affiliate in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies, the Institute for LGBT Research, and the Graduate Program in Social, Cultural, and Critical Theory. Before joining the faculty at UArizona, I earned my PhD in Anthropology from the University of California Berkeley, and was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the University of Michigan Society of Fellows. My work has been funded by the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

I am a native Oregonian living in the Sonoran Desert in perpetual search of shade.

And, with apologies to everyone who thought theirs were better, I am certain that my wife and daughter are the greatest people on earth.