About me

I am a Postdoctoral Research Fellow based at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore. I am currently writing my first monograph, which is a historical comparative study of policies directed towards marketplaces and traders in Vietnam. I earned my PhD from the University of Michigan, based jointly in the departments of Health Management and Policy (HMP) & Political Science in the summer of 2025. I have a specific regional focus in Southeast Asia and in Vietnam, where I was based between 2021-2023 conducting fieldwork for my dissertation, meeting and interviewing traders, food safety specialists, managers, and global experts. I especially enjoy visiting traditional markets (chợ truyền thống) to learn about cultural and historical aspects of food trade. I am currently working on projects related to colonial-era policy and food traders in Singapore and Hong Kong. I also have interest in studying political development in the American South. I am affiliated with the HMP Governance Lab at the University of Michigan. I have recently been published in Health Security, contributed to the Oxford Bibliographies, and have reviewed for The Lancet Planetary Health.

My dissertation research was supported by a Boren Award for International Study, FLAS, the Menakka and Essel Bailey fellowship, and the Rackham Graduate School, among others. Prior to my time in Michigan, I taught social sciences at a magnet high school in Sejong City, South Korea and helped develop community partnerships and programs for the Mississippi Center for Obesity Research in Jackson, MS. I received my master's degree in International Health Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2015, and my bachelor's degree from the University of Mississippi in 2014. I grew up on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.