My central focus is the diversity of human language and what this can tell us about the nature of language, culture, deep history, and the possibilities of the human mind. I am especially interested in the ongoing dialectic between primary documentation of little-known languages, and induction from these to more general questions about the nature of language. My book Dying Words: Endangered Languages and What They Have to Tell Us outlines the field's engagement with the planet's dwindling linguistic diversity.

I have carried out fieldwork on several languages of Australia and Papua New Guinea, publishing grammars of Kayardild (1995) and Bininj Gun-wok (2003), and dictionaries of Kayardild (1992) and Dalabon (2004). I love fieldwork and have spent around seven years living in remote communities, learning and recording their languages, and relating this to broader issues including Native Title, vernacular literacy, and indigenous art and music. Training young scholars interested in carrying out language documentation and description, within a broad ethos of reciprocal engagement with speech communities, is a key goal of our program.