I am interested in music subcultures and their associated youth scenes and social movements.

I study popular music through the theoretical lenses of subculture studies, social movement theory, and framing theory. (And, of course, timbre studies too!)

I consider how music subcultures create collective action frames, how those frames impact the behavior of people in the scene, and if/how the reach of the subculture extends to any type of social movement.

I locate these scholarly intersections in ska, punk, and reggae.

Timbre and Form in Popular Music

I am collaborating with eight other scholars in an ongoing project investigating timbral markers in the musical form of popular songs from the 1980s–90s across multiple genres.

Timbre and Narrative in Popular Music

I have an ongoing project on how timbre affects the interpretation of musical narrative with McGill’s Music Perception and Cognition Lab.