I am an socio-cultural anthropologist who conducts research on the matrilineal Minangkabau of West Sumatra, Indonesia and studies female same-sex relations outside the West. My publications include work on Native American female two-spirits and tombois in Indonesia as well as several articles on gender, kinship, and political economy in rural West Sumatra. I am conducting on-going research on historical and contemporary alternative genders and sexualities in Indonesia, focusing on tombois in West Sumatra. Part of this project examines the impact of state, Islamic and transnational lesbian and gay processes on the development of queer subjectivities, with reference to Indonesia and Southeast Asia more generally.

I edited The Many Faces of Homosexuality: Anthropology and Homosexual Behavior (1986) and with Saskia E. Wieringa co-edited Female Desires: Same-sex Relations and Transgender Practices Across Cultures(Columbia University Press 1999). My monograph on the Minangkabau is entitled Webs of Power: Women, Kin and Community in a Sumatran Village (Rowman and Littlefield 2000).

Women’s Sexualities and Masculinities in a Globalizing Asia

Edited by Saskia Wieringa, Evelyn Blackwood and Abha Bhaiya. This exciting new anthology is now available through Palgrave Macmillan Publishers.
Awarded the 2007 Ruth Benedict Prize for an anthology by the Society of Lesbian and Gay Anthropologists in recognition of distinguished scholarship on a lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender topic.

You can view the table of contents - pdf.