I am an American-Canadian philosopher and Assistant Professor at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario.  I received my Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of California, Riverside in 2016, supervised by John Perry and Howard Wettstein.

Most of my philosophical thinking and writing thus far has focused on a variety of issues related to language. Specifically, I have written on foundational theories of meaning, the semantics/pragmatics distinction, metaphor, the nature of conversational maxims, and theories of reference. I’m also interested in speech act theory, semantic minimalism, and discourse about fiction, among other topics.

A major area of focus in my work on language has always been its nature as a fundamentally social phenomenon, which has led to a broader interest in the metaphysics of the social world (social ontology). I have written on the nature of social conventions and am currently developing a new account of the metaphysics of social institutions, funded by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Beyond my main research areas, my teaching interests also range into epistemology, logic, critical thinking, history of political philosophy, and ethics.