I obtained my PhD in 2000 from The University of Melbourne based on fieldwork on Indigenous agriculture and development in the Andes of Peru. After graduation I pursued the study of Andean agriculture and culture while employed as a research fellow within the Dept. of History and Philosophy of Science (conducting research on internet and communication technology in the modern 'connected home').

I joined the Department of Anthropology at ANU in 2007 to undertake ARC-funded postdoctoral research on rural development in Timor-Leste, involving  extensive fieldwork in Timor-Leste  and archival research in Portugal and Macau.

Since 2012, my research has broadened in both Timor-Leste and Peru. In Timor-Leste, the focus includes Indigenous religion (animism), colonial history and the history of anthropology and youth violence. My Peruvian research has turned to human trafficking in Amazonia, mining and Indigenous relocation in the Andes, the politics of agricultural biodiversity and Andean environmental history.  

Career highlights

I have published two books and around 30 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters. My two books on Timor-Leste––Development and Environmental Politics in East Timor (2014, Routlege) and Haunted Houses and Ghostly Encounters: Animism and Ethnography in East Timor, 1860–1975 (2019, NUS) have been well received. The latter book in particular has received ten reviews in journals such as American Ethnologist, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Asian Journal of Social Science, Southeast Asian Studies, and Moussons. Haunted Houses is also the topic of a New Books Network Podcast author interview: https://newbooksnetwork.com/christopher-j-shepherd-haunted-houses-and-ghostly-encounters-ethnography-and-animism-in-east-timor-1860-1975-nias-press-2019/?fbclid=IwAR27h6RIpcXerv6G2RzjK7bDBjgQe9-tQzEkH4e0S-cGxFwsjqyMbS376fE 

I have been awarded various research grants such as an ARC postdoctoral fellowship and two Wenner-Gren Foundation Postdoctoral Grants, inter alia.

Over two decades I have collaborated with tens of development organisations in Timor-Leste and Peru and I am currently working on human trafficking. Intermittently, I am engaged in contract research/consultancy. 

The anthropology of development; social studies of science and technology; postcolonial studies; Latin American studies; Asian studies.