Unlocking Awe

When Understanding Finally Clicks

I make people say, “Wait! I never thought about it that way before.”

You’re drowning in information but starving for meaning. You have data that won’t talk to each other, experts who can’t translate across their silos, programs that work on paper but shatter against reality.

I came to this work slowly: through archives that didn’t agree with each other, classrooms where students arrived speaking different intellectual languages, and programs that had to function even when the plan fell apart.

What I Do

I’m a generalist by conviction. I work across ideas, systems, and people to keep institutions from forgetting the humans they exist for.

I See Patterns Others Miss

Most people look at colonial Tunisia, international research programs, and undergraduate seminars and see three separate things. I see the same problem: how do you make complexity intelligible without flattening it?

I’ve tracked fascist networks across archives in Tunisia, France, and Italy. I’ve kept research running through political upheaval. I’ve made complex theory accessible to first-years. I’ve organized conferences bringing together researchers who’d never been in the same room. I’ve facilitated reading groups that actually changed how people thought.

The thread? I recognize how things connect when others see fragments. That moment when disconnected pieces suddenly organize into something you can actually use—I create the conditions for that.

I Navigate Ambiguity

Reality is messier than any plan accounts for. Budgets shift. Politics change. Stakeholders disagree. Perfect information never arrives. Most systems break when they hit this tubulence.

I build systems that bend instead of shattering.

The work isn’t avoiding complexity—it’s designing for it. I account for cultural nuance, competing priorities, the fact that reality always exceeds your model of it.

I Translate Between Worlds

I’ve spent years working in places where my assumptions didn’t survive first contact; I had to learn to rebuild them in conversation with others. I’ve done archival research in multiple languages, managed programs across cultures, taught students whose entire intellectual frameworks were incompatible. I’ve translated between academic scholarship and organizational compliance, between theoretical frameworks and operational realities.

I translate frameworks. I help people understand why their approach works in Boston but fails in Tunis, why that policy makes sense to economists but terrifies the people it’s supposed to help, and how to build programs that honor local realities while meeting institutional requirements.

Translation isn’t finding equivalent terms—it’s building bridges sturdy enough to carry actual weight.

Why This Matters Now

We’re living through a crisis of intelligibility: Information proliferates while understanding erodes, expertise multiplies while the ability to connect across domains atrophies, organizations accumulate knowledge they can’t access, people speak past each other using the same words.

The solution isn’t more information. It’s better synthesis. It’s people who can hold multiple frameworks simultaneously without collapsing into relativism, the people who can translate without dilution, and the people who can build systems accounting for reality’s complexity instead of trying to flatten it.

That’s not a technical skill. It’s a way of thinking. A discipline. A practice.

For the past decade, I’ve been building that practice across research, teaching, program coordination, and institutional work. I’ve learned to recognize patterns across domains, navigate ambiguity without losing coherence, and translate between worlds without betraying either.

This is what I do: I help people and organizations see more clearly, think more deeply, and act more effectively.

About This Website

This site serves as my online presence—a portfolio, a home for writing, and a collection of cultural reviews spanning books, films, music, and series. I built it myself from scratch: the HTML structure, CSS styling, JavaScript interactions, and Hugo templating that powers it.

The design reflects how I believe online communication should work in the 21st century. Social media platforms have become walled gardens, each company controlling its own territory and working against the public benefit. I’m interested in something different: decentralized networks where communication moves freely across platforms through open protocols like email and RSS feeds.

The IndieWeb movement’s DIY ethos resonates with me. I remember when the internet felt more open, before it was locked down by a handful of massive corporations. There’s something worth recovering in that earlier vision—inspiration for what digital space could become.

This website represents a positive vision for networked communication. It’s a space I control, built with care and intention, where I can share work without algorithmic interference or corporate mediation. It’s my contribution to what the internet could be: open, personal, interconnected, and genuinely useful.