I was born in the English town of Luton, and spent my childhood on the town's post-war Farley Hill council estate. My love of history was inspired by James Dyer FSA (1934-2013), archaeologist and historian, who in the 1960s taught at my primary school.

I came with my family as assisted migrants to Brisbane in 1996.  Living in what was then the outer southern suburb of     Acacia Ridge,  I attended Salisbury High School, leaving at grade 12 with mediocre grades.  While working for Queensland Prison's Department as a records clerk, I attended evening classes,  achieving adult matriculation to James Cook University of North Queensland. 

I began my studies at James Cook University in 1974, after The Whitlam Government passed the Student Assistance Act the previous year to provide means-tested financial assistance for tertiary students.

My intention was to become a clinical psychologist, but I was soon drawn to study literature and intellectual history, not least because I came to think that many common psychological problems were social problems with historical origins.

In the late 1970s, I chose to pursue a doctorate in history under the supervision of Paul Lawrence Rose, investigating the religious, philosophical  and historical thought of Edward Gibbon, the great Enlightenment historian of Rome. 

In the late 1980s, I was drawn to investigate the scientific theft and uses of the bodily remains of Australia's First peoples, and the history of comparative human anatomy and anthropology from the Enlightenment to the early twentieth century. This has led to many years spent in archive-based historical research and analysis, informed by concepts in the historiography of science and colonialism.  

For near thirty years now, I have drawn on my research to assist  First Nations, state and national museums in Australia and overseas, and Australia’s federal government, to locate, identify and repatriate First Nations Ancestors from overseas scientific institutions to their communities of origin for reburial. 

I am also known internationally as a pioneer in creating research-based digital resources for Pacific and Australian history, and I have been instrumental in the creation of the Return, Reconcile, Renew Archive, an innovative, indispensable online knowledge base for assisting Australian and other First Peoples in locating and repatriating their Ancestors in Western medico-sceintific archives.   

My first academic job was tutoring in European History at Macquarie University. Since then I have held positions teaching history and digital humanities at several Australian universities – with guest appointments and fellowships in European and US academia. 

I took early retirement  from the University of Tasmania in 2017  to focus on research writing in late 2017.