Disturbing the Peace: Black Culture and the Police Power after Slavery (Harvard University Press, 2009)

The Tar Baby: A Global History (Princeton University Press, 2017)

Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places (Fordham University Press, 2019), an essay collection, edited with Marianne Constable and Leti Volpp; The Wild Tchoupitoulas (33 ⅓ Series, 2019), a study of a classic funk album that set the template for the commercialization of processional second-line music; and The Life and Legend of Bras-Coupé: The Fugitive Slave Who Fought the Law, Ruled the Swamp, Danced at Congo Square, Invented Jazz, and Died for Love (Louisiana State University Press, 2019), a documentary history of an eminent maroon.

He is Principal Investigator for two multidisciplinary projects in the digital humanities: Louisiana Slave Conspiracies (lsc.berkeley.edu), an interactive archive of trial manuscripts related to slave conspiracies organized at the Pointe Coupée Post in the Spanish territory of Louisiana in 1791 and 1795; and Tremé 1908, which tells the story of one year in the everyday life of an extraordinary neighhorhood that was a crucible for civil rights activism, cultural fusion, and musical innovation.  

He is currently writing a book, The People's Court: Law and Performance from Slavery to the Civil Rights Movement, that reconstructs a period-bound demotic tradition in music, folklore, popular theater, and vaudeville comedy based on the setting and procedures of the minor judiciary. He is also working on a public humanities collaboration, An Open Classroom on New Orleans Culture, with partnering organizations including Neighborhood Story Project and New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts.