His focus is historical archaeology, or the archaeology of the modern world, with research interests in the material culture of labor, immigration, and diaspora. His main research centers on the Irish Diaspora, both in the United States and Ireland. His work has been featured in top tiered archaeology journals and he is the author of one of the first books on the material culture of the Irish Diaspora – An Historical Archaeology of the Irish Diaspora: A Transnational Approach. Dr. Brighton is a licensed archaeologist in Ireland and currently directs a field school on the Irish Diaspora in Skibbereen, County Cork.