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Paper short abstract

This paper critiques colonial dynamics in knowledge production on the South Caucasus, showing how Global North scholars exploit local researchers and contexts while erasing epistemic agency.It calls for radical decolonisation of research that prioritises ethical,situated, and collaborative practice.

Paper long abstract

This article interrogates the colonial dynamics embedded in contemporary academic knowledge production on the South Caucasus, with particular attention to how Global North institutions and scholars reproduce epistemic violence through extractive research practices. Drawing on autoethnographic reflection and critical decolonial scholarship, the article foregrounds the lived experiences of a precarious researcher from Azerbaijan navigating Western academia while researching queer life in authoritarianism. It argues that scholars from the region are routinely positioned as “local informants,” fixers, or fieldwork facilitators, rather than recognised as equal intellectual contributors. Meanwhile, white, institutionally secure academics leverage the South Caucasus as a site of career advancement, often engaging in superficial or fragmented fieldwork that flattens political, historical, and social complexities.

The article further examines academic gatekeeping, citation regimes, and funding infrastructures that privilege Global North epistemologies while marginalising situated, embodied, and politically engaged knowledge. Particular attention is paid to the role of German-speaking academia in reinforcing hierarchical norms of critique, surveillance, and silencing, as well as to the broader political limits of academic freedom in Europe. Ultimately, this piece calls for a radical rethinking of research ethics, collaboration, and authorship. It advances epistemic resistance as both a methodological and political imperative, insisting that decolonising the Caucasus requires not symbolic inclusion, but the redistribution of authority, resources, and narrative power.