Short Abstract

This panel examines ethics in research practices in the humanities and social sciences through Nigerian Studies. It explores the stakes and limits of research conducted “with” or “for” people and communities in Nigeria and across its diasporas, approaching ethics as integral to the research process.

Long Abstract

This panel examines ethics in research practices in the humanities and social sciences through the lens of Nigerian studies. On the one hand, domination and decoloniality are simultaneously research objects, epistemic positions, and critical categories that invite us to consider ethics in relation to asymmetries specific to the Nigerian groups and societies under study, as well as to those that exist between Western and Nigerian researchers and institutions. On the other hand, Nigeria and its diasporas are themselves shaped by hierarchies rooted in the histories and trajectories of individuals and groups, which fieldwork can bring to light through ethnographic experience.

Nigerian studies, understood in both theoretical and empirical terms, thus illustrate the necessary shift from research conducted “on” to research conducted “with”, and potentially even “for”. This panel explores the effects, stakes, and limits of this shift, bringing together contributions grounded in concrete research experiences in Nigeria or among its diasporas. It invites reflection on how researchers approach ethics not merely as an institutional protocol or a peripheral aspect of research, but as a process inherent to the research endeavour—one that requires attention to and critical reflection on: the power relations that shape fieldwork relationships; the researcher’s positionality and reflexivity; the role of interlocutors, research assistants, translators, intermediaries, and Nigerian colleagues in defining research objects, categories, and analyses; and the development of methods for sharing knowledge that go beyond mere restitution and instead open up possibilities for extending the research through critical engagement.

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