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My research is grounded in ethnographic fieldwork in the United Kingdom, Germany, and the United States with Turkish and Zimbabwean diaspora communities. Through interviews and participant observation at overseas elections, demonstrations, community meetings, and cultural spaces, I examine how authoritarian politics travels across borders and how emigrants negotiate voice, loyalty, and silence. The photographs below document some of the settings, institutions, objects, and collective practices that shaped this research. Unless otherwise noted, I took them during fieldwork.
Election Campaigning in London
A CHP campaign poster displayed in a community association window before Turkey’s 2023 elections. Overseas campaigns became part of the neighborhood through shops, associations, cultural centers, and other community spaces.
Voting Across Borders
A Turkish overseas polling site in London during the 2023 elections. For several days, voters, state officials, party representatives, and civil-society monitors occupied this temporary political venue.
After the Polls Closed
Late at night, ballots and official records were gathered into sealed bags after voting. Numbered tags, cloth sacks, and wax seals reveal the material procedures behind election administration and the effort to maintain a secure chain of custody.
Monitoring the Election from Abroad
I volunteered through Oy ve Ötesi during Turkey’s 2023 elections in London. Because polling-station observers must be appointed by a political party or an independent candidate, I entered with a party-issued credential while conducting nonpartisan monitoring.
Jeremy Corbyn at the 2024 SPOT Conference
Former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn joined trade unionists, journalists, academics, and campaigners to discuss political repression, attacks on organized labor, and democratic decline in Turkey. His participation connected diaspora advocacy with a broader tradition of international labor solidarity.
Political Memory in Community Spaces
At Gorki’s Library, located inside a cafe, books, posters, and memorial objects make political memory part of everyday life. A banner commemorating Berkin Elvan sits alongside an informal community library, bringing past state violence into an everyday gathering space.
Reading the Community Through Its Own Archives
Local newspapers such as Olay Gazete, Londra Gazete, and Açık Gazete helped me trace organizations, events, and disputes rarely covered by national media. Faruk Eskioğlu’s three-volume Londra’da Bizimkiler placed these encounters within a longer history of migration, work, culture, and community leadership.
Freedom for Can Atalay
London, 2024. At a demonstration organized by TİP UK, participants called for the release of imprisoned MP Can Atalay. The protest brought disputes over courts, representation, and democratic accountability in Turkey into London’s public space.
Funding Politics Through Everyday Solidarity
A £10 solidarity coupon issued by the Britain Election Coordination of the Labour and Freedom Alliance to raise funds for electoral mobilization infrastructure.
Brunch and Politics
North London, April 2, 2023, before the election. Community members filled the hall for a free potluck brunch, bringing food to share before listening to former HDP MP Osman Baydemir. With no entrance or breakfast fee, the gathering relied on collective contribution. Food, hospitality, and political discussion turned a Sunday meal into an accessible form of community mobilization.
Online to Offline Mobilization and Participation
A digital announcement for a community breakfast organized by CHP UK Branch. Flyers like this circulated speakers, locations, and schedules through diaspora networks, turning an ordinary weekend gathering into a political event.
Mobilization Before the Protest
This digital call preceded a June 2023 demonstration demanding the release of Zimbabwean opposition politician Job Sikhala. At the time, Sikhala had spent a year in pretrial detention without bail. The poster shows how diaspora mobilization began online before moving into Parliament Square.
Between Embassies
Participants greet each other and exchange information near the Zimbabwean Embassy before continuing through central London. Demonstrations often moved from the Zimbabwean Embassy to the South African High Commission and then to Downing Street, where activists delivered petitions and sought to convert public protest into diplomatic pressure.
Opposition Fashion
A demonstrator is wearing a 2023 campaign shirt featuring Nelson Chamisa and the Citizens Coalition for Change, then Zimbabwe’s principal opposition coalition. Clothing made political affiliation immediately visible, allowing supporters to carry campaign messages through the streets, even without holding a placard.
Zim Vigil
At the Zim Vigil in London, activists chant, sing, collect signatures, and speak with passersby about political developments in Zimbabwe. The table serves as a public information point, turning the pavement outside the embassy into a space for sustained advocacy and direct engagement with the British public.
Thirteen Miles for a Free Vote
On April 1, 2023, the UK chapter of Restoration of Human Rights Zimbabwe organized a thirteen-mile sponsored walk from Leytonstone to the Zimbabwean Embassy. The walk raised funds for voter-registration outreach and called for a free and credible election.
A banner from the Zimbabwe Human Rights Organisation declares, “ZANU-PF must go.” The Zimbabwe African National Union–Patriotic Front has dominated Zimbabwean politics since independence in 1980, maintaining its rule partly through severe crackdowns on political opposition, activists, and civil society.
Solidarite, fraternite
Demonstrators wrap themselves in Zimbabwean flags and stand shoulder to shoulder outside the Zimbabwean embassy in London.
Making the Message
Protest signs are assembled from cardboard on the pavement before the march.
Dual Citizenship
This artwork from Hakkı Keskin’s personal archive depicts German and Turkish passports, side by side. It was presented to Keskin in recognition of his advocacy for dual citizenship. Keskin is a Turkish-German political scientist, former member of the German Bundestag, and a prominent advocate for the political rights of immigrants in Germany.
Turkey in Berlin
A demonstrator draped in a Turkish flag bearing Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s portrait faces Brandenburg Gate.
Istanbul Is Only Three Hours Away
A hand-lettered sign reads, “Do not think we have left. Istanbul is only three hours away.” The message presents emigrants not as detached observers but as political actors who remain closely connected to political events in Turkey.
Making the Protest
The day before the largest diaspora demonstration of the decade, CHP Berlin's youth branch prepared signs by hand until the midnight. This one reads, “Hands off democracy” and “Middle East Technical University is not alone,” in solidarity with student mobilization in Turkey.
İmamoğlu Is Not Alone
Demonstrators organized a gathering in hours and met at Brandenburg Gate following the detention and imprisonment of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu. The central banner reads, “The CHP will not be left undefended; İmamoğlu is not alone.”
One Sign, Two Political Contexts
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