The Epistemic Advantage of the Periphery: A Self-socioanalysis of Academic Habitus in the European Scientific Field

This article challenges the notion that a peripheral position (geographical and/or symbolic) in the scientific field in relation to dominant centers is merely a structural disadvantage, advancing the thesis that can be converted into a distinct epistemic advantage. To defend this argument, the research is based on a Bourdieusian-inspired self-socioanalysis, in which the author examines his own trajectory as a sociologist in an ultra-peripheral territory (the islands of the Azores), using structural challenges as empirical data. The analysis concludes that the peripheral condition potentially fosters a specific academic habitus that transforms practical obstacles into objects of research. In this way, scientific objectivity is redefined not as neutrality, but as the ability to rigorously objectify one's own position in the field, converting disadvantages into strategic observation points. The main implication is that the subjectivity of the researcher, when rigorously analyzed, becomes a tool for uncovering power structures in science, demonstrating that the periphery can be a privileged starting point for a deeper and more objective sociology.