The project Hidden Research performs stories and conflicts about scientific freedom by endangered and refugee scientists worldwide. The performances are based on interviews with researchers and extracted leitmotifs that are dramaturgically constructed in the form of dialogues. Hidden Research brings these theatrical dialogues into the public space and thus creates points of contact with the anonymous, personal experiences of the scientists. In addition, the connections between academic freedom and democracy are communicated via public events organised by the Berlin University Alliance (BUA) and via digital content (project website in progress). Hidden Research is based on close cooperation between thematically relevant research projects from the humanities, social sciences and theatre studies, affected researchers and performance artists and dramaturges who deal intensively with the topic of academic freedom.

The Berlin Center for Global Engagement (BCGE) is coordinating the project in close scientific collaboration with the BUA project Co2libri. The SCRIPTS Cluster of Excellence, Center for Comparative Research on Democracy (CCRD) of Humboldt University, the BUA Obj. 2 Fostering Knowledge Exchange, and the BUA Forum on Diplomatic Resilience are also supporting the project.

Hidden Research is being funded as part of the BMBF Science Year 2024 from May to December 2024.