Unequal Academics: AI as a Threat to the Voice and Agency of Asian Women in Academia

Abstract

The application of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been identified as one of the fastest-growing areas in higher education. While AI improves productivity, it simultaneously shapes knowledge production, distribution and evaluation. Utilising a Foucauldian analytical lens, I use voice, agency and epistemic justice as integrated analytical tools to examine how AI-mediated systems constrain the voice and agency of Asian women academics in Western higher education institutions. This conceptual paper argues that AI is not a neutral tool; it is a discursive force embedded within existing structures of power as it standardises academic expression, mediates scholarly visibility, and reproduces existing gendered and racialised inequalities. When we lose Asian women's voices in academic discourse, we risk inaccurate decision-making and the reproduction of structural inequalities. By presenting Asian women academics as a critical case in the debate about scaling up AI use in universities, it provides a conceptual diagnosis of deeper systemic issues with AI. It calls for institutions to create strong academic leadership and AI governance protocols. Our future should be shaped by governance and leadership, not technology.