2017 Workshop

Ann Stoler

On Archiving Dissensus

This paper is an exercise in imagining how a collective might go about shaping the imaginative geography of a Palestinian archive. An issue is an archival assembly  that is not constrained by the command in form and content that is dictated by colonial state priorities nor by even Palestinian authorities- one that is authored and authorized by a constituent as yet unspecified Palestinian representative body. What concerns should be weighed and who shall be its archons? How might a principle of dissensus operate on such a heavily territorialized subject and with the participation of such a vastly deterritorialized populous? Might this disaporic reality provide its strength, its exemplary status, and political grace?