Archival aporias : the (im)material limits of archival violence in Tigray and Palestine

This thesis aims to bring the material and immaterial limits of the archive into focus in the hopes of undermining the structures of violence which are stored within and reproduced by the archive. My overall methodological approach is perhaps best described as a critical archival study. I draw from theorists who engage with ‘the archive’ as a conceptual framework to elucidate the relationship between the archive, settler colonialism, ethnonationalism, antiblackness, and slavery. I will first argue that the archival and genocidal violence suffered by Tigrayans and Palestinians are functions of the ethnonational state-making projects of Ethiopia and Israel, respectively, with these projects being constituted through the archival regimes of these states. I will then conduct close analyses of Sarah Wood’s short film, For Cultural Purposes Only (2009), and Kamal Aljafari’s feature length A Fidai Film (2024) to determine whether counter-archival aesthetic practices can turn the various forms of archival violence discussed throughout this thesis against the forces that sanction them.