Archival Imperialism: An Analysis of Racial Hierarchy in the Six Day War Files
General Material Designation
[Thesis]
First Statement of Responsibility
Rayan, Tamara N.
Subsequent Statement of Responsibility
Duff, Wendy
.PUBLICATION, DISTRIBUTION, ETC
Name of Publisher, Distributor, etc.
University of Toronto (Canada)
Date of Publication, Distribution, etc.
2020
GENERAL NOTES
Text of Note
68 p.
DISSERTATION (THESIS) NOTE
Dissertation or thesis details and type of degree
M.I.S.
Body granting the degree
University of Toronto (Canada)
Text preceding or following the note
2020
SUMMARY OR ABSTRACT
Text of Note
Using a theoretical framework of critical race theory, settler colonialism, and symbolic annihilation, this research investigates how records creators and archivists of the Six Day War Files Collection have constructed their own narrative of the War, thereby legitimizing a racial hierarchy between Palestinians and Israelis and sustaining Israeli imperialism. Chapter One problematizes why there is little written about Palestine from the archival perspective, despite the abundance of scholarship on the colonial power of the archive. Chapter Two analyzes the content of the Collection, investigating how records creators used symbolic annihilation to construct Palestinians as a racialized Other. Chapter Three analyzes the context of the Collection, investigating how archival practices have sustained the colonizer's representation of the colonized and furthered racial inequality. This thesis offers a novel perspective to the current archival scholarship regarding Palestine, revealing how symbolic annihilation in the archive extends, and is an extension of, systemic annihilation.