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Performing colonial sovereignty and the Israeli “separation” wall
Busbridge, Rachel
Busbridge, Rachel
Author
Abstract
As a structure that does not mark an actual border and is constructed primarily on occupied territory, the Israeli 'separation' wall is a unique space that functions as both border and borderlands. Here, I explore the wall as a performance of sovereignty which simultaneously constructs and de-constructs imaginings of the Israeli nation-state. On the one hand, I contend that the wall is a colonial production that draws a psychic line between a 'civilised in here' and 'uncivilised out there', fulfilling the double function of forging a perceived bounded, protective national enclosure at the same time as buttressing the necessity of controlling territory beyond the bounds of that enclosure. On the other hand, I argue that the complex relationship between settler and state materialised in the wall points to a blending of theology and politics in Israel, which threatens to empower a God-sanctioned politics that undermines state. In addition to promoting anxiety of the Palestinian 'out there', then, the wall is understood as also fostering an anxiety increasingly turned inward to the structures of the Israeli state itself
Keywords
sovereignty, performance, 'separation' wall, Israel-Palestine, settler colonialism
Date
2013
Type
Journal article
Journal
Social Identities: journal for the study of race, nation and culture
Book
Volume
19
Issue
5
Page Range
653-669
Article Number
ACU Department
School of Arts and Humanities
Faculty of Education and Arts
Faculty of Education and Arts
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Open Access Status
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Controlled