Bordering the academy: comment la frontière de Damoclès empêche de travailler sur la Palestine?

Abstract. As the author carried out a research project on the question of borders in Palestine at the end of the 2010 decade, she offers a retrospective of her experience in the form of commented narrative reconstructions. Through this process, the author describes and analyzes the processes of silenciation and the obstacles encountered in conducting research on Palestine. The author first examines the physical entry to the study territory, to show how this moment involved a negotiation between ethics and lies. In addition to the classic considerations surrounding access to the field, this example will then reveal the institutional obstacles to the deployment of research that the author had to face, involving strong pressure from her peers and institutional disengagement. Finally, the author takes a look back to the formulation of the concept of «border of Damocles» to describe the experience of borders that cross the Palestinian space and the bodies that inhabit it. She proposes to apply this concept to academic space itself. In so doing, the author intends to raise questions about what is and what is not legitimate within the academic space, drawing a line between legitimate and illegitimate debate and reflecting on the power relations that act as structural brakes on the production of knowledge.