The article titled “The Archive as a Battlefield for the Future: Anti-colonial Struggles and Insurgent Temporality” published in South Atlantic Quarterly, critically examines what it means to engage with the artifacts of past struggles and insurgencies. It argues for a historical method that emphasizes the agency of insurgent subjects, women, slaves, foreigners, the poor, and peasants, highlighting their role in shaping an "insurgent universality" (Tomba 2019).
The authors explore pivotal moments of collective resistance, including the international brigades of the Spanish Civil War, the peasants supporting the Second Havana Declaration, and the audience for Thomas Sankara's historic speech in Harlem. These events are presented as embodied expressions of collective struggles, showcasing a political subjectivity that challenges the temporal and spatial boundaries of modern politics.
The study suggests that these artifacts of insurgency hold transformative potential for contemporary political thought and action, offering profound ways to reimagine and engage with the political present.