Modern Berber/Amazigh identity has been deeply shaped by the political and epistemological interventions of French colonialism, ranging from the fantasy of “our loyal Berbers” to the misconception of a strict dualism between bilad al-Makhzen (in the language of Scott: the space of state-making) and bilad al-siba (or for Scott: the space of state evasion). This paper explores how modern Amazigh nationalism deals with this contested legacy: While modern Amazigh nationalism mirrors certain colonial ideas (not least in terms of Amazigh indigeneity), the symbolic repertoire of the Amazigh cultural movement clearly reflects core notions of anti-colonial nation-building. Based on the case study of the Berber Academy, the paper explores how this site of intellectual production integrated both colonial motifs and anti-colonial patterns of resistance, reflecting its historical setting in Paris in the 1960s and 1970s. The paper discusses how the scholarly output of the Berber Academy discussed Amazigh history in terms of state evasion and state-making, frequently with a focus on reinventing an Amazigh past that lived up to the state-focused expectations of anti-national liberation movements of the time.