‘A true Iraqi’: blogging from the Green Zone in post-invasion Iraq

The use of digital spaces to record everyday experiences and speak against oppression has taken on different forms throughout the Middle East over the last decade. Following the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq, Iraqi women used online spaces to grapple with the politics of everyday life – growing up and working in war-torn Iraq. In this paper we engage with one Iraqi woman – Neurotic Iraqi Wife (or ‘Neurotica’) – who works and blogs from Iraq’s Green Zone. Neurotica questions her presence in the Americanized Green Zone and agonizes over her identity as a married ‘Iraqi expat’. Her blog tells a story of movement, struggle, alienation, longing and nostalgia. In her blog, Neurotica practises a digital self that questions political processes, occupation, intervention and her own presence in Iraq. Her blog offers a glimpse into a life-world shaped during a time of war, social chaos and violence.