The Repercussions of Sectarian Violence in Post-Invasion Iraq: The Implementation of Fanon’s “National Culture" In Saadawi’s Frankenstein in Baghdad

Abstract

The military invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the Iraqis quest for molding a national culture features the repercussions of colonialism and the reality of decolonization. Within the institution of literature, there are a burgeoning literary writing on the project of nationalism and imperialism in Iraq. Of course, introspectively, some Iraqi writers strive to creatively depict the unceasing legacy of the American-led invasion of Iraq and, indeed, the individual, collective and the national experiences of Iraqi people in their works as vehicle for conveying historical, moral, plural and national conflicts and resolutions. Some Iraqi writers illustrate the notion of post-colonialism, nationalism, tradition and revolution in post-colonial Iraqi books and what happened in the Republic of Iraq after 2003. Not only that, they show the demands of Iraqis’ for a national culture and how can the affirmation of the Iraqi’s existence be reflected in a literary work. By using the postcolonial lens of Fanon’s “national culture”, this study examines Saadawi’s novel of Frankenstein in Baghdad, to explicate how the Iraqi writer Ahmed Saadawi reflects on the personal, collective and national experiences of post-invasion Baghdad. My premise is that a Fanonian approach to the project of colonialism, nationalism and evolution in the story of Frankenstein in Baghdad draws the malice of sectarian violence, national disintegration and the hope for creating a revolutionary national culture in the context of post-invasion Iraq. A brief historical background will be provided to recognize the Iraqi’s responses to sectarian violence and its particular effects on their national culture.