Bullets in Envelopes: Iraqi Academics in Exile

by Louis Yako

Following the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, many Iraqi academics were assassinated. Countless others received bullets in envelopes and instructions to leave their institutions (and in many cases the country) or get killed. Many heeded the warning and fled into exile. Having played such a pivotal role in shaping post-independence Iraqi society, the exile and internal displacement of its academics has had a profound impact. Tracing the academic, political, and social lives of more than 60 academics, Bullets in Envelopes offers a 'genealogy of loss', and a groundbreaking appraisal of the dismantling and restructuring of Iraqi institutions, culture and society. Through extensive fieldwork in the UK, Jordan and Iraqi Kurdistan, Louis Yako shows the human side of the destructive 2003 occupation, how things are today, and how they came to be.

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2021

About the author

Louis Yako, PhD, is an independent Iraqi-American anthropologist, writer, poet, and journalist.

Reviews

[Sergio · Rating 4 out of 5]

An extremely compelling and well structured book that also happens to be an very tough read about people's careers being derailed before their eyes as part of an assault on Iraq's education system and social fabric as a result of the UN's sanctions and the 2003 US invasion. The transcribed conversation fragments really propelled me through; the context and stories provided in-between are good, but hearing people's experiences from their own mouths is really effective and hard hitting.

[Todd Heath · Rating 5 out of 5]

No better way to get educated on Iraq and Middle Eastern history affairs.