About

Iraq Lullaby Service is a singing syndication service provided by kanarinka for Iraqi blogs during 2009 (why?), the year in which the US is to begin ending its occupation of Iraq. I sing one blog post every week or two as a lullaby to my young son in Boston. Each song is broadcast via this website and a video podcast. Please subscribe and/or leave your comments.


kanarinka

About kanarinka

I am an artist and educator based in Boston, MA. You can learn more about me on my website. To suggest an Iraqi blog post to sing for this week or an Iraqi blog that I should include, send me an email.

Why an Iraq Lullaby Service?

Lullabies are melodic and repetitive. They have traditionally served as cautionary tales for a child’s moral development and many include violence. My son was born in August 2008 into a world where the US forces were (are) occupying Iraq. Iraq, like so many other remote wars, is a place that US citizens see through media channels – tv, newspapers, internet. The news can sometimes be numbing. So I decided to create an intimate, embodied news service, for myself and my son (and you, Reader-Watcher), as a way to try to connect to the everyday lives, opinions, and small broadcasts in a conflict that is impossible to comprehend but morally, ethically and politically difficult to ignore the ways in which the futures of Iraq and the US are now intertwined. Of course, this fails on many levels – does a practice of paying attention change anything? Does striving for empathy count as political action? Does my son have any idea about all this? – Perhaps not, but I’m doing it anyways.

Thanks

Thanks to the following organizations and people for their help in making this project possible: Anderson Ranch Extending Creativity in Digital Media program, RISD Professional Development Fund, iKatun, Savic Rasovic, Yuri Stone, Dave Raymond and, of course, my son.

About This Site

A singing syndication service provided by kanarinka for Iraqi blogs during 2009, the year in which the US is to begin ending its occupation of Iraq. I sing one blog post every week or two as a lullaby to my young son in Boston.