Messages in Bottles: An Archive of Black Iraqi Identity in Diaa Jubaili’s al-Biṭrīq al-Aswad

The novel al-Biṭrīq al-Aswad [The Black Penguin] by the Iraqi author Diaa Jubaili is a rare example of contemporary Arabic that centers experiences Iraq’s population, most whom live near Basra in south. novel’s mixed-race narrator recounts his life story form letters addressed to international figures, highlighting family on margins society and later involvement with real-life civil rights group, Movement Free Iraqis. This article draws Stuart Hall’s dual conception cultural identity diaspora frame characters’ search for as dynamic engagement memory, one represents counternarrative face legacies African slavery legal discrimination.