Arts Access

Haller and the Veterans Book Project team built relationships with the Iraqi American Reconciliation Project and the communities they serve. In addition, our grant activities helped Iraqi American Reconciliation Project connect with new Iraqi families, expanding their community and the individuals they will serve in the future. Iraqi American Reconciliation Project and Veterans Book Project worked together throughout the year, and evaluated this work in various ways. This success was measured through our communication with each other all along. For example, at the end of the workshop activities and before the next phase of promotion, lead Iraqi American Reconciliation Project contact, Luke Wilcox and I met outside the busy, practical interaction we normally have just to keep the project running, and reflected on our work process. We discussed the future, too - ongoing ways Iraqi American Reconciliation Project could sustain the bookmaking and exhibiting. The second way we measure the success of this relationship is through the fact that Iraqi American Reconciliation Project has initiated ongoing projects with Veterans Book Project. Iraqi American Reconciliation Project has written a National Endowment for the Arts grant and several others that include the Veterans Book Project. They want to continue exhibiting the Veterans Book Project books on their own throughout the United States, and also try to take over the workshop to make more books. They have hosted their own Veterans Book Project book reading receptions in addition to the ones described here. They have done radio interviews together with Veterans Book Project authors, and use the Veterans Book Project books for their own fundraising and promotional purposes to show what their organization has done. The books demonstrate the urgency and reasons to support their important work with Iraqi/American reconciliation. 2: We measured by the number of Iraqis who made books. Eleven Iraqi authors total - higher than anticipated, despite very real barriers: Language. Transportation. Safety. Safety comes with anonymity and making their experience public threatens this safety. Time was a barrier, especially for Iraqi authors. The student authors were often responsible for caring for their younger siblings. Adults, too. For two young Iraqi female authors, once into book-making process, we faced cultural and generational barriers where fathers reconsidered allowing their daughters to finish their books. One substantial way we addressed these barriers was taking TIME. Getting to know the authors’ family members. Picking up authors, dropping them off. Haller revised the workshop structure to meet nights, weekends. We often met individually instead of group. Language differences, intensity of experience, the scope of Iraqis’ books, the extent to which the war changed their whole lives all required time.