Abstract
Totalitarian terror compels people to develop strategies and practices for protecting themselves that people in democracies almost never need to know. Blending in becomes a survival tactic, like camouflage; communication is fraught; and individuals generally assume they are under some form of surveillance. In Iran, this situation is hardly new: for more than four decades, Iranians inside and outside the country have developed sophisticated ways of coding their language—both verbal and visual—to survive. In what follows, I consider how Iranian artists put these practices into play, and I use these case studies to frame my own practice as...