Culture and Politics of Identity in Sri Lanka

Culture and Politics of Identity in Sri Lanka
Author: Mithran Tiruchelvam
Publisher:
Total Pages: 212
Release: 1998
Genre: Social Science
ISBN:

Papers presented at a symposium held at the International Centre for Ethnic Studies, Colombo, 13-15 March 1997; chiefly reflects the social aspects of cultural and political identity in Sri Lanka.

Everyday Ethnicity in Sri Lanka

Everyday Ethnicity in Sri Lanka
Author: Daniel Bass
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 250
Release: 2013
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0415526248

Focusing on notions of diaspora, identity and agency, this book examines ethnicity in war-torn Sri Lanka. It highlights the historical development and negotiation of a new identification of Up-country Tamil amidst Sri Lanka's violent ethnic politics. Over the past thirty years, Up-country (Indian) Tamils generally have tried to secure their vision of living within a multi-ethnic Sri Lanka, not within Tamil Eelam, the separatist dream that ended with the civil war in 2009. Exploring Sri Lanka within the deep history of colonial-era South Asian plantation diasporas, the book argues Up-country Tamils form a "diaspora next-door" to their ancestral homeland. It moves beyond simplistic Sinhala-Tamil binaries and shows how Sri Lanka's ethnic troubles actually have more in common with similar battles that diasporic Indians have faced in Fiji and Trinidad than with Hindu-Muslim communalism in neighbouring India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Shedding new light on issues of agency, citizenship, displacement and re-placement within the formation of diasporic communities and identities, this book demonstrates the ways that culture workers, including politicians, trade union leaders, academics and NGO workers, have facilitated the development of a new identity as Up-country Tamil. It is of interest to academics working in the fields of modern South Asia, diaspora, violence, post-conflict nations, religion and ethnicity.

The Politics and Poetics of Authenticity

The Politics and Poetics of Authenticity
Author: Harshana Rambukwella
Publisher: UCL Press
Total Pages: 178
Release: 2018-07-02
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 1787351289

What is the role of cultural authenticity in the making of nations? Much scholarly and popular commentary on nationalism dismisses authenticity as a romantic fantasy or, worse, a deliberately constructed mythology used for political manipulation. The Politics and Poetics of Authenticity places authenticity at the heart of Sinhala nationalism in late nineteenth and twentieth-century Sri Lanka. It argues that the passion for the ‘real’ or the ‘authentic’ has played a significant role in shaping nationalist thinking and argues for an empathetic yet critical engagement with the idea of authenticity. Through a series of fine-grained and historically grounded analyses of the writings of individual figures central to the making of Sinhala nationalist ideology the book demonstrates authenticity’s rich and varied presence in Sri Lankan public life and its key role in understanding postcolonial nationalism in Sri Lanka and elsewhere in South Asia and the world. It also explores how notions of authenticity shape certain strands of postcolonial criticism and offers a way of questioning the taken-for-granted nature of the nation as a unit of analysis but at the same time critically explore the deep imprint of nations and nationalisms on people's lives.

The Sri Lanka Reader

The Sri Lanka Reader
Author: John Holt
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 791
Release: 2011-04-13
Genre: History
ISBN: 0822349825

Fifty-four images and more than ninety classic and contemporary texts introduce Sri Lankas recorded history of more than two and a half millennia.

Dressing the Colonised Body

Dressing the Colonised Body
Author: Nira Wickramasinghe
Publisher: Orient Blackswan
Total Pages: 188
Release: 2003
Genre: Design
ISBN: 9788125024798

This Book Explores Popular, Political And Symbolic Meanings Assigned To Dress In A Variety Of Colonial Contexts In Sri Lanka; Thus It Focuses On The Politics Of Nationalism And Identity Under Late Colonialism. Proceeding From The Understanding That Self-Representation Is At Its Peak At The Moment Of Political Independence, The Author Examines The Lineages That Exist Between That Moment In Sri Lanka And The Colonial Past, As Also The Meaning Of The Commemorations That Took Place On Independence Day.

Identity and Pleasure

Identity and Pleasure
Author: Ariel Heryanto
Publisher: NUS Press
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2014-07-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9971698218

Identity and Pleasure: The Politics of Indonesian Screen Culture critically examines what media and screen culture reveal about the ways urban-based Indonesians attempted to redefine their identity in the first decade of this century. Through a richly nuanced analysis of expressions and representations found in screen culture (cinema, television and social media), it analyses the waves of energy and optimism, and the disillusionment, disorientation and despair, that arose in the power vacuum that followed the dramatic collapse of the militaristic New Order government. While in-depth analyses of identity and political contestation within the nation are the focus of the book, trans-national engagements and global dimensions are a significant part of the story in each chapter. The author focuses on contemporary cultural politics in Indonesia, but each chapter contextualizes current circumstances by setting them within a broader historical perspective.

The Politics of Difference

The Politics of Difference
Author: Edwin Norman Wilmsen
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 232
Release: 1996-08
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780226900162

According to most social scientists, the advent of a global media village and the rise of liberal democratic government would diminish ethnic and national identity as a source of political action. Yet the contemporary world is in the midst of an explosion of identity politics and often violent ethnonationalism. This volume examines cases ranging from the well-publicized ethnonationalism of Bosnia and post-Apartheid South Africa to ethnic conflicts in Belgium and Sri Lanka. Distinguished international scholars including John Comaroff, Stanley J. Tambiah, and Ernesto Laclau argue that continued acceptance of imposed ethnic terms as the most appropriate vehicle for collective self-identification and social action legitimizes the conditions of inequality that give rise to them in the first place. This ambitious attempt to explain the inadequacies of current approaches to power and ethnicity forges more realistic alternatives to the volatile realities of social difference.

Culture and Politics in South Asia

Culture and Politics in South Asia
Author: Dev Nath Pathak
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2017-07-20
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1351656139

This volume looks at the politics of communication and culture in contemporary South Asia. It explores languages, signs and symbols reflective of current mythologies that underpin instances of performance in present-day India and its neighbouring countries. From gender performances and stage depictions to protest movements, folk songs to cinematic reconstructions and elections to war-torn regions, the chapters in the book bring the multiple voices embedded within the grand theatre of popular performance and the cultural landscape of the region to the fore. Breaking new ground, this work will prove useful to students and researchers in sociology and social anthropology, art and performance studies, political studies and international relations, communication and media studies and culture studies.

Heritage Movements in Asia

Heritage Movements in Asia
Author: Ali Mozaffari
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 216
Release: 2019-11-04
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1789204828

Heritage processes vary according to cultural, national, geographical, and historical contexts. This volume is unique in that it is dedicated to approaching the analysis of heritage through the concepts of social movements. Adapting the latest developments in the field of social movements, the chapters examine the formation, use and contestation of heritage by various official, non-official and activist players and the spaces where such ongoing negotiations and contestation take place. By bringing social movements into heritage studies, the book advocates a shift of perspective in understanding heritage, one that is no longer bound by (at times arbitrary) divisions such as those assumed between the state and people or between experts and non-experts.

The Politics of Religion, Nationalism, and Identity in Asia

The Politics of Religion, Nationalism, and Identity in Asia
Author: Jeff Kingston
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 309
Release: 2019-07-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 1442276886

This comprehensive book provides a comparative analysis of religious nationalism in contemporary, globalized Asia. Exploring the nexus of religion, identity, and nationalism, Jeff Kingston assesses similarities and differences across the region, focusing on how religious sentiments influence how people embrace nationalism and with what consequences. Kingston shows that in the age of the internet this has become an especially volatile mix that breeds violence and poses a significant risk to secularism, diversity, civil liberties, democracy, and political stability. This extremist tide has swept across Asia with tragic results, as witnessed by 730,000 Rohingya Muslims driven out of Myanmar, 70,000 Kashmiris slaughtered in India, and Islamic State affiliates terrorizing Bangladesh, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Sri Lanka. Who could have imagined Buddhist monks inciting violence and intolerance or setting themselves on fire? Or pious vigilantes beheading atheist bloggers? Or clerics defeating and jailing powerful politicians on blasphemy allegations? And, what explains why one million Uighur Muslims are locked up in China? Examining the causes and consequences of these varied phenomena and what they portend, Kingston casts a sobering light on the prospects of the Asian Century.