Terror, Trauma, Transitions : Representing Violence in Sri Lankan Literature

Because of Sri Lanka's 26-year-long ethnic conflict between the Sri Lankan government and militant groups like the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the comparatively brief but bloody conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), violence has occupied an important place in contemporary Sri Lankan literature. This essay surveys the role of violence in contemporary Sri Lanka literature in English, Tamil, and Sinhala, considering the ways in which literature bears witness to violence, mourns violence, protests violence, and calls for and models dialogue and reconciliation.A causa de veintiséis años de conflicto étnico en Sri Lanka entre el gobierno y los grupos militantes como Los Tigres de Liberación de Eelam Tamil (LTTE) y al mismo tiempo, el conflicto, breve pero sangriento, entre el gobierno de Sri Lanka y Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), la violencia ha ocupado un lugar importante en la literatura esrilanquesa contemporánea. Este estudio examina el papel actual de la violencia en la literatura esrilanquesa en inglés de Tamil y Sinhala, teniendo en cuenta las maneras en las cuales la literatura es un testimonio escrito que lamenta, protesta en contra de la violencia y hace un llamamiento a los modelos de diálogo y reconciliación

Terror, Trauma, Transitions : Representing Violence in Sri Lankan Literature

Because of Sri Lanka's 26-year-long ethnic conflict between the Sri Lankan government and militant groups like the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the comparatively brief but bloody conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), violence has occupied an important place in contemporary Sri Lankan literature. This essay surveys the role of violence in contemporary Sri Lanka literature in English, Tamil, and Sinhala, considering the ways in which literature bears witness to violence, mourns violence, protests violence, and calls for and models dialogue and reconciliation.A causa de veintiséis años de conflicto étnico en Sri Lanka entre el gobierno y los grupos militantes como Los Tigres de Liberación de Eelam Tamil (LTTE) y al mismo tiempo, el conflicto, breve pero sangriento, entre el gobierno de Sri Lanka y Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), la violencia ha ocupado un lugar importante en la literatura esrilanquesa contemporánea. Este estudio examina el papel actual de la violencia en la literatura esrilanquesa en inglés de Tamil y Sinhala, teniendo en cuenta las maneras en las cuales la literatura es un testimonio escrito que lamenta, protesta en contra de la violencia y hace un llamamiento a los modelos de diálogo y reconciliación

Terror, trauma y transición: representaciones de la violencia en la literatura de Sri Lanka

Because of Sri Lanka’s 26-year-long ethnic conflict between the Sri Lankan government and militant groups like the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the comparatively brief but bloody conflict between the Sri Lankan government and the Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), violence has occupied an important place in contemporary Sri Lankan literature. This essay surveys the role of violence in contemporary Sri Lanka literature in English, Tamil, and Sinhala, considering the ways in which literature bears witness to violence, mourns violence, protests violence, and calls for and models dialogue and reconciliation.A causa de veintiséis años de conflicto étnico en Sri Lanka entre el gobierno y los grupos militantes como Los Tigres de Liberación de Eelam Tamil (LTTE) y al mismo tiempo, el conflicto, breve pero sangriento, entre el gobierno de Sri Lanka y Janata Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), la violencia ha ocupado un lugar importante en la literatura esrilanquesa contemporánea. Este estudio examina el papel actual de la violencia en la literatura esrilanquesa en inglés de Tamil y Sinhala, teniendo en cuenta las maneras en las cuales la literatura es un testimonio escrito que lamenta, protesta en contra de la violencia y hace un llamamiento a los modelos de diálogo y reconciliación

Terror and reconciliation : Sri Lankan Anglophone literature, 1983-2009 /

Includes bibliographical references and index.Sri Lankan Anglophone literature and the problem of publication -- Island dialogues. Mourning terror: memorials to the conflict in poetry and film -- Talking with the enemy: dialogue and empathy in fiction -- Diasporic interventions. Interpreting the conflict: historiography and Sri Lankan fiction -- Diasporic differences: the Sri Lankan conflict from a distance -- Conclusion

Wielding the “kaduwa”: The politics of Sri Lankan writing in English at a time of ethnic conflict

This dissertation examines the complex issues that are brought up in and by the recent works in English by Sri Lankan writers—both those who live in Sri Lanka and those who do not—when they write about the ethnic conflict that has divided the country for the last two decades. I argue that Sri Lankans who write in English, through the very act of writing, conspicuously problematize dangerous and false claims about national purity. Moreover, I argue that the writings in English by local authors must be considered alongside the more well-known offerings of expatriate writers in order to comprehend how the ethnic conflict has changed the body of Anglophone literature that has come out of and about Sri Lanka as well as to gain a better understanding about the complexities of the situation in the country. Chapter 1 provides the background for the literature about the ethnic conflict by outlining the factors that contributed to the conflict and its various stages as well as the development of Anglophone writing in Sri Lanka. A discussion of the myths of purity put forward by the opposing sides to justify their claims shows why Anglophone literature about the conflict problematizes those narratives. Through a discussion of the works of Neil Fernandopulle and Kamala Wijeratne, Chapter 2 examines the difficulties faced by local writers as they attempt to bring their work to the public in an unhelpful publishing environment. Chapter 3 considers the development of Anglophone literature in Sri Lanka and the effect of the ethnic conflict on this category of literature through an examination of the works of Jean Arasanayagam and the work of Nihal de Silva. Chapter 4 explores the work of two expatriate writers, A. Sivanandan and Shyam Selvadurai, who attempt to intervene in the ongoing debate about the ethnic conflict and primarily address Sri Lankans, presenting the history of the ethnic conflict and racial polarization in Sri Lanka. Chapter 5 examines the work of two other expatriate writers, Romesh Gunesekera and Michael Ondaatje, who attempt to put the problems in Sri Lanka in a global context

“The Shadow Class”: Immigration and Class in Contemporary South Asian/American Fiction.”

This article explores the representation of non-elite immigrants from South Asia to the United States in the fiction of Kiran Desai and Ameena Hussein. The works of these two writers shift the conventional representation of South Asian immigration to the United States as a middle and upper class phenomenon to a representation of the ways that non-elite South Asian immigrant experiences connect with the experiences of immigrants from around the world whose mobility is limited and whose imagined version of their prospective host country is shaped by incomplete and even illusory information