Ethnicity, Indigeneity, and Migration in the Advent of British Rule to Sri Lanka

The notion that the colonial entity administered as Ogoja Province represented a Nigerian form of “the frontier” persisted right through the period of British rule in Nigeria. In a late colonial geography, Ogoja and eastern Calabar are referred to as the “pioneer fringe.” Marginalized by the economic geography of colonialism, as a result of its relatively low population density, in contrast to much of southeastern Nigeria, and by virtue of its terrain, crossed by unforded rivers and characterized by heavy, clayey soils which restricted wet-season travel, it could still be characterized in the 1940s as a “traceless praierie [sic]” by one of its most seasoned European observers, and as “the Lost Province” in common colonial parlance. Scholarly exploration has done little to address this marginalization, a fact both pivotal in the administration and development of Ogoja Province and restrictive of our attempts to understand and describe these administrative processes. The dynamics of community, trade, and migration in Ogoja, and the systematic misunderstandings to which these dynamics were subject, both constitute historical processes which call for scrutiny, and help shape development and welfare projects undertaken in the later colonial period and in post-independence Nigeria. This study investigates the problematic interaction of ethnography and administration at the colonial margin, and the implications of this both for the historical study of Ogoja and its hinterland and for economic and social development planning in the area.

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The Ambivalence of Freedom: Slaves in Jaffna, Sri Lanka, in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

The Journal of Asian Studies ◽

10.1017/s0021911819000159 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 78 (03) ◽

pp. 497-519

Author(s):

Nira Wickramasinghe ◽

Alicia Schrikker

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

East India Company ◽

Dutch East India Company ◽

Court Records ◽

Local Practice ◽

British Rule ◽

Eighteenth And Nineteenth Centuries ◽

Dutch Colonial

This article discusses slavery and the lives of enslaved people in Jaffna, northern Sri Lanka, under Dutch and British rule. It argues that by sanctioning and tapping into a perceived local practice of slavery and legally constituting slaves, Dutch colonial rulers further strengthened the power of the dominant caste Vellalar over their subordinates. This was done through processes of registration, legal codification, and litigation. For some enslaved people, however, bureaucratization provided grounds for negotiation and resistance, as well as the potential to take control over their individual lives. British rule that took over areas controlled by the Dutch East India Company or Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie—first in the guise of the East India Company (1796–1802), then under the Crown (1802–1948)—introduced a number of measures, acts, and incentives to dismantle slavery as it was practiced on the island. This article draws from Dutch and early British period petitions, court records, commission reports, and slave registers to interrogate the discourse of freedom that permeated the British abolition of slavery from 1806 to 1844 and suggests that in Jaffna after abolition there remained bondage in freedom.

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Locations of Authenticity: S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka and the Search for Indigeneity

The Journal of Asian Studies ◽

10.1017/s0021911816002047 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 76 (2) ◽

pp. 383-400 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Harshana Rambukwella

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

Political Elite ◽

Late Nineteenth Century ◽

Nationalist Discourse ◽

British Rule ◽

The People ◽

Cultural Implications ◽

The Face ◽

Paddy Cultivation ◽

Village Life

Visions of a grand hydraulic civilization and a pastoral ideal of paddy cultivation–based village life have shaped Sinhala nationalist discourse since the late nineteenth century. Derived from colonial sociology, the local political elite fashioned these ideas into a discourse of Sinhala authenticity that positioned themselves as legitimate representatives of the people while simultaneously placing them as custodians of national culture. However, this was a fraught dynamic given the elites’ highly Anglicized nature and their inability to maintain control over this discourse in the face of wider participation in public culture in the first half of the twentieth century. S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, who became prime minister in 1956, eight years after Sri Lanka gained independence from British rule, is popularly seen as one of the few elite politicians of the late colonial period who sought to engage substantively in mass-based politics and is remembered as a heroic anti-colonial figure. This article explores the contradictions and ironies in Bandaranaike's turn to indigeneity and the political and cultural implications of this turn. It also briefly discusses authenticity's continued resonance in contemporary Sri Lanka.

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Social Mobility, Popular Ideology, and Collective Violence in Modern Sri Lanka

The Journal of Asian Studies ◽

10.2307/2056900 ◽

1987 ◽

Vol 46 (3) ◽

pp. 583-602 ◽

Cited By ~ 13

Author(s):

John D. Rogers

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

South Asia ◽

Social Mobility ◽

Good Deal ◽

Colonial Period ◽

Collective Violence ◽

Modern Times ◽

Political Beliefs ◽

British Rule

Riots, rebellions, and other disturbances have broken out periodically in most parts of South Asia in modern times. Both early resistance to British rule and the religious and nationalist violence of the later colonial period have attracted a good deal of attention from scholars. One of the general trends apparent from this research is the weakening of distinctions among “communal,” “economic,” and “political” disturbances, and detailed studies have emphasized the ambiguity of most riots. Ostensibly religious affrays often reflected more general social and economic tensions, while the expression of economic grievances was often channeled by cultural or political beliefs.

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Feeling of love in Batticaloa folk songs

International Research Journal of Tamil ◽

10.34256/irjt21414 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 3 (4) ◽

pp. 108-121

Author(s):

Murugu Thayanithy

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

Tamil Nadu ◽

Folk Songs ◽

Cultural Hierarchy ◽

The People ◽

Love Marriage ◽

Written Form ◽

Long Time ◽

And Migration ◽

The 19Th Century

Literatures have been studied orally before taking written form. History makes it clear that such songs were written during the Sanskrit period. These oral literatures shed light on the life and history of a country and its flaws and serve as a mirror that reveals the cultures, customs, and ancient thoughts of the people. Although the study of folk songs on the world stage has been in vogue for a long time, it came into practice in Tamil Nadu in the 19th century and then came into the study. However, it has not been advanced as a separate discipline in the University of Sri Lanka to date. Instead, the study of folk songs is being carried out in collaboration with the Tamil Department.In the case of Batticaloa Tamil Nadu, the close connection between India and Sri Lanka due to migration, migration and migration from ancient times can be seen from the identification of Tamils as the first and last king of Sri Lanka.Therefore, it is possible to realize that folk songs are widespread among the people of Batticaloa as there was not only Tamil Nadu connection but also Indian national connection. The songs are arranged in the form of Ritual, Rain and Famine, Lullaby, Game, love, Marriage, Family, Community, Relationship and Career, Obpari, Swing, Satire, Mother Songs.These songs explore love songs, present the feeling of love found in them, show how they fit in with the general characteristics found in the literature of Sangala Agathi and reveal aspects of the Batticaloa socio-cultural hierarchy. The gist of the song is not to give a direct meaning, but to explain its essence. They are classified as motherly songs, Fatherly songs, Leader songs, Leader songs, Friend songs, and General songs.

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Confrontations with Colonialism: Resistance, Revivalism and Reform under British Rule in Sri Lanka 1796-1920 (Vol. I) by P. V. J. Jayasekera

Sri Lanka Journal of Social Sciences ◽

10.4038/sljss.v41i1.7593 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 41 (1) ◽

pp. 65 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Chandra Richard De Silva

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

British Rule

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Hocazâde Süleyman Şevket’in Gözünden Lozan Sonrası Kıbrıs Türkleri / Cyprus Turks After Lausanne Through the Eyes of Hocazâde Süleyman Şevket

Journal of History Culture and Art Research ◽

10.7596/taksad.v8i2.2064 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 8 (2) ◽

pp. 450

Author(s):

Cemile Şahin

Keyword(s):

Social Life ◽

Reform Movements ◽

Turkish Republic ◽

British Rule ◽

The Future ◽

Archival Documents ◽

And Migration ◽

Education Culture ◽

Turkish Cypriot ◽

Greek Cypriots

AbstractAfter Turkey had approved formally that Cyprus was under the British rule with the Treaty of Lausanne, some of the Turkish Cypriot population that were accepted as Turkish citizens stayed in the island through British nationality, many Turkish Cypriots had to leave the island but in the later period, the challenges that the Turkish Cypriots experienced continued to increase. When compared with the Greek Cypriots, the challenges that the Turkish Cypriots who were quite backward in political, social and economic terms had were ignorance, poverty, non-organizing problem, and migration. Hocazade Süleyman Şevket, who was among the intellectuals trying to find valid solutions by examining the situation of the Turkish Cypriots, wrote articles about the situation of the Turkish Cypriots in the newspaper, Soz, one of the important newspapers of Cyprus. Süleyman Şevket frequently expressed his anxiety about the future of Turkish Cypriots and he also stated issues such as the inability to unity, ignorance, and poverty that were common among Turks dragged them into disaster and emphasized that these issues could be resolved only by modeling the Turkish Republic and the reform movements. In this study, the issues that the Turkish Cypriots had in education, culture and social life in the post-Lausanne period are discussed based on the article “How are the Turkish Cypriots?” by Süleyman Şevket. In addition, archival documents and other related reports of this period are examined comparatively.ÖzLozan Antlaşması’yla Kıbrıs’ın İngiliz yönetimine geçtiğinin Türkiye tarafından resmen onaylanması üzerine, o güne kadar Türk tebaası olarak kabul edilen Kıbrıslı Türklerden bir kısmı İngiliz uyruğuna geçerek adada kalırken, çok sayıda Kıbrıslı Türk de adadan göç etmek zorunda kalmış, ancak bundan sonraki süreçte, Kıbrıs Türkleri için yaşanan sıkıntılar artarak devam etmiştir. Kıbrıs Rumları ile mukayese edildiğinde; siyasal, toplumsal ve iktisadi bakımdan oldukça geri oldukları gözlenen Kıbrıs Türklerinin yaşadıkların sorunların başında, cehalet, yoksulluk, örgütlenememe sorunu ve göç yer almıştır. Kıbrıs Türklerinin içinde bulundukları durumu inceleyerek, geçerli çözüm yolları bulmaya çalışan aydınlar arasında bulunan Hocazade Süleyman Şevket, Kıbrıs’ın önemli gazetelerinden olan Söz gazetesinde, Kıbrıs Türklerinin durumu ile ilgili yazılar kaleme almıştır. Süleyman Şevket, Kıbrıs Türklerinin geleceğinden duyduğu endişeyi sıklıkla dile getirmiş olup, Türkler arasında yaygın olan; birlik olamama, cehalet ve fakirliğin, onları her geçen gün felakete sürüklemekte olduğunu, bu sorunların, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti ve inkılap hareketlerinin örnek alınarak çözülebileceğini ifade etmiştir. Bu çalışmada, Süleyman Şevket’in, “Kıbrıs Türkleri Ne Halde?” başlıklı yazısından yola çıkılarak, Lozan sonrası dönemde Kıbrıs Türklerinin eğitim, kültür, ekonomik ve sosyal hayatta yaşadıkları sıkıntılar ele alınmıştır. Ayrıca, bu döneme ait arşiv belgeleri ve konu ile ilgili diğer raporlar da mukayeseli olarak incelenmiştir.

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South Asia

Asian Transformations ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198844938.003.0021 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 531-556

Author(s):

S.R. Osmani

Keyword(s):

Political Economy ◽

Sri Lanka ◽

Southeast Asia ◽

South Asia ◽

Human Development ◽

Poverty Reduction ◽

The Political ◽

British Rule ◽

Economic Strategies ◽

East And Southeast Asia

Soon after independence from British rule, the South Asia region seemed to have a much better prospect than many other parts of the developing world; the prospects soon dimmed, however, as South Asia crawled while East and Southeast Asia galloped away. But a large part of the region seems finally to have turned a corner and is looking forward to a much better future—in terms of growth, poverty reduction and human development. This chapter describes and explains this story in terms of economic strategies and the political economy of the region and also looks ahead to identify the major challenges that remain—focusing on Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.

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