Sri Lankan gastronomy: In conversation with Koluu
Koluu is arguably Sri Lanka’s best known and most loved chef, and an actor to boot. We begin our conversation by going back to his childhood and looking at what prompted him…
Year: 2014
Buddhists challenged to respect their religion
Photo by Dinouk Colombage, via The third resolution on Sri Lanka to be taken up for vote at the 25th Sessions of the UNHRC now in progress, saw even Galaboda Gnanissara Thera,…
Cultural Domination and Subordination among the Sinhalese: Colonialism, Resistance, Religion and Critical Discourse
Image from Rough Guides In my previous two articles I discussed Caste and Class domination and subordination. In this article, I am looking closely at cultural domination in the context of post-independent…
Colossal Mihin Lanka losses: Some context
Photo courtesy Wikipedia Through and other media we learn that Mihin Lanka, the brainchild of Sri Lanka’s current President Mahinda Rajapaksa, lost 2.2 billion over the current financial year. As Colombo Page notes,…
The National and International Significance of the 13th Amendment
Image courtesy DBS Jeyaraj It appears to be widely believed in our country that Indian foreign policy, particularly in relation to Sri Lanka, is shaped by the ethnic politics of Sri Lanka.…
The invisible sexism in mainstream media
The ran this story today. Rather than critique it, we did a simple thing. We changed the gender of those mentioned in the story. If you think the following article is utterly…
“Strong Women”: A book review
In the post-war phase, discourse around women and their rights remains extremely weak. As such, attention must be paid to the day-to-day increase of violence against women and girls across the country.…
NO LABELS: International Women’s Day 2014
If there were no division, there would be no sides to be taken. We take stances as women’s organizations, LGBT collectives, racists, classists, as men as women. We call each other names…
In conversation with Lakshman Joseph de Saram
Lakshman Joseph de Saram is an internationally acclaimed Film Composer, classical musician & Artistic Director of the Chamber Music Society of Colombo. We begin our conversation by looking at Lakshman’s childhood –…
Why the Government of Sri Lanka fails internationally
This is among the many important challenges to the “democratically elected” Government of “democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka” (GOSL). There may be various answers but let me offer five reasons why…
Defending non-implementation of the LLRC in Geneva
Image courtesy Sri Lanka Brief The Rajapakse Administration has deployed a key architect of its post war policy towards minorities and war affected communities in Presidential Secretary Lalith Weeratunga, through his position…
On forgiving and forgetting
Pre-Independence, our island was among most peaceful lands in Asia. For some centuries there had been no large scale ethnic riots in our Island apart from the anti-Muslim riots of 1915. Even…
Archive of #askcbsl: Twitter Q&A with the Governor of the Central Bank
Image courtesy Centralbanking.com On 17th February, Central Bank Governor Ajith Nivad Cabraal participated in an unprecedented Q&A session over Twitter, in the vein of similar interactions with Lalith Weeratunge, the President’s Secretary and…
Time Out: Breaking the Cycle for a New Conversation, a New Vision
Image courtesy Reuters It was 2007, at the height of the war, when one hundred youth (Tamil, Muslim and Sinhala) from every part of the country except the north gathered in Thanamalvila…
The ‘Post-colonial Grip’ and ‘Class Domination’: Sinhalese Upper and Middle Classes
At a time where there is much discussion on how the Western powers are dominating the world, in particular the global South including countries such as Sri Lanka, it is important to…