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Sri Lanka at the Crossroads of History

Posted By: lengen
Sri Lanka at the Crossroads of History

Sri Lanka at the Crossroads of History by Biedermann
English | June 7, 2017 | ISBN: 1911307843 | 357 Pages | PDF | 12 MB

A young man, proudly dressed up as a Roman legionary, has lowered his gaze to observe us – with a mix of wariness, curiosity and defiance, it seems (Figure 0.1). He is a part of a Catholic Passion play performed in the town of Negombo on Sri Lanka’s west coast. The wooden sword in his right hand is raised, the helmet and armour shine assertively even under the cloudy sky. Behind the man is a statue of Christ, hands tied, the symbol of a religion brought to Sri Lanka during one of the many moments of change triggered by more or less violent contacts established across the sea. There is in this single picture a multitude of worlds – an indication of the capability of Lankan society to adopt the foreign, but also to appropriate it, digest it, reinvent it and, if necessary, defy it. To throw light on the deeper history of such ambiguities is the main objective of this book.
The most striking development in history writing of the past decade or two has been the rise of world history, and the most common way of doing world history has been to pursue ‘connections’ – the more unexpected the better. Societies and regions that were once studied independently are now increasingly being placed within flows of influence and conjunctures that extend across much larger geographies. If all historians write with one eye on the present, then evidently we feel globalization to be the essence of our present condition and the crucible of our history. Global connections are increasingly what we look into the even quite distant past to find.