Malaiyaka Tamils in Sri Lanka: identity, ethnonyms, and ethnic boundaries

Title:

Malaiyaka Tamils in Sri Lanka: identity, ethnonyms, and ethnic boundaries

Creator:

Novotný, Radek

Identifier:

https://cdk.lib.cas.cz/client/handle/uuid:b773d8bd-4858-4a89-b559-62db396e225b
uuid:b773d8bd-4858-4a89-b559-62db396e225b

Type:

model:article and TEXT

Format:

bez média and svazek

Description:

Malaiyaka Tamils are descendents of immigrants from South India, who were brought to Ceylon by the British colonialists in the 19th and early 20th centuries to work on their coffee and later, tea estates. After Ceylon had attained independence, Malaiyaka Tamils were indirectly deprived of their citizenship and franchise by new legislation in 1948 and 1949. The final group of Malaiyaka Tamils only attained their civil rights in 2003, but most of them have been living, until now, in very poor social, medical and housing conditions in the central hill country of Ceylon. Malaiyaka Tamils have been regarded as being undesirable aliens that belong in India. They represent a low-status group in contemporary Sri Lanka. Many official and unofficial ethnonyms for Malaiyaka Tamils have appeared during their relatively short "ethnic history" on the island, but an overall consensus has not yet been reached. The social and political developments of the last two decades indicate that Malaiyaka Tamil society has been engaged in a process of specific social change. Discussions about the appropriate ethnonym for Malaiyaka Tamils reflect the discussions in relation to the identity and status of Malaiyaka Tamils in Sri Lankan society.

Language:

English

Rights:

http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/
policy:public

Source:

Archiv orientální | 2008 Volume:76 | Number:1

Harvested from:

CDK

Metadata only:

false