Living with Violent Heritage: contests and coexistence in post-war Sri Lanka

ICES Colombo

24-25 March 2023

[in person and online]

Conveners: Mark R. Frost, Darshi Thoradeniya, Nirmal Dewasiri, Hasini Hapunthanthri, Neluni Tillekeratne

Workshop organizers: Melanie Horstead, Neluni Tillekeratne

This international workshop explores the relationship between heritage, memory and conflict in the increasingly fraught setting of post-war Sri Lanka. Here, cultural and natural heritage have become weaponized tools of symbolic and sometimes physical violence, straining inter-ethnic relations and rupturing social cohesion in ways that policy makers and stakeholders have yet to fully address. At the same time, Sri Lanka has produced numerous efforts at grassroots heritage, remembrance and arts activism that seek to promote truth, justice, and reconciliation.

  • Papers and presentations are welcomed over a broad range of themes not restricted to but including:

  • The experiences, actions, and responses of marginalized, minority and displaced groups living with violent heritage

  • Official vs non-official efforts to map, identify and establish sites of memory and ‘heritage’ in former conflict zones

  • Sri Lanka’s pre-1983 heritage of co-existence and cultural exchange

  • The representation and memorialization of colonial violence and leftist insurrection in Sri Lanka

  • Grassroots heritage and memory activism as a mechanism for truth, justice, and reconciliation

  • The influence of regional and international governments and organizations on heritage-making and heritage tourism in post-war Sri Lanka

  • The arts as modes of protest, peace-making and documentation

  • Natural heritage in former conflict zones

The programme can be downloaded here.