Being quite an internet-holic I have been doing many google searches for Diaspora generated literature during the past couple of weeks as an attempt towards identifying an issue to stimulate a healthy and productive discussion on SahaSamvada. Firstly what struck me was the appalling lack of accessible, ‘neutral’ literature on the role of the Tamil Diaspora and the ethnic conflict, despite the ‘internationalness’ of the Sri Lankan Diaspora. Nevertheless, I stumbled across a paper written by Manivillie Kanagasabapathy of the Carleton University in Canada titled ‘Articulating the Oppressed and Imagined Homeland: Discourses of Violence as a way of Homogenizing Sri Lankan Tamil Diasporic Identity in Canada’*. This paper had been submitted at a Conference in Germany, in 2004 (Apologies for using an out of date paper for this brief analysis. The real purpose is to stimulate a discussion. Furthermore, the article highlights some important aspects of the Diaspora phenomenon, which is highly topical). Here the author states that the purpose of the essay ‘is to examine the way that discourses of violence can create a homogenous diasporic cultural identity in the Tamil Canadian diasporic context. ….discussion will show the way that Sri Lankan Tamil culture is maintained in Canada through the narration of sites of oppression’ and uses two illustrations to argue her point, namely the World Tamil Movement protest held in Ottawa in 2001 and the film ‘In the name of the Buddha’. I must mention here that the broader framework within which the facts are set in, is on the elements of culture, which the author identifies as values, symbolic objects, roles, occasions, stories and persona. The first thought that comes to my mind is the author’s use of merely two illustrations to base her arguments in examining an aspect that is complex and far reaching. The other is that her portrayal of the violence in Sri Lanka is very limited and narrow. She talks of the Ottawa protest in very personal terms and makes a commonly made mistake of homogenising the view that all Tamil people are united in their perception of the ethnic conflict, and in terms of their perceptions of the major parties to the conflict, through the presumption that all of the Canadian Tamil Diaspora is united in this belief.
She portrays a clear bias when she states that ‘People in the protest felt justified and empowered because they are participating in the creation of a narrative that is emphasising the “wrongness” of the current Sri Lankan political system’. How can one criticise just one party to the conflict and stay blind to the atrocities of the other faction and hope to ‘emphasise the wrongness of the current Sri Lankan system’? All warring parties are part of the Sri Lankan political system. It is this lack of neutrality that portrays the Sri Lankan Diaspora in a lop-sided and hypocritical manner. It is this aspect that needs change.
In terms of the author’s second example, 'In the name of the Buddha', she again with bias states the connection between the film, through its visual images, with the Tamil community mainly the Tamil Diaspora, in connecting to a ‘fragmented narrative of their homeland and history that is being offered to them’. I must add here that I have not been able to see this film in order to present a more accurate and personal view but reading several reviews and reportage available on it, it is quite clear that a bias is definitely seen in the film, ‘questions have been asked about what the film leaves out - most notably atrocities committed by the Tamil Tigers, whose murderous response to Tamil persecution is largely glossed over’ (Trouble in paradise, The Guardian, May 9 2003)
So what is it that we have here? Why cannot we denounce and criticise all acts of violence on a neutral footing? Why is it that we resort in pervasively justifying this bias by actually turning a blind eye to it? By being silent? How do we heal this cataract?
*www.transforma-online.de/deutsch/transforma2004/papers/kanagasabapathy.hstm
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