Paper short abstract:

This paper will unpack the urge to remember, to commemorate and also, to forget, in Sri Lanka while also attempting to offer a framework within which an alternative politics of reconciliation could be envisioned.

Paper long abstract:

Sri Lanka has a long history of monumentalizing and memorializing. Both rural and urban islandscapes are scattered with Buddhist stupas and irrigation tanks built by pacifist as well as war-mongering monarchs, rock stelae proclaiming conquests, cave inscriptions commemorating acts of beneficence, statues of colonial and nationalist rulers, tsunami memorials, war cemeteries and 'victory' monuments. This paper will unpack this urge to remember, to commemorate and to forget while also attempting to offer a framework within which an alternative politics of reconciliation could be envisioned.