Midweek Review

Vision for a Holistic Education

Published

4 years ago

2021/12/8

Sahan Weerasooriya

Closer Connections among Different Branches of Human Knowledge:

by Liyanage Amarakeerthi

(A shortened version of a plenary speech given by Prof. Amarakeerthi at the International Conference of Sabaragamuwa University, Sri Lanka, on 03 December)

Every year I teach a course in aesthetics and non-linguistic arts. In that, I discuss what we ‘get’ from visual art works such as painting. One of the difficulties I constantly have is to explain to my students what they gain from looking at a painting, watching a dance performance, or listening to a piece of music.

Getting something out of art is a tricky business. Visual arts appeal to our eyes and through that sensory agent, a painting creates a certain aesthetic effect on us. Alexander Baumgarten, the first philosopher to open up the field what is now called “aesthetics”, thought that human beings gain a certain knowledge of themselves and the world through aesthetic objects. That knowledge is, he argued, acquired through our senses, eyes, ear, skin, tongue. This bodily perception he thought is inferior to rational knowledge. For him, only the rational mind can produce superior knowledge. In his book, Aesthetica (1750), he famously said, ” Aesthetics is the sister of logic.” One can easily see the Cartesian separation of mind and body here. Descartes’ has it that, “I think, therefore I am.” Here think means, logical thinking, the activity of the mind. But the ‘aesthetic cognition’ of Baumgarten was about bodily perception, about what we feel with our senses. Descartes or card-carrying Cartesians would never say, “I feel, therefore, I am.”

In the Western discussions about knowledge after Descartes, a tragic separation of the rational mind and emotional body takes place and it has continued to exist and widen despite numerous attempts to bridge it. My speech today is about creating points of contact across this divide. This is not a new theme in the scholarly discussions, of course, but in Sri Lanka this requires much more attention.

Professor Antonio Damasio has demonstrated in his excellent book, Descartes’ Error, maintains that the mind/body separation was a mistake made in the rationalist tradition. According to him, rational thoughts and emotions nurture and supplement each other. In fact, it is in the fertile ground of emotions that rational thought achieves its richest form. Damasio claims in the fields of neuroscience and biochemistry emotions have been given the due place they disserve: “Contrary to traditional scientific opinion, feelings are just as cognitive as percepts”(xxv). After all, it might not all that wrong to call, ” I feel, therefore, I am.”

Taking cue from scientists

Taking a cue from scientists like Damasio, I think that these new developments in natural sciences can be wisely used to create a new dialogue between sciences and the humanities, the latter being often regarded as fields that deal with human emotions.

In a striking paragraph in their Primordial Bond, Stephen Schneider and Lynn Morton state,

“Along with the attempt to separate himself from Nature, man has also separated himself from his fellow man. We have subdivided ourselves into groups: professions, nationalities, religions, sexes, and even intellectual sectors like artists and scientists”(1981, 21).

Separations of this kind might be somewhat conceptual in the West, here, in Sri Lanka, the separation is physical, social, and even political. It is physical in the sense that those of us who are in these separate subject areas are physically distanced from each other as exemplified in the way different faculties are separated at the best-planned university, Peradeniya. The separation is social because those who have the expertise in different subjects are hierarchically organized – doctors at the top and others are bellow at different degrees. At least in the public imagination, this is usually the case. That separation is political in the sense powerful trade unions of doctors to continue to the get the lion’s share from the country economy. Remember, those were the ones who go the lion’s share of the country’s education in the first place.

This kind of intellectual or cultural attitudes are absent, at least in a crude form like the above, in countries where the idea of liberal arts has persisted for centuries. A typical liberal arts curriculum includes natural sciences, mathematics, history, literature, economics, languages, fine arts and so on. All these subjects are taught all the way up the university entrance level. At the university, students are required to take humanities and social science courses no matter what subject they are going to major in. For example, to get into the medical school, one has to pass some pre-med courses which typically include the following: Biology, biochemistry, calculus, ethics, psychology, sociology, statistics, genetics, humanities, public health, and human physiology.

As a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin, I have met pre-med students and students from the School of Engineering, and the Business School taking courses in literature, drama and philosophy at the school of Arts and Sciences.

Even this long tradition of liberal arts in such powerful countries has been under threat in recent times. But when that happens over there, numerous educationists come forward to defend that concept of holistic education. One such scholar, Mark William Roche wrote an excellent book, Why Choose the Liberal Arts? when the idea of holistic education came under attack nearly decade ago. Let me quote a paragraph that might resonate with all of you: “Liberal arts students are encouraged to develop not only an awareness of knowledge intrinsic to their major but a recognition of what that discipline’s position within the larger mosaic of knowledge. The college or university citizen invested in the search for not only specialized knowledge but also the relation of the diverse parts of knowledge to one another. To be liberally educated involves knowing the relative position of the little one knows within the whole knowledge. Mathematics helps us see the basic structures and complex patterns of the universe, and the sciences help us understand and analyze the laws that animate the natural world, the inner world, and the social world. History opens a window onto the development of the natural and social world. The intellectual fruits of arts and literature, the wisdom of religion, and the ultimate questions of philosophy illuminate for us the world as it should be. In essence, the arts and sciences explore the world as it is and the world as it should be (pp. 21-2).

A rethink needed

In Sri Lanka too, it is time for us to reconsider the separation of various branches of knowledge and to imagine the ways by which we can reconnect- most rewarding ways to reconnect. Regular discussions with some of my colleagues in natural sciences at Peradeniya, and engineering have convinced me that there are so many intelligent and creative people on the other side of the divide, eagerly waiting to hold on to a friendly hand extended from our side.

This does not mean that the disciplinary hierarchies within the world of education have suddenly fallen down, and all have become equals. That is hardly the case. The subordination of all other subjects to natural sciences still continues. Publishing industry, funding mechanisms, ranking systems, the methods of rewarding scholars are more or less dominated by the scientific way of thinking. Scientism, that is elevating science to an object of worship, is also visible.

But still it is worthwhile for those of us in the humanities to engage in discussions at least with some branches of natural science. In fact, I think that, as a first step towards initiating this dialogue, everyone enters the faculties of arts should be provided with opportunities to learn the basics of science. In addition, a course in philosophy of science will show them both potentials and the limits of science.

A Union of Nature and Culture

Already, in cultural studies, there is a closer dialogue between natural sciences and social sciences in the effort understand how much of our ways of being in the world owes to nature and how much can be attributed to culture, and more importantly how much of culture gets into our psyche during the course of evolution or history. The way we carry ourselves in the world has been determined by both culture and Nature. Much of human nature is in that sense both cultural and natural.

Constructivism

Cultural constructivism had a major blow after that famous Canadian experiment in 1960s failed. Let me remind you that famous case. When a Canadian baby boy being circumcised, a doctor accidentally cuts off a large part of the boy’s penis. It was the heyday of cultural constructivism and the baby’s parents and the doctors decided to remove the remaining part of the penis, and to turn the boy into a girl. The plan was to raise the child as a girl, and surgically change the penis into a vagina, and, when she comes to the age of puberty, they would give her required hormones to help her move into complete womanhood. The parents named her “Brenda.” Famous psychologist named John Money advised the doctors and parents about how culture constructs gender, and Brenda was raised as a girl. Her clothing, toys, games and so on all were the ones typically assigned to girls. But Brenda never felt at ease with any of these. She did not feel comfortable among girls. The carefully planned socialization program failed.

But the textbooks on gender difference instructed the parents that the project should succeed. John Money the psychologist did not want to admit that it was a failure because of the impact it was likely to have on his career. By the time, Brenda was going to be given hormone injections to transform her completely into a woman, she rebelled and the parents decided to tell her what really happened. Brenda gave up all her cultural identity of a woman and took a male name. Of course, he is unable to father children. He married a woman who had two children from a previous relationship and became the father to them.

Culture and socialisation

Culture and socialisation, two mechanisms, the constructivists thought could transform a boy into normal girl, failed making a huge impact on the constructivist school of thought. Our biological hardwiring and genes are so crucial in deciding who we are. The culture, society, ideology and the like are still important creating and sustaining our identities. A much finer understanding between natural sciences, social sciences and the humanities can help us get the bigger picture of being human. We might never understand the final or the most perfect picture of all realities of the humanity. One of the remarkable truths the study of genes reveals is that a minute genetic uniqueness can result in giving each of us a unique identity, and end up making us significantly different from each other. Culture and socialization can only strengthen, even overdetermine, that difference. Moreover, socialisation can make us see our shared humanity as well. One may recall here Simone de Beauvoir’s famous sentence, “One is not born, but rather becomes, woman”. (The Second Sex).

These scientists are not suggesting at all that we should return to biological determinism to argue, contrary to de Beauvoir’s point, that all the attributes of a woman are natural and she is born with them. No. We know much of what makes a woman is socio-culturally determined. But Brenda’s case invites us to come up with much richer understanding of nature/culture divide.

What I am suggesting here is that the humanities will certainly benefit by paying closer attention to some meticulous research in natural sciences. Yet, I am no expert to use scientific knowledge in a scientific manner. Therefore, what I am saying here might be incomplete and partial. But still, these facts, I hope, that make some sense.

Amygdala, the Almond

Let me tell you about the story of Amygdala – a small segment of the human brain. In Greek, Amygdala means, ‘almond’ because it is what this particular part of the brain looks like. This small area of the brain is so crucial in determining human behavior, especially various behaviors related to aggression. We in the humanities and social sciences, often study causes of human aggression. In the field literature, we interpret aggressive behaviours looking into their social-cultural origins. We often use one person’s actions as windows into human action in general in a given social or historical contexts. I truly believe that scientific explanations about the workings of Amygdala reveals us certain realities of human life that we cannot ignore. Incorporated into our culturalist or behaviorist explanations about human affairs, these scientific revelations can deepen our understating of ourselves. Extreme naturalists too can learn one or two things from the humanities and social sciences.

Scientists have experimented with Amygdala for years using various animals in addition to human beings. When this particular portion of the brain is damaged or wounded by some scientific methods, rates of aggression in that animal significantly decline. Conversely, when the Amygdala is stimulated by implanting electrodes there, aggression of the animal increases. In humans too, scientists have found out that the functioning of amygdala is so crucial for aggressive behaviour.

Human aggression has some important pathological source, and by scientifically controlling Amygdala aggression can be controlled. In other words, surgery knife, electric shocks or injections can be more useful in suppressing riots than armies or police forces! Perhaps, that is already happening.

Robert Sapolsky discusses two cases, one from Germany and another from the US, where two perfectly normal people turning into gangsters and murderers simply because their amygdala is damaged. In the two cases, more than socio-cultural causes, the damaged amygdala was the most apparent reason for them to become what they later became. The whole story of two cases are the stuff of novels and films- things we regularly discuss in our classrooms, lecture halls and in our literary or cinematic criticism. We are more than likely to use these two cases as points of departure to embark on much larger socio-cultural analysis.

Not only aggression

Amygdala is related to many other emotions, mental traits and behaviors. Anxiety, fear, and certain phobias might have their origin in certain parts of amygdala. This part of the brain plays a crucial role in making social and emotional decisions. Even at the risk of this speech turning into a lesson in neurology, please allow me to cite some more examples.

When we accidentally chew on some rotten food, we instantly spit it out even before we could make a conscious decision of it. That is amygdala at work. A chemical reaction happens there, gets what is harmful to us out of our body. What is interesting for us is this: When see something morally disgusting such as woman being subjected to violence, the same chemical reaction takes place in amygdala and prompts us to take appropriate actions. Here amygdala and the frontal cortex of the brain work in unison to alert us about the right kind of behavior.

It is not surprising perhaps that amygdala gets activated by rotten food because it is nature’s way of protecting us from harm. But we activate amygdala when we think about morally disgusting things. Remember, when we think about them. In other words, a mental image of such a thing can still get us physically activated. Perhaps, this explains how and why literary works and films can move us into moral actions.

But there are ways this becomes complicated. These chemical reactions to disgust occur in the brain, for examples when accidentally chew on a cockroach or think about doing so. Things get still more complicated, my friends- still more complicated! Similar chemical reactions in our brain take place when we feel that a neighboring tribe, a group of people are like ‘loathsome cockroaches'(Sapolsky. Behave. 41-2). Now, you can see that neuro-chemistry in our bodies participate in our nationalism, racism and the self/other divide.

I do not want to argue here that nationalism, racism or political rivalry is all about a set of chemical-electric work within the body. I am just drawing your attention to the fact that our biochemistry has a significant role in our cultural, social and political life. No scientist, whose work I have studied so far claim that our culture, our social relations and so on are all about biochemistry. They certainly acknowledge the significance of socio-cultural contexts. In the concluding section to his monumental book, Behave, professor Sapolsky puts it four words: “Brains and cultures coevolve.” (672)

US and Them

Human beings, like some other animals, separate the world into Us and Them. This division often takes to be fundamentally cultural. Many of signs that are interpreted as US are indeed cultural. But the function of amygdala tells us something interesting. Us and Them separation may have a biological foundation. Explaining how empathy and brain are related, Sapolsky states,

“‘…Amygdala activates when viewing fearful faces, but only of in-group members; when it is an out-group member, them showing fear even might be good news — if it scares Them, bring it on”(395).

In winding up, this speech, let me repeat my main argument: The isolation of different branches of knowledge from each other has been a perennial problem in our education. Specialized knowledge is important indeed. But still there must be intense discussions among those fields because for a holistic understanding of our lives, societies, and the world can only be arrived at by attempting to create an organic whole in which each field of knowledge has a gap to fill. Where the gap is seemingly filled by one branch of knowledge, still other branches of knowledge might be able to fortify filling even further. And there may be certain gaps the humanity will never fill, and that is where we need much more engaged discussion among ourselves.

In this speech, I suggested that liberal arts model followed in the US and elsewhere, could guide us to think of model of our own to integrate various forms of knowledge. To begin this process of integration, those of us in the humanities should consider the ground-breaking new research, some of which, I have summarized above. Those of us in the natural sciences too need to learn the art of writing science in a manner that can be understood by the non-specialists.

(Amarakeerthi is professor of Sinhala at University of Peradeniya)

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Midweek Review

A question of national pride

Published

2 days ago

2026/02/11

Sahan Weerasooriya

Marshal of the Air Force Roshan Goonetileke speaking with Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka. Admiral of the Fleet Wasantha Karannagoda is in the middle (pic by Nishan S. Priyantha)

President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who also holds the Finance and Defence portfolios, caused controversy last year when the Defence Ministry announced that he wouldn’t attend the National Victory Day event. Angry public reactions over social media compelled the President to change his decision. He attended the event. Whatever his past and for what he stood for as the President and the Commander-in-Chief of our armed forces, Dissanayake cannot, under any circumstances, shirk his responsibilities. The next National Victory Day event is scheduled in mid-May. The event coincides with the day, May 18, when the entire country was brought back under government control and the Army put a bullet through Prabhakaran’s head as he hid in the banks of the Nanthikadal lagoon, on the following day. The government also forgot the massive de-mining operations undertaken by the military to pave the way for the resettlement of people, rehabilitation of nearly 12,000 terrorists, and maintaining UN troop commitments, even during the war.

By Shamindra Ferdinando

The majestic presence of Field Marshal Sarath Fonseka, Admiral of the Fleet Wasantha Karannagoda and Marshal of the Air Force Roshan Goonetileke, though now more than 16 years after that historic victory, represented the war-winning armed forces at the 78 Independence Day celebrations. Their attendance reminded the country of Sri Lanka’s greatest post-independence accomplishment, the annihilation of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in May 2009.

Among the other veterans at the Independence Square event was General Shavendra Silva, the wartime General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the celebrated 58 Division. The 58 Division played a crucial role in the overall Vanni campaign that brought the LTTE down to its knees.

The 55 (GOC Maj. Gen. Kamal Gunaratne) and 53 Divisions (GOC Brig. Prasanna Silva) that had been deployed in the Jaffna peninsula, as well as newly raised formations 57 Division (GOC Maj. Gen. Jagath Dias), 58 Division and 59 Division (Brig. Nandana Udawatta), obliterated the LTTE.

Chagie Gallage, Fonseka’s first choice to command the 58 Division (former Task Force 1) following his exploits in the East, but had to leave the battlefield due to health issues then, rejoined the Vanni campaign at a decisive stage. Please forgive the writer for his inability to mention all those who gave resolute leadership on the ground due to limitations of space. The LTTE that genuinely believed in its battlefield invincibility was crushed within two years and 10 months. Of the famed ex-military leadership, Fonseka was the only one with no shame to publicly declare support for ‘Aragalaya,’ forgetting key personalities in the Rajapaksa government who helped him along the way to crush the Tigers, especially after the attempt on his life by a female LTTE suicide bomber, inside the Army Headquarters, when he had to direct all military operations from Colombo. And he went to the extent of addressing US- and India-backed protesters before they stormed President’s House on the afternoon of July 9, 2022. President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, wartime Defence Secretary, whose contribution can never be compared with any other, had to flee Janadhipathi Mandiyara and take refuge aboard SLNS Gajabahu, formerly of the US Coast Guard. The same sinister mob earlier ousted him from his private residence, at Mirihana, that he occupied previously without being a burden to the state. It was only after the attack on his private residence on March 31, 2022, that he came to reside in the official residence, the President’s House.

The presence of Fonseka, Karannagoda and Goonetileke at the Independence Day commemoration somewhat compensated for the pathetic failure on the part of the government to declare, during the parade, even by way of a few words, the armed forces historic triumph over the LTTE against predictions by many a self- proclaimed expert to the contrary. That treacherous and disgraceful decision brought shame on the government. Social media relentlessly attacked the government. To make matters worse, the elite Commandos and Special Forces were praised for their role in the post-Cyclone Ditwah situation. The Special Boat Squadron (SBS) and Rapid Action Boat Squadron (RABS), too, were appreciated for their interventions during the post-cyclone period.

The shocking deliberate omission underscored the pathetic nature of the powers that be at a time the country is in a flux. If Cyclone Ditwah hadn’t devastated Sri Lanka, the government probably may not have anything else to say about the elite fighting formations.

The government also left out the main battle tanks, armoured fighting vehicles, tank recovery vehicles and various types of artillery, as well as the multi barrel rocket launchers (MBRLs). The absence of Sri Lanka’s precious firepower on Independence Day shocked the country. The government owes an explanation. Lt. Gen. Lasantha Rodrigo of the Artillery is the 25th Commander of the Army. How did the Commander of the Army feel about the decision to leave the armour and artillery out of the parade?

The combined firepower of armour and artillery caused havoc on the enemy, thanks to deep penetration units that infiltrated behind enemy lines giving precise intelligence on where and what to hit.

The LTTE suffered devastating losses in coordinated attacks mounted during both offensive and defensive action, both in the northern and eastern theatres. The current dispensation would never be able to comprehend the gradual enhancement of armour and artillery firepower over the years to meet the growing LTTE threat. The MBRLs were a game changer. President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga’s government introduced the MBRLs in 2000 in the aftermath of devastating battlefield debacles in the northern theatre. (If all our MBRLs had been discarded after the successful conclusion of the war in May 2009, there is no point in blaming this government for non-display of the monster MBRLs. But, there cannot be any excuse for the government decision not to display the artillery.

Even during the three decades long war and some of the fiercest fighting in the North and East, the armour and artillery were always on display. It would be pertinent to mention the acquisition of Chinese light tanks in 1991, about a year after the outbreak of Eelam War II, and T 55 Main Battle Tanks (MBTs) from the Czech Republic, also during the early ’90s, marked the transformation of the regiment. Let me remind our readers that both Armour and Artillery were deployed on infantry role due to dearth of troops in the northern and eastern theatres.

No kudos for infantry

The Armour and Artillery were followed by the five infantry formations, Sri Lanka Light Infantry (SLLI), Sinha Regiment (SR), Gemunu Watch (GW), Gajaba Regiment (GR) and Vijayabahu Infantry Regiment (VIR). They bore the brunt of the fighting. They spearheaded offensives, sometimes in extremely unfavourable battlefield situations. The team handling the live media coverage conveniently failed to mention their battlefield sacrifices or accomplishments. It was nothing but a treacherous act perpetrated by a government not sensitive at all to the feelings of the vast majority of people.

The infantry was followed by the Mechanized Infantry Regiment (MIR). Raised in February 2007 as the armed forces were engaged in large scale operations in the eastern theatre, and the Vanni campaign was about to be launched, at the formation of the Regiment, it consisted of the third battalion of the SLLI, 10th battalion of SR and 4th battalion of GR. The 5th and 6th Armoured Corps were also added to the MIR. The 4th MIR was established also in February 2008 and after the end of war 21 battalion of the Sri Lanka National Guard was converted to 5 (Volunteer) MIR.

The contingent of MIR troops joined the Independence Day parade, without their armoured vehicles. Perhaps the political leadership seems to be blind to the importance of maintaining military traditions. Field Marshal Fonseka, who ordered the establishment of MIR must have felt really bad at the way the government took the shine off the military parade. What did the government expect to achieve by scaling down the military parade? Obviously, the government appears to be confident that the northern and eastern electorates would respond favourably to such gestures. Whatever the politics in the former war zones, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP)-led Jathika Jana Balawegaya (JJB) must realise that it cannot, under any circumstances, continue to hurt the feelings of the majority community.

The description of Commandos and Special Forces was restricted to their post-Ditwah rehabilitation role. The snipers were not included in the parade. Motorcycle riding Special Forces, too, were absent. The way the Armour, Artillery, Infantry, as well Commandos and Special Forces were treated, we couldn’t have expected justice to other regiments and corps. In fact, the government didn’t differentiate fighting formations from the National Guard.

The National Guard was raised in Nov. 1989 in the wake of the quelling of the second JVP-led terrorist campaign. Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike’s government swiftly crushed the first JVP bid to seize power in April 1971. The second bid was far worse and for three years the JVP waged a murderous campaign but finally the armed forces and police overwhelmed them. On Nov. 1, 1989, prominent battalions that had been deployed for the protection of politicians were amalgamated to establish the first National Guard battalion and upgraded as a new battalion of the Volunteer Force.

The Navy and Air Force, too, didn’t receive the recognition they deserved. Just a passing reference was made about the Fourth Attack Flotilla, the Navy’s premier offensive arm. The government also forgot the turning point of the war against the LTTE when Karannagoda’s Navy, with US intelligence backing, hunted down Velupillai Prabhakaran’s floating arsenals, on the high seas.

Karannagoda, the writer is certain, must have felt disappointed and angry over the disgraceful handling of the parade. The war-winning armed forces deserved the rightful place at the Independence Day parade.

The government did away with the fly past. Perhaps, the Air Force no longer had the capacity to fly MiG 27s, Kfirs, F 7s and Mi 24s. During the war and after Katunayake-based jet squadrons thundered over the Independence Day parade while the Air Force contingent was saluting the President. Jet squadrons and MI 24s (Current Defence Secretary Air Vice Marshal (retd) Sampath Thuyakontha commanded the No 09 Mi 24 squadron during the war (https://island.lk/govt-responds-in-kind-to-thuyaconthas-salvo/). Goonetileke’s Air Force conducted an unprecedented campaign to inflict strategic blows to the enemy fighting capacity. That was in addition to the SLAF taking out aerial targets and providing close-air-support to ground forces, while also doing a great job in helicopters whisking away troop casualties for prompt medical attention.

Chagie’s salvo

Maj. Gen Chagie Gallage

The armed forces paid a very heavy price to bring the war to a successful conclusion. During the 1981 to 2009 period, the Army lost nearly 24,000 officers and men. Of them, approximately 2,400 died during January-May 2009 when the Vanni formations surrounded and decimated the enemy. (Army, Navy and Air Force as well as police suffered loss of lives during the campaigns against the JVP in 1971 and during the 1987-1989 period) At the crucial final days of the offensive, ground forces were deprived of aerial support in a bid to minimise civilian losses as fleeing Tigers used Tamil civilians they had corralled as a human shield. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) as revealed by Wikileaks acknowledged the armed forces gesture but no government sought to exploit such unintentional support for Sri Lanka’s advantage. That wasn’t an isolated lapse.

In the run-up to the now much discussed 78 Independence Day parade, Gallage caused unprecedented controversy when he warned of possible attempts to shift the Security Forces Headquarters, in Jaffna, to the Vanni mainland. The GR veteran’s social media post sent shockwaves through the country. Gallage, known for his outspoken statements/positions and one of the victims of global sanctions imposed on military leaders, questioned the rationale in vacating the Jaffna Headquarters, central to the overall combined armed forces deployment in the Jaffna peninsula and the islands.

Regarding Gallage’s explosive claim, the writer sought clarification from the government but in vain. About a year after the end of the war, the then government began releasing land held by the armed forces. In line with the post-war reconciliation initiatives, the war-winning Mahinda Rajapaksa government released both government and public property, not only in the Jaffna peninsula, but in all other northern and eastern administrative districts, as well. Since 2010, successive governments have released just over 90 percent of land, once held by the armed forces. Unfortunately, political parties and various local and international organisations, with vested interests, continue to politicise the issues at hand. None of them at least bothered to issue a simple press release demanding that the LTTE halted the forcible recruitment of children, use of women/girls in suicide missions and end reprehensible use of civilian human shields.

The current dispensation has gratefully accepted President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s proposal to reduce the Army strength to 100,000 by 2030. Wickremesinghe took that controversial but calculated decision in line with his overall response to post-Aragalaya developments. The Island learns that the President’s original intention was to downsize the Army to 75,000 but he settled for 100,000.

Whatever those who still cannot stomach the armed forces’ triumph over the LTTE and JVP had to say, the armed forces, without any doubt, are the most respected institution in the country.

Maithripala Sirisena and Ranil Wickremesinghe can never absolve themselves of the responsibility for betraying the armed forces at the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in Oct. 2015. The treacherous JVP-backed the Yahapalana government to co-sponsor a US-led accountability resolution. That massive act of unprecedented betrayal should be examined taking into consideration primarily two issues – (1) the Tamil electorate throwing its weight behind Sirisena at the 2015 presidential election at the behest of now defunct Tamil National Alliance [TNA] (2) a tripartite agreement on the setting up of hybrid war crimes court. That agreement involved the US, Sri Lanka and TNA. Let me stress that at the 2010 presidential election, the TNA joined the UNP and the JVP in supporting war-winning Army Commander Fonseka’s candidature at the first-post war national election. Thanks to WikiLeaks, the world knows how the US manipulated the TNA to back Fonseka, the man who spearheaded a ruthless campaign that decimated the LTTE. Fonseka’s Army beat the LTTE, at its own game. Then, the Tamil electorate voted for Fonseka, who won all predominately Tamil speaking electoral districts but suffered a humiliating defeat in the rest of the country.

Let us not forget ex-LTTE cadres as well as members of other Tamil groups who backed successive governments. Tamil men contributed even to clandestine operations behind enemy lines. Unfortunately, successive governments had been pathetic in their approach to counter pro-Eelam propaganda. Sri Lanka never had a tangible action plan to counter those propagating lies. Instead, they turned a blind eye to anti-Sri Lanka campaigns. Dimwitted politicians just played pandu with the issues at hand. The Canadian declaration that Sri Lanka perpetrated genocide in May 2022 humiliated the country. Our useless Parliament didn’t take up that issue while three years later the Labour Party-run UK sanctioned four persons, including Karannagoda and Shavendra Silva, in return for Tamil support at the parliamentary elections there.

Victory parade fiasco

In 2016, the Yahapalana fools cancelled the Victory Day parade, held uninterrupted since 2009 to celebrate the country’s greatest post-independence achievement. By then, the Yahapalana administration had betrayed the armed forces at the UNHRC. The UNP-SLFP combine operated as if the armed forces didn’t exist. Sirisena had no option but to give in to Wickremesinghe’s despicable strategy meant to appease Eelamists whose support he desired, even at the expense of the overall national interest.

The Victory Day parade was meant to mark Sri Lanka’s triumph over separatist Tamil terrorism. It was never intended to humiliate the Tamil community, though the LTTE consisted of Tamil-speaking people. Those who complained bitterly about the May Victory Day celebration never wanted to publicly acknowledge that the eradication of the LTTE saved them from being terrorised any further. All concerned should accept that as long as the LTTE had the wherewithal to wage terror attacks, peace couldn’t have been restored. As Attorney-at-Law Ajaaz Mohamed repeatedly stressed to the writer the importance of UNP leader Wickremesinghe’s genuine efforts to address the national issue, he could have succeeded if the LTTE acted responsibly. The writer is also of the view that Wickremesinghe even risking his political future bent backwards to reach consensus at the negotiating table but the LTTE exploited the 2002 Ceasefire Agreement (CFA) arranged by Norway, to bring down Wickremesinghe’s government.

Wickremesinghe earned the wrath of the Sinhalese for giving into LTTE demands but he struggled to keep the talks on track. Then, the LTTE delivered a knockout blow to his government by withdrawing from the negotiating table, in late April 2003, thereby paving the way for President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga to take over key ministries, including Defence, and set the stage for parliamentary polls in April 2004. The LTTE’s actions made Eelam War IV inevitable.

The armed forces hadn’t conducted a major offensive since 2001 following the disastrous Agnikheela offensive in the Jaffna peninsula. Wickremesinghe went out of his way to sustain peace but the LTTE facilitated Mahinda Rajapaksa’s victory, at the presidential election, to create an environment which it believed conducive for the final war. Having killed the much-respected Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar, in August 2005, and made suicide attempts on the lives of Sarath Fonseka and Gotabaya Rajapaksa in April and Oct 2006, the LTTE fought well and hard but was ultimately overwhelmed, first in the East and then in North/Vanni in a series of battles that decimated its once powerful conventional fighting capacity. The writer was lucky to visit Puthumathalan waters in late April 2009 as the fighting raged on the ground and the Navy was imposing unprecedented blockade on the Mullaitivu coast.

The LTTE proved its capabilities against the Indian Army, too. The monument at Battaramulla where Indians leaders and other dignitaries, both military and civilian, pay homage, is a reminder of the LTTE fighting prowess. India lost nearly 1,500 officers and men here (1987 to 1990) and then lost one-time Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in a suicide attack in Tamil Nadu just over a year after New Delhi terminated its military mission here. The rest is history.

Midweek Review

Theatre and Anthropocentrism in the age of Climate Emergency

Published

2 days ago

2026/02/11

Sahan Weerasooriya

Saumya Liyanage as Silindu in Beddegama (Village in the Jungle) television series directed by Priyantha Kolambage. Photo credit Priyantha Kolambage.

A few days ago, I was in a remote region of Sri Lanka, Hambantota, a dry zone area, where people mainly live on farming. The farming methods are still very primitive. I was engaged in a television series, titled Beddegama, directed by Priyantha Kolambage. The character I play is ‘Silindu’, a hunter. Silindu is a character created by Leonard Woolf, a colonial administrator, who lived in Sri Lanka in the early 20th century. In his widely read book, Village in the Jungle, Silindu, the hunter lives with his two daughters and his sister in a mud hut in the forest. They are one of the few families in this village struggling to survive amidst drought, famine and overbearing government authority.

Phenomenologically speaking, Silindu is an environmental philosopher. He believes that the jungle is a powerful phenomenon, a living entity. He thinks that the animals who live in the jungle are also human-like beings. He talks to trees and hunts animals only to dull the pangs of hunger. He is an ethical man. He believes that the jungle is an animate being and its animals are his fellow travellers in this world. His younger daughter, Hinnihami, breastfeeds a fawn. His sustainable living with fellow animals and nature is challenged by British law. He kills two people who try to dominate and suppress poor villagers by using their administerial powers. He is sentenced to death.

What I want to highlight here is the way our predecessors coexisted with nature and how they made the environment a part of their lives. Silindu’s philosophy of nature and animals is fascinating because he does not think that humans are not the centre of this living environment. Rather humans are a part of the whole ecosystem. This is the thinking that we need today to address the major environmental crises we are facing.

When I first addressed Aesthetica, the International conference on Performing Arts, as a keynote speaker, at Christ University, Bangalore, in 2018, in my keynote address, I emphasised the importance of understanding the human body, particularly the performing body as an embodied subject. What I meant by this term ‘embodied subject’ is that over the centuries, our bodies in theatre, rehearsal spaces and studios are being defined and described as an object to be manipulated. Even in modern dance, such manipulation is visible in the modernist approaches to dance. The human body is an object to be manipulated. However, I tried to show the audience that the performing body was not a mere object on stage for audience appreciation. It is a being that is vital for the phenomenological understanding of performance. The paradox of this objectification is that we objectify our bodies as something detached from the mind and similarly, we assume our environment, the world as something given for human consumption.

Performance and Sustainability

Just to bring the phenomenological lexicon to this discussion, I will draw your attention to one of the chapter in my latest book, titled, Lamp in a Windless Place: Phenomenology and Performance (2025) published by VAPA Press, University of Visual and Performing Arts, Colombo. This project is based on Sarah Kane’s famous play text 4.48 Psychosis. In this chapter I wrote phenomenological environmentalists explain the two ways that human beings interact and engage with the life-world. The one way of this engagement is defined as ‘involvement’ we involve with various activities in the world and it is one of the ways that we are being-in-the-world. The second way of being-in-this-world is that we ‘inhere’ in the world meaning that we are built with worldly phenomena or we are made out of the same stuff of our environment. (James cited in Liyanage 2025, pp. 98-99). This coupling and encroachment between our bodies and the environment occur mostly without our conscious interference. Yet, the problem with our human activities, and also our artistic practices is that we see our environment (human body) as an object to be consumed and manipulated.

Today, it is more important for us to change our mindsets to rethink our daily practices of performing arts and understand how human, nature, space and non-human species are vital for our existence in this world. Sustainable discourse comes into play with the United Nations initiative to make humans understand the major crises we are facing. In 2016, 195 parties agreed to follow the treaty of the Paris Agreement, which is mainly focused on climate change and the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. Major scientists are talking about the ‘tipping points’. Tipping points indicate the current crisis that humans and other-than humans are going to face in the coming years.

Among those sustainable goals, the most important and the urgent point to be focused seems to be the climate emergency. Leading scientists of environmental sciences have already warned that within a few years, global warming will increase up to the level that the consequences will be catastrophic and dangerous to all, human and non-human. Ice sheets are shrinking; sea water level is increasing, and coral reefs are dying. It is becoming increasingly evident that countries in our region, particularly in South Asia, have been experiencing major climate shifts over the past few decades. Recent Cyclone Ditwah and the catastrophic flood devastated parts of not only Sri Lanka but also Malaysia, Sumatra, India, etc. Professor Missaka Hettiarachchi and Devki Perera published a landmark book, titled Nature – based method for water resource management (2025). In this work Hettiarachchi and Perera clearly argue that flood, erosion, and landslides are a part of the geological evolution and transformations. They are inherent activities in nature, which form new landscapes and conditions in natural environments. But the problem is that we experience these natural events frequently and they abruptly occur in response to human-nature collisions.

Climate Emergency

Professor Jeffry Sachs stresses the importance of taking action to prevent future climatic change. For him, we are facing three mega environmental crises: 1. Climate crisis leading to greenhouse gas emission due to fossil fuel burning. We have already come to the 1.5 warming limit now. He predicts that humans will experience 2.0 degree Celsius within two decades. 2. Second is the ecological crisis. This is the destruction of rainforests in South East Asia, Amazon and other regions. He argues that Amazon has reached the tipping point, meaning that the rain forest is in danger and it would be a dry land in a few decades time. Because of ocean acidification, scientists have already warned that we are in the wake of the destruction of coral reefs. The process is that high carbon dioxide dissolves in the water and it creates the carbonic acid. It causes the destruction of the coral reef system. 3. The third ecological crisis is the mega pollution. Our environment is already polluted with toxic chemicals, our waterways, ocean, soil, air and food chains are polluted. Micro plastics are already in our blood streams, in our lungs and even in our fetuses to be born.

The climate crisis is not just a natural catastrophe; it is political in many ways. Greenhouse gas emission is still continuing, and the developed countries such as the United States of America, Canada, China and Germany produce more carbon than the countries in the periphery. As Sachs rightly argues, the US politics is manipulated by the biggest oil companies in the world and President Trump is an agent of such multinational companies whose intention is to accumulate wealth through oil burning. Very recently, the US invaded Venezuela not to restore democracy but to gain access to the largest oil reserves in the country. We have seen many wars, led by the US, due to greed for wealth and natural resources. The US has withdrawn from the Paris agreement. President Trump calls climate change a hoax! So, the world’s current political situation is directly linked to the future of our environment, our resources and climate change.

Anthropocentrism in Performance

Back to creative arts. In the modernist era of our artistic practices and culture, we mimicked and replicated proscenium theatre inherited from Europe and elsewhere and revolutionised the ways that we see performance and perceiving. Our traditional modes of performance practices were replaced by the modern technology, architectural structures, studio training methods and techniques. Today, we can look back and see whether these creative arts practices have been sustainable with the larger human catastrophes that we experience almost daily. Eddie Patterson and Dr. Lara Stevenson have recently published an important and influential book, titled Performing Climate (2025). Being performance studies scholars, Patterson and Stevenson’s book contains 14 chapters interconnected and explores the human and non-human or more than human elements in the world. Patterson and Stevenson write that ‘performance is a messy business; a bloody mess’. ‘Performance is a mess of matter, climate, things, actors, and affects: neither a dramatic or postdramatic theatre but a network of dramaturgical elements; a site of birth and death, decay and renewal’ (Patterson and Stevenson, 2025, p. 1). In this book, they further explore the new ways of reading performance, making performance and perceiving performance. They argue that ‘we are interested in analyzing performance not as an insulated, exclusive art form predicated on human centrality but as a process that celebrates the transformative properties of waste – bacteria, debris and breakdown – composting and mulching within a larger network of bacteria, fungi and microbes embedded in the skin, air, soil and interacting with cellular networks and atmospheric conditions’ (ibid).

Our modern theatre has always been anthropocentric. Even in Sri Lanka, the father of modern Sinhala theatre, Professor Ediriweera Sarachchandra adapted traditional dance drama and developed a modern theatre for middle class theatregoers. This modern theatre was anthropogenic, patriarchal and marginalised the subaltern groups such as women, non-human beings, environment and so forth. The traditional dance and dramas, nadagam and kooththu were much more embedded in rituals performed by communities for various social, cultural and spiritual purposes were uprooted and established in the proscenium theatre for the audience, whose aesthetic buds were trained and sustained by the colonial theatre and criticism. Even traditional dance was uprooted from its traditional setting embedded in the ecosystem and placed on the proscenium theatre for the sake of modernisation of dance for the modern theatregoers. A new group of spectators, theatregoers, were produced to watch those performances which took place in city theatre buildings, insulated architectural spaces where the black boxes were lit up with expensive lighting technology and air-conditioning. As Patterson and Stevenson argue, the Western theatre has been obsessed with the human drama or autobiography. This western history of theatre has been ‘blind to the non-human agency and the natural world has always been in the background to the human centred stories’ (Patterson and Stevenson 2025).

Carbon Emission theatre

The performance practice that we have inherited and is continuing even today is highly problematic in the ways that we centre human agency over the non-human and the environment. This anthropocentric performance practice, as German philosopher Peter Sloterdijk called it, is ‘biospherical’. The biospherical theatre sees human action in the artificially constructed atmospheres for artistic innovations (Patterson and Stevenson 2025). Biospherical theatre is proto-laboratories and human greenhouses – in which able-bodied actors are trained and perform within air-conditioned black boxes; or more tellingly white people in white cubes’ (ibid).

Patterson and Stevenson further assert that ‘biospherical theatre is an enclosed Western form it is labour intensive, carbon intensive, hierarchical, exclusive, inaccessible extractive rather than generative of new knowledge and different ways of being with the world (ibid, p. 10). We inherited this hierarchical, exclusive, and carbon-oriented performance space from our past; as a colonial heritage. This colonial heritage of labour intensive, carbon intensive theatre is the major practice of performance in our societies. I am currently the Chairman of the National Theatre Sub-Committee under the purview of the Arts Council of Sri Lanka. Theatre practitioners today in Colombo are highly critical of the Ministry of Cultural Affairs for not having quality enclosed theatres in major cities in the country. They do not see the problems pertaining to the performance practice that is not ecologically sustainable for island nations like us.

We are possessed with the model of Globe theatre, which has been the model for theatre and entertainment in our regions for centuries now. However, today, we are forced to revisit and rethink this model of Globe theatre in the wake of the climate emergency. Patterson and Stevenson remind us that ‘inside these globes, art develops in enclosed and air-conditioned bubbles (laboratories, rehearsal rooms, conservatories, and galleries). This kind of theatre is biospherical: a human centric endeavour, evolving inside the globe, largely upholding the fantasy of itself as disconnected from atmospheric and environmental interactions beyond the human’ (Patterson and Stevenson 2025, p. 16).

Conclusion

According to Jim Bendell, it is not enough for us to develop resilience towards the climatic emergency; we need to embrace relinquishment (Stevenson, 2020, p. 89). It is the letting go of certain assets, behaviours and beliefs. Grotowski articulated this concept many decades back in his actor training at the Polish theatre laboratory. Grotowski developed the idea of via negative, letting go, or elimination for actors. Letting go of all the acculturations as Eugenio Barba articulates, to tap into the pure impulses and action. Grotowski even rejected the audience participation in his later works, para theatre, like Antonin Artaud, who rebelled against the dialogic, bourgeoisie theatre in France at the time. So, the modernist theatre directors have shown us that the Globe theatre is no longer a sustainable pathway for performance practice. It is time for us to rethink the carbon intensive, labour intensive, hierarchical, exclusive, and class-oriented theatre and performance.

References

Hettiarachchi, M., & Perera, D. (2025). Nature-Based Methods for Water Resources Engineering. The Institution of Engineers, Sri Lanka.

India Today Global. (2025, September 24). “U.S. government is in an open war against the Sustainable Development Goals”: Jeffrey Sachs. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qb4Jpqq4wvE

James, S. P. (2009). The Presence of Nature A Study in Phenomenology and Environmental Philosophy. PALGRAVE MACMILLAN IK.

Liyanage, S. (2025). Lamp in a Windless Place: Phenomenology and Performance. VAPA Press. (Original work published 2025)

SDSN. (2024, October 11). Sustainability Fundamentals with Jeffrey Sachs. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJR0Q8ueQpc

Stevens, L. (2019). Anthroposcenic Performance and the Need For ‘Deep Dramaturgy’. Performance Research, 24(8), 89-97.

Stevens, L., & Varney, D. (2022). The Climate Siren: Hanna Cormick’s The Mermaid. TDR, 66(3), 107-118.

Woolf, L. (2012). The village in the jungle. Forgotten Books.

Author wishes to thank Himansi Dehigama for proofreading this manuscript.

Professor Saumya Liyanage is a professor of Drama and Theatre Currently working at the Department of Theatre Ballet and Modern Dance, Faculty of Dance and Drama, University of the Visual and Performing Arts, Colombo. He is the chairman of the State Theatre Subcommittee.

by Saumya Liyanage