THE PROBLEMS OF SURVIVAL FOR THE DIASPORIC SRI LANKAN TAMIL SOCIETY DEPICTED IN THE SRI LANKAN TAMIL DIASPORIC LITERATURE

Authors:
Dr. J. KENNEDY

Abstract:
The Sri Lankan Tamil Diasporic Literature becomes a considerably significant factor in the Sri Lankan Tamil literature. They gain importance as they contribute potential contents to the Sri Lankan Tamil Literature and portray the life condition of the diasporic Tamil migrants from Sri Lanka. Based on the studies of the literature of the diasporic writers, the present study analyses the challenges faced in the life of the displaced Tamils. In order to facilitate the process, many writings and literary studies in the realm of diasporic literature have been brought and empirically analysed in the view of the social and descriptive-analytical process. Thus, the present study explains not only the emergence of the new life condition when the large number of Tamils displaced from Sri Lanka during the ethnic conflicts broke out after 1980’S and the challenges, and oppression that they underwent in the aspect of family, profession, education, language, and culture as they have been put into the new life condition as political refugees, but also asserts the fact that the diasporic literature is the social documentation to expose such vulnerabilities of the diasporic victims. Besides, while it depicts the serious concerns of former/older generation of diasporic Tamils on the contemporary cultural confrontation upon their younger generation, it also emphasises the subsequent improbabilities in the hope of sustaining the identity of the Tamils in the hosting countries. In the light of the above fact, this study highlights the threat of losing cultural identity as the diasporic Tamils having been assimilated with the culture of the hosting countries and subsequently losing their own identity as Tamils. Therefore, the present study arrives at a conclusion that there would be a change in the trend and the contents of the diasporic literature in future.

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