English
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Item Imagining the Future of English Studies in Sri Lanka(Postcolonial Text, 2008) Wickremasinghe, MaithreeThe submission is a speech made at the launch of Arbiters of a National Imaginary: Essays on Sri Lanka - a Festschrift for Professor Ashley Halpé edited by Chelva Kanaganayakam. The speech begins with a tribute to Professor Ashley Halpé, followed by a methodological perspective when examining the festschrift. While it does not technically review the articles in the book, it however discusses their significance for contemporary disciplinary practices of English Studies in Sri Lanka. The objective of the speech, therefore, is to argue for a paradigm shift in English Studies when engaging with the specificities of the Sri Lankan context, which would necessarily involve a consideration of the interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary directions of English, as well as the political and ethical needs of the local situation.Item Making meaning of meaning-making: a case study of feminist research methodology in Sri Lanka(Institute of Education, University of London, 2007) Wickremasinghe, MaithreeWhile women-related (WR) research has proliferated in Sri Lanka since 1975, research focusing on such literature and on research methodology is limited. My research concentrates on the theoretical frameworks, ontological and epistemological standpoints, methods, politics and ethics that constitute WR research methodology in Sri Lanka. In effect, it considers the ways in which researchers extract I construct meanings to fulfil feminist objectives in research. Consequently, the work covers the epistemological gap in methodology within local Women's Studies; and enriches international research by highlighting the Sri Lankan situation through being generalisable to wider theoretical objectives. Women-relatedness of research is posited as a paradigmatic shift in knowledge-making within which research activism takes place. The umbrella concept and materiality of WR research methodology is case studied through constituent case studies of method, ontology, epistemology, theory, and politics I ethics. This involves conceptualising I engaging with the particularities of Sri Lankan ontological politics; an epistemology of gender that originates from a sense of being I doing; the method of literature reviewing as an epistemic project; theory on methodology as epistemology and feminisms as a form of ethical politics. Maithree Wickramasinghe- Making Meaning of Meaning-Making 2 Sri Lankan women's studies and discourse compose a somewhat abstract ontology for my research purpose, while WR research methodology is captured I constructed in research through the examination of research texts and interviews. My own methodology is founded on the principle of knowledge as a process of both discovery and construction. Analysis of research is from multiple theoretical locations and methodological intersects of positivism and postrnodernism; as well as feminist standpoints, postcolonialism, and reflexivity. The ultimate aim of the study is not only conceptual unity, but also, conceptual contestation.Item An epistemology of gender - An aspect of being as a way of knowing(Elsevier Ltd, 2006) Wickremasinghe, MaithreeIn this article, I examine the concept of gender as applied in Sri Lankan Women's/Gender Studies, and discuss the methodological assumptions behind the usages of the concept. It is based on theoretical understandings of contemporary currents in non/post-positivist methodologies, feminist theory and epistemologies, as well as postmodernism and postcolonialism. I argue for the conceptualisation of gender as ontology in local feminist research/writing by referring to the multiple conceptual constructions of gender as aspects of ‘being’-spanning gendered identities to societal systems. I then focus on gender as epistemology with regard to the ways in which Sri Lankan feminists use gender as political aspirations, theoretical constructs, analytical categories and methodologies. I argue that politicized experiences of gender are at the crux of conceptualising realities in formal knowledge. And conversely, that the gender realities conceptualized in knowledge also mediate in the actual enactments of realities; that gender epistemology (or a way of knowing) is also ontology (or a sense of being). This can be summed up with the convoluted statement that gender ontology as epistemology is gender epistemology as ontology.Item Feminist research methodology: Making meanings of meaning-making(Routledge, 2010) Wickremasinghe, MaithreeMentioning the word ‘methodology’ in conversation often elicits passive disinterest at the least, and vocal disdain at the most. For those practising development, the term can conjure up images of flow charts, log frames and data sets, while for those in academia, dry lectures on regression analysis may come to mind. Despite the consideration given to the subject of methodology in various fields, however, very little has been written linking feminist methodologies to development practice (one exception being Volume 15, Issue 2 of this journal, to which the author of this review contributed), and there is an even greater gap in such literature published from the perspective of feminist researchers working in the global South, although there is likely much work published locally that has escaped the attention of Northern audiences. Sri Lankan academic and self-described feminist researcher, Maithree Wickramasinghe, sets out to address these gaps in her book, Feminist Methodology: Making Meanings of Meaning-making, published by Routledge as the second book in its Research on Gender in Asia series.Item Gender dimensions in disaster management: a guide for South Asia(Zubaan, 2005) Ariyabandu, M.M.; Wickremasinghe, MaithreeThis book aims to address the dearth of specific information on the subject of'gender issues in disaster', particularly in the South Asian countries. Targeted at policy makers and development practitioners in South Asia, it argues that the risk posed by natural hazards is a variable, which has direct implications on development in general, and livelihoods in particular. The specific vulnerabilities and capacities of men and women, and the gender/social dynamics of disaster situations are often not obviously visible, but it is vital ...Item Beyond Glass Ceilings and Brick Walls - Gender at the Workplace(2006) Wickremasinghe, Maithree; Jayatilaka, WijayaItem Introduction to Gender Mainstreaming Universities- Training Module(2012) Wickremasinghe, MaithreeItem Representation in Politics: Women and Gender in the Sri Lankan Republic(2012) Wickremasinghe, Maithree; Kodikara, Chulani