The Buddhist Nationalism and the Promotion of North Indian Music in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Sri Lankan music and its structural relationship to nationalism offer a specific case from which to reflect more generally on ideology and its relationship to Buddhism and AryaSinhala concept. This study focuses on investigation of the preference for North Indian music which plays considerable role among the Sinhalese people owing to one of the main theories of Buddhist Nationalism in Sri Lanka which led to subdue the music of minorities. This paper offers a critical, genealogical understanding of the theory of ‘Buddhist Nationalism’ exploring how it has been expressed from the past as inter elite connection between Sinhala and Indian (North and South) people under the focus on Hindustani Classical Music. This is an important exploration into the social, cultural and historical contexts of musical practice to develop some insights through analysing various opinions and statements about the significance of musical behaviour. Qualitative musical analysis has been used as the main approach in this study. Academic, grey literature, open-end interviews, participant-observation, and autoethnography were used to collect data.