The Politics within the Histories We Write: Postcolonial Narrations of the Past in the Realm of Religion, Gender, and Education in Colonial Sri Lanka
This article is a case study of Musaeus College, Colombo, especially its colonial past and the postcolonial histories written about it and its founder, Marie Musaeus Higgins. Marie Higgins, the founder of the school, is not only celebrated within the school, but also throughout the country as the mo...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2024
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| In: |
Religion & gender
Year: 2024, Volume: 14, Issue: 3, Pages: 244-264 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Musaeus Higgins, Marie 1855-1926
/ De Abrew, Peter 1862-1940
/ Olcott, Henry Steel 1832-1907
/ Musaeus College
/ Theosophische Gesellschaft
/ Ceylon (Colony)
/ Women's education
/ Buddhism
/ National consciousness
/ History 1850-1950
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| IxTheo Classification: | AD Sociology of religion; religious policy AZ New religious movements BL Buddhism KBM Asia NCC Social ethics TJ Modern history TK Recent history ZB Sociology ZF Education |
| Further subjects: | B
Sri Lanka
B Memory B white feminism B Race B girl’s education |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | This article is a case study of Musaeus College, Colombo, especially its colonial past and the postcolonial histories written about it and its founder, Marie Musaeus Higgins. Marie Higgins, the founder of the school, is not only celebrated within the school, but also throughout the country as the mother of girls’ education. Strikingly, being a white woman coming from ‘the West’ to establish this school as well as some vernacular village schools and a teachers’ training college, is not criticised within postcolonial Sri Lanka as other imperial remains are. This article will look at exactly this opposition between the memory of Higgins today and the historical sources to illuminate the ways in which a present-day narration of the past is used to construct a postcolonial Buddhist-Sri Lankan identity within which contemporary issues of racialised religion are obscured by Buddhist nationalism. |
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| ISSN: | 1878-5417 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Religion & gender
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/18785417-bja10014 |
