Tradition & Ethnicity
Traditional Sri Lankan life was centred on the gamma (village), a high-
ly organised hub of activity, where everyone fulfilled specific roles.
Agriculture was the mainstay, and some villages focused on particular
products – even today you might pass through a ‘cane-furniture gam-
ma’. Every village had a protector deity (or several), usually associated
with aspects of nature.Veddahs
The Veddahs (Hunters), or, as they refer to themselves, Wanniyala-aetto
(People of the Forest), are Sri Lanka’s original inhabitants. Each wave
of migration to Sri Lanka left the Veddahs with less forest on which
to subsist. Today they are so few in number that they don’t even make
the census, and only a tiny percentage of those retain a semblance of
their old culture, which comprises a hunter-gatherer lifestyle and close
relationships to nature and their ancestors. The Kele Weddo ( jungle-
dwelling Veddahs) and Can Weddo (village-dwelling Veddahs) live main-
ly in the area between Badulla, Batticaloa and Polonnaruwa.Sinhalese
The predominantly Buddhist Sinhalese sometimes divide themselves
into ‘low country’ and ‘high country’ (ie Kandyan). The Kandyan Sin-
halese are proud of the time when the Hill Country was a bastion of
Sinhalese rule, and still consider Kandy to be the island’s spiritual hub.
Although the Buddha taught universalism, the Sinhalese have a caste
system, with everyone falling somewhere along the spectrum between
aristocrat and itinerant entertainer.Tamils
Most Tamils are Hindu and have cultural and religious connections with
South Indian Tamils across the water, though they generally see them-
selves as discrete groups. The same is true of Jaffna Tamils, who live
mostly in the North and East, and ‘Plantation Tamils’, who were brought
by the British from India in the 19th century to work on tea farms.
For most Hindus, caste is very important. Jaffna Tamils are mainly of
the Vellala caste (landlords and blue bloods), while Plantation Tamils
mainly come from lower castes. Times are changing, however, and tradi-
tional caste distinctions among both Sinhalese and Tamils are gradually
eroding.People of Sri Lanka
Every day in Sri Lanka, families bring flowers to white-domed dagobas (stupas), women
in bright saris walk to rainbow-coloured Hindu temples with offerings for their gods, and
whitewashed mosques call the faithful to prayer in the cool dawn. Of course, the country
has seen decades of war and violence, and tensions remain. But the traditions continue,
and Sri Lankans somehow manage to find moments of peace, all the while greeting vis-
itors with warmth and hospitality as they’ve done for millennia.To learn more
about historical
and contempo-
rary Veddah life
and customs, see
http://www.vedda.org.VEDDAH
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