Michael Roberts
Pressed by a friend in Australia, I revisited my academic journey as recorded in my old CV listings and feel that it may possibly be beneficial to the numerous personnel venturing into Sri Lankan history and politics via the stimulation of social media to have these items marked as targts for criticism and, even possibly, inspiration. I commence by listing Articles — but not books – presented in the period 1965 to 1999.
a
As Preface, I note here that I got my History Degree at Peradeniya University (still “University of Ceylon”) in 1959/60 and proceeded in 1962 to Merton College in Oxford courtesy of a Rhodes Scholarship — where I received my D. Phil in History in 1965. In October 1965 I also commenced the ROBERTS ORAL HISTORY PROJECT courtesy of funding from the Asia Foundation in Ceylon and continued with that work of historical exploration in Ceylon from mid 196 till 1970 while teaching at Peradeniya University (see Appendix fro Note by cHryl Hoskins for the ROHP material).
ARTICLES 1965-1999
1965 “The Master-Servant Laws of 1841 and the 1860’s and Immigrant Labour in Ceylon”, Ceylon Journal of Historical and Social Studies, vol. 8, 1 and 2 (Jan-Dec 1965), pp. 24-37.
1966 “Indian Estate Labour in Ceylon during the Coffee Period I”, Indian Ecnoomic.and Social History Review, 3: 1-52.
1966 “Indian Estate Labour in Ceylon during the Coffee Period II”, Indian Economic and Social History Review, 3: 101-36.
1967 “The Paddy Lands Irrigation Ordinances and the Revival of Traditional Irrigation Customs, 1856-1871”, Ceylon Journal of Historical and Social Studies, 10:114-30. This has been reprinted in Irrigation and Agricultural Development in Asia, ed. by E. Walter Coward Jr., Cornell University Press, 1980, pp. 186-202.
1968 “Grain Taxes in British Ceylon, 1832-1878: Problems in the Field”, Journal of Asian Studies, 27: 810-34.
1969 “The Rise of the Karavas”, Ceylon Studies Seminar, Series: no. 5, 4 March 1969, 36 pages.
1970 “Grain Taxes in British Ceylon, 1832-1878: Theories, Prejudices and Controversies”, Modern Ceylon Studies, 1: 115-40.
1970 “The Impact of the Waste Lands Legislation and the Growth of Plantations on the Techniques of Paddy Cultivation in British Ceylon: A Critique”, Modern Ceylon Studies, 2: 157-96.
1970 “The Political Antecedents of the Revivalist Elite in the MEP Coalition of 1956”, Ceylon Studies Seminar, 1969/70 Series no. 11, 30 August 1970, pp. 1-37.
1971 “The Ruin of Ancient Ceylon and the Drift to the South-West” in The Collapse of the Rajarata Civilization, a symposium ed. by K. Indrapala, Peradeniya: Ceylon Studies Seminar, pp. 99-109.
1971 “Variations on the Theme of Resistance Movements: The Kandyan Rebellion of 1817-18 and Latter-Day Nationalisms in Ceylon”, Ceylon Studies Seminar, 1970/72 Series no. 10, 5 October 1972.
1972 “Some Comments on Ameer Ali’s Paper”, Ceylon Studies Seminar, 1970/72 Series no. 31, February 1972.
1972 “Irrigation Policy in British Ceylon During the Nineteenth Century”, South Asia, 2: 49-63.
1973 “Export Agriculture in the Nineteenth Century” in The History of Ceylon, Vol. III, Colombo: Colombo Apothecaries’ Ltd., pp. 89-106 and 117-18.
1973 “Land Problems and Policies c. 1832 to c. 1900” in History of Ceylon, Vol. III, pp. 119-45.
1973 “Aspects of Ceylon’s Agrarian Economy in the Nineteenth Century” in History of Ceylon, Vol. III, pp. 146-54.
1973 “Elites and Elite Formation in Ceylon, c. 1830-1930” in History of Ceylon, Vol. III, pp. 263-84.
1974 “Problems of Social Stratification and the Demarcation of National and Local Elites in British Ceylon”, Journal of Asian Studies, August 1974, 23: 549-77.
1974 “Fissures and Solidarities: Weaknesses within the Working Class Movement in the Early Twentieth Century”, Modern Ceylon Studies, vol. 5: 1-31.
1974 “Labour and the Politics of Labour in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries”, review article, Modern Ceylon Studies, 5: 179-208.
1975 “A New Marriage, An Old Dichotomy: The ‘Middle Class’ in British Ceylon” in The James T. Rutnam Felicitation Volume, Jaffna, pp. 32-63.
1978a “Ethnic Conflict in Sri Lanka and Sinhalese Perspectives: Barriers to Accommodation”, Modern Asian Studies, 12:353-76.
1978b “Reformism, Nationalism and Protest in British Ceylon: The Roots and Ingredients of Leadership”, in Rule, Protest, Identity, Aspects of Modern South Asia, ed. by Peter Robb and David Taylor, Centre of South Asian Studies, SOAS, Collected Papers on South Asia No. 1, London, pp. 259-80.
1978c “1970 and Thereabout in Sri Lanka: The Politics of a General Election”, South Asia, n.s., 1:90-101.
1979a “Meanderings in the Pathways of Collective Identity and Nationalism”, in M. Roberts (ed.) Collective Identities, Nationalisms and Protest in Modern Sri Lanka, Colombo: Marga Publications, pp. 1-90.
1979b “Elite Formations and Elites, 1832 – 1931” in Collective Identities, Nationalisms and Protest in Modern Sri Lanka, Colombo: Marga Publications, pp 153-213.
1979c “Stimulants and Ingredients in the Awakening of Latter-Day Nationalisms”, in Collective Identities, Nationalisms and Protest in Modern Sri Lanka, Colombo: Marga Publications, pp. 214-42.
1979d “Problems of Collective Identity in a Multi-Ethnic Society: Sectional Nationalism vs Ceylonese Nationalism, 1900-1940”, in Collective Identities, Nationalisms and Protest in Modern Sri Lanka, Colombo: Marga Publications, pp. 337-60.
1979e “Nationalism in Economic and Social Thinking, 1915-1945”, in Collective Identities, Nationalisms and Protest in Modern Sri Lanka, Colombo: Marga Publications, pp. 386-419.
1980 “From Southern India to Lanka: The Traffic in Commodities, Bodies, and Myths from the Thirteenth Century Onwards”, South Asia, n.s. 3: 36-47.
1981a The 1956 Generations: After and Before, G.C. Mendis Memorial Lecture for 1981, Colombo, Evangel Press.
1981b “Hobgoblins, Low-Country Sinhalese Plotters or Local Elite Chauvinists?: Directions and Patterns in the 1915 Communal Riots”, Sri Lanka Journal of the Social Sciences, 4: 83-126.
1981c “Occupational Diversification, Pooling Networks, and Spiralism in the Social Mobility of Karava Families in Sri Lanka”, South Asia, 4: 47-57.
1981d “The Hydraulic Society of Ancient Ceylon: Speculations on the Factors Contributing Towards the Relative Stasis in its Socio-Economic Structure”, Journal of the Oriental Society of Australia, pp. 23-33.
1983 “‘Our Duty to Act’: Brown Sahibs in Universal Suits”, South Asia, 6: 62-77.
1984 “‘Caste Feudalism’ in Sri Lanka? A Critique through the Asokan Persona and European Contrasts”, Contributions to Indian Sociology, 18: 189-217.
1985a “Ethnicity in Riposte at a Cricket Match: The Past for the Present”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 27: 401-429.
1985b “‘I Shall Have You Slippered’: The General and the Particular in an Historical Conjuncture”, Social Analysis, 17: 17-48.
1985c “From Empiricist Conflation to Distortion: Caste in South Asia”, Modern Asian Studies, 19: 353-52.
1988 “Sri Lanka: Ethnic Conflict and Political Crisis, A Review Article”, Ethnic Studies Report, 6: 40-62.
1989a “The Two Faces of the Port City: Colombo in Modern Times,” in Frank Broeze (ed.), Brides of the Ocean: Port Cities of Asia, 1500 to Modern Times, Sydney, Allen and Unwin. pp. 173-87.
1989b “A Tale of Resistance: The Story of the Arrival of the Portuguese in Sri Lanka”, Ethnos, 55: 1-2:69-82.
1989c “Pejorative Phrases: The Anti-Colonial Response and Sinhala Perceptions of the Self through Images of the Burghers,” in Swedish in Lanka. Tidskrift om Lankesisk Kultur (Uppsala), No. 2, March 1989.
1989d “The Political Antecedents of the Revivalist Elite within the MEP Coalition of 1956” in K.W. Goonewardena Felicitation Volume, ed. by C.R. De Silva & Sirima Kiribamune, Peradeniya University, pp. 185-220.
1989e “Indian Plantation Labour in Sri Lanka,” a review essay, Indian Economic and Social History Review, 3: 380-85.
1989f “Apocalypse or Accommodation? Two Contrasting Views on Sinhala-Tamil Relations in Sri Lanka”, South Asia, 12: 67-83.
1990 “Noise as Cultural Struggle: Tom-Tom Beating, the British and Communal Disturbances in Sri Lanka, 1880s-1930s,” in Veena Das (ed.), Mirrors of Violence: Communities, Riots, Survivors in South Asia, Delhi: O.U. P., pp. 240-85.
1993a “Nationalism, the Past and the Present: the Case of Sri Lanka,” Ethnic and Racial Studies, 16: 133-161.
1993b “Emotion and the Person in Nationalist Studies” in Japanese in The Shinso, Jan. 1993. (Special edition on Nationalism Today ed. by T. Aoki), pp. 127-50.
1994a “The Cultured Gentleman: the Appropriation of Manners by the Middle Class in British Ceylon”, Anthropological Forum, 7: 55-73.
1994b “Of Traditions, Memories and Ideological Blockages”, Asian Studies Review, November 1994, 18:71-76.
1996a “Beyond Anderson: Reconstructing and Deconstructing Sinhala Nationalist Discourse”, Modern Asian Studies, 30: 690-98.
1996b “Teaching Lessons and Removing Evil: Strands of Moral Puritanism in Sinhala Nationalist Practice,” Felicitation Volume for Professor S. Arasaratnam, edited by Michael Pearson, as South Asia, sp.issue, Sept. 1996, pp. 205-20.
1996c “Filial Devotion and the Tiger Cult of Suicide”, Contributions to Indian Sociology, 30: 245-72.
1997a “Sri Lanka: Intellectual Currents and Conditions in the Study of Nationalism,” in Sri Lanka. Collective Identities Revisited. Vol 1, ed. by Michael Roberts, Colombo: Marga Institute, pp. 1-43.
1997b “Histories,” International Social Science Journal, no. 153: 373-85.
1997c “For Humanity. For the Sinhalese. Dharmapala as Bosat Crusader,” Journal of Asian Studies, 56: 1006-1032.
1998b “Meanderings Amidst Heightened Moments: Editor’s Preface to the Second Volume,” Sri Lanka. Collective Identities Revisited. Vol 2, Colombo: Marga Institute, pp. xxviii-xxvii.
1998c “Cricketing History and Some Nationalist Hues in Ceylon and Lanka,” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp. 19-30.
1998d “An Ethnic Encounter at a Cricket Match” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp. 95-105.
1998e “Controversies: The Sri Lanka Cricket Team’s 1995-96 Tour of Australia,” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp. 112-23.
1998g “Fundamentalism in Cricket: Crucifying Muralitharan,” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp. 124-25.
1998h “Letters: About Tigers, Bombs and Cricket,” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp.126-30.
1998i “Avoiding Lanka: Australia and the World Cup,” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp. 131-42.
1998j “The World Cup on Field and Newsprint,” in Michael Roberts and Alfred James (eds) Crosscurrents. Sri Lanka and Australia at Cricket, Sydney: Walla Walla Press and Mobitel, pp. 143-54
1998-99 “Emotion and the Person in Nationalist Studies,” Sri Lanka Journal of the Humanities, vol. XXIV & XXV, pp. 65-86.
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Michael Roberts in Bath Place, Oxford with daughter Kim in early 1966
A MEMO fom Cheryl Hoskins of the Barr Smith Library, Adelaide University re the ROBERTS ORAL HISTORY PROJECT Mss material
Hi Michael
To get to the Michael Roberts Oral History Project recordings:
Option 1:
- Go to the Michael Roberts manuscripts listing http://www.adelaide.edu.au/library/special/mss/roberts/
And click on the link to Adelaide Research and Scholarship under Series 1 – Digital versions
Option 2: Do a Google search on Michael Roberts. Oral History Project
Option 2:
Go to the University of Adelaide Libraries home page http://www.adelaide.edu.au/library/
On left hand menu bar click ‘Digital Services’
Then ‘Adelaide Research & Scholarship’
Then type in ‘Michael Roberts’ into the search bar at the top left of the screen to retrieve all your online items
Option 3:
Go to the University of Adelaide Libraries home page http://www.adelaide.edu.au/library/
On left hand menu bar click ‘Digital Services’
Then ‘Adelaide Research & Scholarship’
Click on ‘Communities and collections’
Scroll down to ‘University Library: Special Collections
- Manuscript Collections’
Click on ‘Sound recordings’\
And then on ‘Title’ box to see a title list of recordings
Click on the title of the recording and then on View/Open to listen.
Regards
Cheryl
Cheryl Hoskin
Special Collections Librarian Ph: (08) 8313 5224
Barr Smith Library Email : cheryl.hoskin@adelaide.edu.au
University of Adelaide S.A. 500
OR
As of 2022, address requests to lee.hayes@adelaide.edu.au OR approach WELIMUNI SUNIL of the National Library Services Board in Colombo = sunilnldsb@gmail.com
Mike,
Thanks a lot for posting this partial bibliography of yours, covering almost 35 years. I have been looking forward to this.
May I have a suggestion? For this bibliography to be reader-friendly, will it be feasible for you to provide abstract/or summary of the full text? I request this, because most of the cited journals (Sri Lankan ones) and book chapters are inaccessible in digital format.
THANKS SACHI … However your request amounts to one helluva job –when THUPPAHI work commands all my time. I may have to hire someone for this work.
Oops! I forgot to add that the two photos of your younger days are charming indeed!
Amazing, incredible and unbelievable as you are still at it and in the same spirit as you began in the early 60s
Thank You, MURALI. May I return the compliments by telling the world about your honesty in reportage, your bravery in difficult conditions in 2008/09 during Eelam War IV in its last stages. It was fortunate for me that we had met briefly at a luncheon in the academic Sanjay Srivastava’s house in New Delhi in 1995. I presume that initial interaction encouraged you to approach me for articles when I arrived in Colombo in mid-April 2009? …. Though the invitation may also have been facilitated by the fact that your boss in THE HINDU and FRONTLINE, the redoubtable N. Ram had met me briefly then in Delhi and earlier at the ICES in Colombo.
Let me, at this point, tell the world about your courageous and honest reportage on the last stages of Eelam War IV in 2009 and, thereafter, your coverage of the massive & complicated humanitarian operations in sustaining and rehabilitating the roughly 250-280,000 Tamil IDPs in the Vavuniya and Jaffna Peninsula Camps — a set of operations involving complex cooperation between NGOs, INGOs and the SL government’s civil administration and armed forces (this set of operations NOW completely erased in the present political agendas of USA, the UNHRC and other allied agencies).
I need to tell the ‘world’ (i.e. the limited readership of Thuppahi) about your reportage THEN and stress that you, Kanchan Prasad of Prasar Bharathi and the Reuters personnel under Bryson Hull were among the few who did not pursue the weighted and highly partisan –repeat HIGHLY PARTISAN — reportage from the BBC, AP personnel and Gordon Weiss of the UN in Colombo and Frances Harrison in London (to name just a few).
So, now, it is up to me to clarify this response by working up an article on the WORK you and Kanchan did in the first half of 2009 –reiterating the messages in the essays and pictorial reproductions of earlier articles for the benefit of a new generation and/or those with short memories.
My MEMORIES are not ephemeral Murali. Thank you, MURALI …. you can stand beside a Sri Lankan with the same name.
If you type “Michael Roberts google scholar”, you see that you have not set up a google page that might help other people to locate your material.
In fact, when you do such a search, a lot of other people turn up!
Just try searching “Michael Roberts, Google Scholar” and see your namesakes!
(But I cannot blame you for not having set it up, because I too have not set it up myself because I have to disable certain firewalls on my laboratory computer and that is a bit of a hassel – but you should have no such problem).