Category Archives: literary achievements

The Question Mark — It’s Intriguing History

Wikipedia

The question mark ? (also known as interrogation pointquery, or eroteme in journalism[1]) is a punctuation mark that indicates a question or interrogative clause or phrase in many languages.

History =  In the fifth century, Syriac Bible manuscripts used question markers, according to a 2011 theory by manuscript specialist Chip Coakley: he believes the zagwa elaya (“upper pair”), a vertical double dot over a word at the start of a sentence, indicates that the sentence is a question.[2][3]

8th century punctus interrogativus from the Godescalc Evangelistary. (BnF NAL 1203, f. 6v.)

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A Travelling History Museum in Mannar, Lanka

ITEM in the DAILY MIRROR, September 2024 …… https://www.dailymirror.lk/news-features/In-Mannar-from-Sept-4-11-Its-About-Time-you-visited-the-travelling-history-museum/131-290977

For many Sri Lankan students, history is a boring subject. It’s About Time is a travelling history museum that can change how most of them feel. This unique museum challenges how we as students and adults who once studied history think about the subject. Having visited Kandy, Kurunegala, Badulla, and Batticaloa It’s About Time Travelling History Museum will travel to Mannar from September 4- 11. Entrance to the museum at the Mannar Town Hall will be free for visitors.  The museum will be open from 8 am-5 pm.

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Engaging India …. With Love …. Dalrymple

Q and A with William Dalrymple, Historian …. in Q and A in The Weekend Australian Magazine, 21/22 September 2024

William Dalrymple was born in Scotland in 1965, and brought up on the shores of the Firth of Forth. He was educated at Ampleforth and Trinity College, Cambridge where he was first History Exhibitioner then Senior History Scholar.

He is the author of nine books about India and the Islamic world, including City of Djinns , White Mughals, The Last Mughal and Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India.

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Kumar Sangakkara’s Ecumenical Patriotic Outreach

Michael Roberts

Kumar Sangakkara’s recent step as a front-personage for tourism in Sri Lanka (see https://thuppahis.com/2024/09/29/kumar-sangakkara-for-tourist-trips-to-sri-lanka/) calls to mind his bold steps on behalf of ethnic compromise and reconciliation in Sri Lanka in the 200os. In these efforts he was joined at diferent moments by Murali and Mahela [tsunami relief tours) and his wife Yehali (visit to St Patricks College in Jaffna, 2009).

These instances underline the weight of the messages in an article from my pen which was presented in GROUNDVIEWS by Sanjana Hattotuwa and Co towards the end of THE YEAR 2012.

Standing now in the year 2024 this essays  — as well as the comments it attracted — may serve as useful points of departure for meaningful commentary.

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The Personnel Behind THE CEYLON JOURNAL

Thuppahi is pleased to present a photo of the key personnel located in Sri Lanka who were involved in launching the new cutting/edge academic venture known as THE CEYLON JOURNAL this year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Remembering Anagarika Dharmapala

Item presented in FACEBOOK by Peradeniya University Friends with this title: 160th Birth anniversary of Anagarika Dharmapala**

Anagarika Dharmapala a noble son of Sri Lanka who made immense sacrifices towards Buddhist revival and national upliftment in the 19th century was born at Matara on 17 Sept 1864.

He worked and campaigned with unswerving loyalty to the nationalist cause in an era when Buddhism and the national culture had reached their lowest ebb.

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THE CEYLON JOURNAL is launched: Seeking to Elucidate the Past & the Present

The Ceylon Journal is finally out

On August 2, 2024, the inaugural volume of The Ceylon Journal was launched at the Sri Lanka Medical Association Auditorium. This new publication by Heritage Publications is spearheaded by young historian Avishka Mario Senewiratne, features 15 articles exploring various facets of Sri Lankan history, including politics, architecture, folklore, and more. Inspired by Charles Ambrose Lorenz’s Young Ceylon, the journal aims to deepen understanding of Sri Lanka’s heritage and inspire progress.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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James Hunter’s Depressing Dissection of American Political Culture Today

Michael Sean Winters, where the chosen title is “From ‘culture wars’ to ‘cultural exhaustion’: James Davison Hunter diagnoses our cultural ills”

Friday, we began a review of James Davison Hunter’s vitally important book Democracy and Solidarity: On the Cultural Roots of America’s Political Crisis with a focus on his historical survey. I stopped with his provocative thesis that the marginalization of religion as a force in cultural politics begins with the close of the Civil War, but he continues his narrative, through Dewey and Niebuhr, the world wars, the Civil Rights Movement, etc. You’ll need to get and read the book to access Hunter’s fine historical sketch of the shifting cultural landscape.

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The Work of Anthropologists from Sri Lanka: Reviewing the World Scenario in 1987

Presenting an academic article published in Contributions to  Indian Sociology , n.s, Vol 21, 1-25 also reproduced subsequently in Sri Lanka in 1989 as No, 10 within the SSC Pamphlet Series marshalled by the late Ana Chittambalam, Willa Wickremasinghe , Hari hulugalle and Michael Roberts

Elizabeth Nissan: “The work of Sri Lankan anthropologists: A bibliographic survey”

 Introduction: Although many of the studies included in this essay are concerned with Sri Lanka, this is not a bibliographic essay on the anthropology of that country. It is, instead, a survey of the work of Sri Lankan anthropologists, wherever they may have carried out their research.

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Notewothy Sri Lankans Past & Present: Those ‘HIT’ in TPS on 19 June 2024

Michael Roberts

The web site is mounted via a web-engine named WORD PRESS. As its editor, I am informed every day about the number of hits …. that is visitors …. the site receives and which items have hits: this many here and this few there. The attention of course is drawn to those receiving many visitors. BUT, today I happened to lookat the bottom rows and the items receiving just one hit or maybe two.

Quite a few in the STATS FOR 19 JUNE 2024 related to biographical work about or by INDIVIDUALS – Sri Lankan personnel for the most part whether resident abroad or in the island …. or deceased.

The photos show Prof  Neil Karunaratne, Dr Darrel Weinman, Dr GC Mendis & Dr Narendran Rajasingham

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