oa De revitalisering van Ravana: Een verkennend onderzoek naar hedendaagse voorstellingen van Ravana onder Sinhalezen in Sri Lanka

This explorative article revolves around contemporary views on Ravana as one of the components of Ravanisation – i.e., the current revitalisation of Ravana among Sinhalese Buddhists in Sri Lanka. The Ravana myth – exceeding its previous incarnation in the early twentieth-century Hela movement in which it was only a myth of marginal importance – plays a central role in this process. By discussing three examples of views on Ravana from my explorative fieldwork research it is argued that the evolving Ravana myth and its current materialisation are intriguing examples of the contemporary ongoing processes of self-understanding and identity formation of Sri Lanka’s ethnic majority in post-war Sri Lanka.