Islamic Identity Formation, Madrasas, and Muslims in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Sri Lankan Muslims form a small (less than 10% of the population) but peaceful community within Sri Lanka’s ethnopolitical landscape. However, the rise of intolerance against the non-mainstream schools of thought, such as Sufism, and violent movements among Muslims as a defensive mechanism during the Sri Lanka government’s war against the Tamil Tigers and after the war in 2009, mainly against Sinhala-Buddhist targets, radically questioned the peaceful nature of Sri Lankan Muslims. This paper attempts to provide some notes on (a) Sri Lanka Muslim elites’ quest for identity formation by intensely resorting to the Islamic faith and values and rejecting the Tamilian identity among Muslims whose mother is mainly Tamil, and (b) the growth of Islamic seminaries among Sri Lankan Muslims or ‘Moors’ as a result of the elites’ construction of Islamic identity for Sri Lankan Muslims. The paper uses both primary and secondary sources to understand the complex ethnoreligious development among Muslims. Apart from a literature review, interviews of former Madrasa students through zoom between October and November 2020 provided inside perspectives about the goals and global views of Madrasas.