Emerging from Conflict: Portrayals of ‘Self’ in the Digital Life Narratives of Sri Lankan Women Archived in I Am Sri Lanka

Abstract

The role of life narratives in making individual experiences part of the socio-political history of a nation is significant as it ensures that stories, especially alternative narratives, that might otherwise go unrecorded are included in the recorded history of a country. These auto/biographical accounts can contest the dominant hero myths and triumphalist narratives by creating more inclusive historical accounts. The present study analyses selected life narratives by women who have experienced the 30-year war and related ethnic conflicts in Sri Lanka, extracted from the digital archive I Am curated and archived by Kannan Arunasalam, in order to understand how self is constructed in their life stories, and its significance for digital life narration. The study intends to understand how self is constructed in the narratives of female survivors of war and conflict in Sri Lanka; and to understand how Sri Lankan women from different communities manoeuvre the construction of their identity and selves within the socio-political and cultural settings they inhabit vis-à-vis war and ethnic conflict situations. This qualitative analysis subjected the selected narratives to a close reading and in-depth analysis using concepts in post-conflict life narration and discovered that war is the catalyst that resulted in changes of selves and identities. The exposure to war and conflict has made the women narrators develop a shared resilience irrespective of their socio-economic or cultural backgrounds. However, the narratives archived in I Am cannot be considered holistic since it only promotes the image of strong and hopeful women without a trace of defeat or embitterment in the post-war and reconciliation context. These can be considered re-representations of selves which are made to align with the curator’s aims and perceptions, probably influenced by the brand of women desired in postwar Sri Lanka. Further, the study revealed the use of exoticism in presenting the narratives in an audio-visual manner, which could appeal to a consumerist audience. Nevertheless, the works archived in this digital repository are important because they contribute to dialogues on post-conflict life narration and peace and reconciliation