Introduction

This introduction provides an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book is an attempt to see media as politics in the expanding and important media landscape of South Asia. It is rooted in the recognition that there need not be the conjunction "and" separating the two fields, but a more definitive interconnection suggested by the preposition "as". The book builds on the proposition that media practices intervene in politics primarily through the modality of publicity which is central to the formation of "publics". It explores activisms, struggles and contestations emerging in conjunction with expanding media, whether through digital media as new technological affordances and cultural practices or via older formats of radio and television. The book describes a vibrant new media culture of criticism emerging in the very midst of the climate of fear and repression in postwar Sri Lanka.