ABSTRACT
The kalai nikarcci, or “cultural show” as usually called it in English, was a huge event on Delbourn estate. Approximately four hundred people gathered for Saturday evening’s performance at the Delbourn Mariyamman temple grounds, where a stage was set up in a pantal decorated with streamers and leaves. Like the cultural shows that second-generation South Asian Americans perform on college campuses, the Delbourn cultural performances showcased theatrical displays of an idealized “Indian culture” for diasporic youth and provided a forum for the performative aspects of ethnicity. The planning, organization and promotion of these cultural shows are the domain of culture workers. Only certain aspects of Up-country Tamil culture were staged within the cultural show format. Up-country Tamil culture workers seek to be accepted as fellow Sri Lankans by Sinhalas, but at the same time they are very protective of their cultural traditions and extremely wary of what they perceive as Sinhala cultural imperialism.
