ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the spatial component of Sri Lankan Buddhist imaginaries in the post-colonial period between 1948 and 2009, when Sinhala nationalism conditioned and was conditioned by an increasingly violent ethnic conflict. I argue that a motif of inclusivist subordination continued to underpin the spatial and cultural models proposed to solve ethnic polarization and the perceived threat of a ‘Tamil homeland’, for instance that the different ethnic communities in Sri Lanka should live throughout the island in their national ratio. I also examine the representations of history that informed them. The chapter ends with contesters of the dominant imaginaries, namely Buddhists who nuanced ethnic essentialism and sought to challenge what they saw as avijja (ignorance) within the Sinhala community.
