[Reader-list] A still-born cosmopolitanism: Golden Jubilee Lecture by Gananath Obeyesekere

[Praveen Rai]

Centre for the Study of Developing Societies

invites you to a Golden Jubilee Lecture

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*A still-born cosmopolitanism: Buddhists, Catholics and *

*other strange beings in the Kandyan Kingdom, 1591-1739*

by* Gananath Obeyesekere*

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*Rajeev Bhargava *will Chair

Friday, 8 November 2013, 5.30 pm

CSDS Seminar Hall,

29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110054





Sri Lankan scholars and the Buddhist public generally believe that
Portuguese influence after 1506 was characterized by a long period of
Catholic proselytization and religious intolerance in the maritime regions
of the island. What is little known is that by contrast, the kingdom of
Kandy in the central region under the rule of King Vimaladhramasuriya and
his successors (1591 - 1731) was characterized by religious tolerance and
the welcoming of Europeans and other immigrants into the kingdom.



This lecture addresses the open cosmopolitanism of that period that
provides an alternative vision of the past and for the future for Sri Lanka.



*Gananath Obeyesekere* is Professor of Anthropology, Emeritus at Princeton
University.  He has worked on Buddhism and popular religions and on such
esoterica as the voyages of Captain Cook and on ‘cannibal talk’. His main
theoretical interests are on social theory and psychoanalytic anthropology.



*Rajeev Bhargava *is Director of the Centre for the Study of Developing
Societies.



Praveen Rai
Academic Secretary
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies
29, Rajpur Road
Delhi - 110054
Phone: 91-11-23942199
Fax: 91-11-23943450
www.csds.in