When NASA’s Kepler telescope looked into space, it was also looking back in time. Locked into a heliocentric orbit, Kepler was set to gradually trail the Earth so that our magnetosphere wouldn’t affect its mission. The result was that Kepler had a unique view of our universe. Which is how we know that a billion … Continue reading
Lavinia Lovie Richards knows what it is to wake a sleeping language. The last native speaker of Barngarla, elder Moonie Davis, died back in the 1960s. He took with him a beautiful and complex language and was reportedly the last of his Aboriginal tribe to know songs that called the sharks and dolphins to chase … Continue reading
Armidale, Australia – What can white cotton underwear tell you about the health of the soil in your farm or garden? Quite a lot, it turns out. Hundreds of people – from farmers to schoolchildren – are burying their cotton underwear in their back gardens to dig up eight weeks later as part of a … Continue reading
Archive of Memory, launched this month, is made up of voices from across seven decades of independence. In the introduction to the book – edited and curated by Malathi de Alwis and Hasini Haputhanthri, with the accompanying photographs by Sharni Jayawardena – the editors note that the publication is as representative of the diversity of … Continue reading
In her introduction to Perspectives (which I wrote for the United Nations Population Fund to mark 50 years of their work in Sri Lanka) Ritsu Nacken the County Representative for UNFPA Sri Lanka explains what the publication sets out to do: “This year, 2019, marks two important milestones in the field of reproductive health globally: 50 years … Continue reading
Zeynep Tufekci is no stranger to protests. The 90s found the Turkish social scientist in Chiapas, watching as the Zapatistas clashed with the Mexican state; in 2011, she was in Tahrir Square in time for the revolution; that same year found her in lower Manhattan for Occupy Wall Street, where the 99% gathered to demand … Continue reading
July 29, 1999. Vasuki Nesiah was on her way to meet Neelan Tiruchelvam when she heard he would not be able to keep their appointment. As his course assistant, Vasuki had been working with Neelan, helping him to prepare for a constitutional law class that considered how the Tamil epic Silapadikaram and the Greek tragedy Antigone could be ‘sources’ … Continue reading
When Dr. Asha Abeyasekera spoke to a woman named Rojani in 2018, she heard that Rojani’s family had lived in 219 Watte since the 1950s. Rojani’s father had even been given a house-ownership card, issued by then President Premadasa’s government. “She had this whole file, though she was illiterate, she had kept these documents and … Continue reading
YOU CIRCLE THIS exhibition as you might a sacred site. The layout is such that one artwork leads you to another in a ring. The Red Dot Gallery in Colombo is so small that every work in ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ seems close enough to speak to its neighbour. They murmur to each other … Continue reading
When Ahilan Arulanantham heard that the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation had named him a recipient of the $625,000 “Genius Grant,” one of the first things he thought about was how much he would like to spend some of it on supporting human rights work in Sri Lanka. Since the announcement was made … Continue reading
