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The Sri Lankan University system celebrated 100 years of university education in the humanities and social sciences in 2021. As part of commemorating the centenary, the UGC with the Standing Committee Head as its convenor organised a conference on the present status of Humanities and Social Science Education. The conference brought together some of the best minds in the Humanities and Social Sciences (H and SS) in the country and was an indication that the disciplines were alive and well within Sri Lanka.
Yet, there is very little recognition or acceptance of the kind of knowledge the H and SS can bring to the table at the level of the UGC mediated Quality Assurance process. Even a cursory look at the level descriptors of the quality assurance framework reveal how little input H and SS perspectives seem to have had in their formulation. While recognising the Standing committee’s important ongoing work to raise the profile of the H and SS within our universities, I would like to discuss a recent experience that spoke to the current level of disregard for these disciplines within the Quality Assurance world.
The AHEAD project is the latest World Bank-funded university improvement exercise and the mantra of “employability”– the contentious ground from which all recent higher education policymaking is done—drives this particular project cycle as well. The workshop we attended was entitled “How to incorporate employability skills into teaching and learning in University Education using the Sri Lanka Quality Assurance Framework (SLQF).” These workshops are ubiquitous within the University System and are conducted by a group of academics who have long been engaged with the SLQF process.
The workshop was part of the systematisation process being carried out in the university where we are required to write our course outlines within a uniform format that names all intended learning outcomes (ILOs) for the programme and the course. This workshop was about how to write learning outcomes at the lesson level.
The first 15 minutes of the workshop was devoted to describing what outcome-based education is. The outcome that we anticipate needs to be programed into our activities at the outset, we were told. If we don’t do that we will be disappointed in what we “produce.” The final “product” that we were to envisage using the SLQF framework was a “good citizen” who could contribute to society. We were then asked to imagine the production of a building, or of a car. Such a product needs plans and a blueprint. When planning a “human product” too, we should think about planning for the production process. A “human product” is more complex, because we must take individuality into consideration, we were told. Every individual is different, and we have less control over the process with Human Products. We were also told that regardless of how difficult it is, if we have a plan for the process, we can be assured of at least some broad similarities in our “products.”
In our H and SS programmes, we constantly strive to teach students to unlearn what has become “normal” in popular parlance. Using the language of the market and the production process of saleable goods to refer to students would be an example of the neoliberal marketisation creep that we would warn students to be attentive to. We would suggest that not referring to students as complex individuals with histories and particular personalities, and as people we form relationships with, and whose talents and abilities we nurture, is a process of dehumanisation. We would draw attention to the fact that such language encourages thinking of students as nondescript cogs in the wheel of a capitalist system, and that using dehumanising language has dehumanising consequences.
My point, in relation to the training workshop is this: there is no inherent problem with designing course outlines and broad learning outcomes. It is good for planning and is efficient. However, the lack of any sensitivity to language, indicates the absence of an H and SS perspective. Outcome-based education could also have been described as a process of preparation essential for the thriving of students, for the encouragement of their creativity and for the nurturing of their skills. Direction and structure are a necessary foundation from which creativity can emerge. The fact that such language was not used speaks both to the ignoring of the H and SS approach and also to a paucity of imagination in the formulation of the purpose of quality assurance. The ultimate goal of the SLQF format and the workshop – as its title suggested– was to incorporate “employability skills.” And the current definition of “employability skills,” as has been discussed repeatedly in this column, is egregious and limiting.
The usage of a metaphor of production to refer to students also meant half the participants at the workshop were completely put off by the presentation. More troublingly, the other half were eager to learn the corporate language to ensure that they performed well in keeping with the requirements of the current dispensation. In the process, irreparable harm was being done to how both sets of young H and SS scholars approached and valued their disciplinary training.
The trainer’s own assessment of H and SS knowledge was illustrated further in the example that she finally used to teach us how to write a lesson’s learning outcomes. We were required to use verbs to correspond with different levels of learning, and provide content to match the verb. As an illustration of how to do that, the trainer used an example she believed would be familiar to us in the H and SS: the Social Determinants of Health, known to people in Economics, Sociology, Psychology and other disciplines, we were told.
The following is a faithful description of the discussion regarding how to produce ILOs when teaching about the Social Determinants of Health.
We should start with the verb “List”, it was suggested, and have the first ILO be – “List common social determinants of health” because these are “basic things a student should know before finding what social determinants a particular person is affected with.”
The second ILO was more puzzling. The trainer said it should start with the verb “Explain”— “an act that require[s] a little more intellectual activity.” She then described what a student should be able to “explain” regarding the Social Determinants of Health. “What would be a social determinant of health that affects a heavy smoker? Maybe the smoking is done in a group with social pressure, maybe it’s his job—there are some jobs where you get free cigarettes.”
The trainer went on to tell us that we should next require that students analyze a health problem to identify Social Determinants of Health and then design strategies of modifying Social Determinants of Health. It soon became clear to some of us that the trainer had no idea what Social Determinants of Health were: the macro social factors impacting the unequal conditions in which people live, and not reducible to a single individual’s social circle or social life, as assumed by the trainer.
The WHO’s somewhat critiqued but easily googled definition reads,
“[The social determinants of health] are the conditions in which people are born, grow, work, live, and age, and the wider set of forces and systems shaping the conditions of daily life. These forces and systems include economic policies and systems, development agendas, social norms, social policies and political systems.
The trainer had made no effort to look up the Social Determinants of Health when choosing to use them as an example.
I choose this incident not primarily to shame the trainer, but to point to a larger malaise affecting the university system and policymaking on education. The assumption behind the trainer’s failure to understand Social Determinants of Health prior to using them to teach us with, is that H and SS knowledge requires no expertise. The years we spend teaching students to recognize different forms of inequality and marginalization, to explain their histories, how they continue to persist, to analyse the material effects of such situations and their prevalence in students’ own contexts, and to design creative strategies to overturn persisting inequality and marginalization, are negated in the trainer’s assumptions.
I present this instance as an illustration of what we, teachers and researchers in the Social Sciences and Humanities experience every day – an undervaluing of the expertise we can bring to the table. The general lack of value placed on Arts Degree holders has transformed into a policy on “employability” widely held within the university system – even among some Social Sciences and Humanities Educators. These policies devalue the worth of H and SS perspectives and undermine and weaken the integrity of these programs.
(The author is Professor and Head in the Department of Sociology, University of Colombo.)
Kuppi is a politics and pedagogy happening on the margins of the lecture hall that parodies, subverts, and simultaneously reaffirms social hierarchies.
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With the Republican Party losing its clout in the US Congress in the wake of the recent midterm election setback the power balance in West Asia could very well be tilting against the US-Israel combine for the first time in decades. In all probability the Republican administration would from now on be challenged to initiate a policy reset in the region that is more amenable to Iran considering that the latter has emerged in a somewhat commanding position from the ongoing political and military turmoil in the region.
So powerful is Iran currently that it has unilaterally set out some seven conditions to the US to bring the conflict in West Asia within manageable limits. At present it is unclear whether the conditions are receiving the undivided attention of the US, given that the central Republican administration is in an effort to pull itself together and act with a degree of policy coherence in the aftermath of the recent polls debacle.
However, the Republican centre would have no choice but to concede some of the key Iranian demands in consideration of the ‘cost of living shock’ that the war in the region has administered to the average US consumer. Provided relief is quickly delivered to the consuming public, the chances are that the Trump administration would continue to witness a slide in its popularity and power. We have another reminder here that economics basically drives politics.
From the above viewpoint, conditions 2, 3 and 4, relating to the lifting of the US naval blockade on Iran, the reopening of shipping lanes and the release of frozen Iranian assets could prove vital since they are decisive in not only worsening the material hardships of the Iranian and US publics but also those of the rest of the world. They exercise a direct bearing, therefore, on the political fortunes of the US centre and may need to be met before long.
However, it is to the degree to which the immediate political consequences from the midterm polls are effectively and swiftly managed that the US centre could give the conditions its concerted attention. But the urgency of granting the key demands of Iran would only be increasingly felt in Washington, thereby denying it the ability to deal with the foreign policy issues at hand with greater ease and freedom of deliberation. That is, Iran would be acting and even negotiating with the US from what could be seen as a position of strength.
It is possible that the Trump administration is biding its time at the moment until ground conditions stabilize and greater policy clarity could be achieved on what needs to be done going forward, but a revival of military strikes on Iran could prove both politically and economically most costly. The administration would be acting in some of the US’ best interests by choosing its policy courses with utmost circumspection.
Meanwhile, it should not come as a surprise if the US is compelled to seriously consider a policy reset towards Israel as well. It is not the case that the US would be substantially downgrading its alliance with Israel in the days ahead but it is possible that there would be reduced financial and material backing by the US for Israel. After all, the US ‘purse’ is beginning to ‘pinch’ and the affordability of US financial assistance could emerge as a major worry.
In fact there has reportedly been an effort to scale down US assistance to a degree. Whether this would seriously undermine the US-Israel alliance is yet to be seen but the development could point to possible future strains that could stringently test the alliance.
It does not follow from the foregoing that Israel would be seeing a steady diminishing of its military power to the degree to which the US cuts down on its assistance. This is unlikely to be because Israel has proved more or less self-sufficient in most respects in the past. But the perception could gain ground among Israel’s enemies in the Arab world in particular that she would be weakened militarily in the absence of continued and substantial US help. This again is primarily a matter for the future.
However, a development of note in Israeli politics at present is the possibility of opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot forming the next government in Israel. He has reportedly been called upon by the Israeli President to do so. If this comes to pass we would have in Israel a more centrist coalition government that could prove less militaristic and less religiously hard line than the Netanyahu regime.
One message that the foregoing development conveys is that the Eisenkot regime could prove more amenable to negotiations in sorting out the Middle East tangle. President Trump is unlikely to easily hear of negotiations but an incoming Democratic Party controlled Congress is likely to. Such an administration could bring pressure on Trump to consider negotiations and political solutions to the outstanding issues in West Asia. Hopefully this opening for progressive change would be seized by the Democrats and sustainably followed through in the days ahead.
An incoming Democratic Party-dominated Congress would need to work on several fronts if it is to prove sensitive to the US public’s aspirations. It would need to end all forms of conflict and war in the Middle East, cut down on needless defense spending and invigorate the weak domestic economy. There is no getting away from the need for a two-state solution in West Asia. The recent mid-term polls results amply prove that these are main among the US public’s needs.
However, incoming more democracy-friendly administrations would also need to call on Israel’s neighbours, including Iran, to cooperate in finding peaceful, negotiated solutions to the problems that have been bloodily tearing the region apart. It will need to be impressed on these neighbours that Israel would not be negotiating from a position of weakness. It is simply that diplomatic, equitable solutions would do everyone concerned good.
Iran’s first demand calls for an ‘end to hostilities on all fronts’; including Lebanon, Gaza and Yemen. This is the way forward, but Iran needs to be asked to do more than what is seen as its part to end hostilities. It should not only down arms against Israel but prove its sincerity by recognizing Israel’s right to exist.
The nuclear option, meanwhile, needs to be shelved by all concerned. It needs to be perceived by all that unending war leads to the eventual annihilation of all.
“Pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart.” Robert F. Kennedy borrowed these words from Aeschylus on the night Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, speaking to a stunned crowd in Indianapolis. Two months later he was murdered himself.
I thought of that line in Washington, thirty-two years after my father, Ossie Abeyagoonasekera, was assassinated in Sri Lanka on 9 November 1994. At my book launch at the National Press Club, I met Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Robert Kennedy’s eldest daughter. She spoke of losing her father at sixteen. I was sixteen when I lost mine. Our fathers belonged to different nations and traditions, yet violence left us the same inheritance: the knowledge that one moment can divide a life into everything before and everything after.
Some losses are not healed by time. Time only teaches us to carry them.
The assassin believes he has settled something. He kills a man to silence an argument and let fear decide the future. But the dead go on asking the questions the living would rather avoid.
My father’s question has not aged: how free is Sri Lanka to decide its own future? I believe the answer lies in two places at once, in how we deal with the world’s great powers and in how we treat our own citizens. A country cannot be sovereign abroad and fearful at home.
He led a small party in an age of executive presidents, ideological quarrels and armed insurgency. After his close friend Vijaya Kumaratunga was assassinated in 1988, he assumed leadership of the Sri Lanka Mahajana Party, which would lose 117 of its members to political violence. He stayed.
In 1986 he travelled to Jaffna with Vijaya to speak with the LTTE, when dialogue itself could be called betrayal. Years later, a former LTTE member told me my father had earned their trust. The irony is unbearable, and I will not soften it: the organisation with which he sought peace carried out the bombing that ended his life.
He did not oppose his country. He opposed the injustice that threatened it. In 1982 he challenged President J. R. Jayewardene with a symbolic rice-ration-book campaign. In Welikada prison he corresponded with Nelson Mandela, who encouraged his struggle. And he supported his opponents’ policies whenever they served ordinary citizens. Loyalty to a party, he understood, is not loyalty to a nation.
His travels took him to India, China, the Soviet Union, Libya and Europe. I lived with him in Bonn in 1988–89, as the Berlin Wall approached its fall, and learned that small nations are never alone in history. They are always being looked at by larger ones. Today the Indian Ocean is contested by India, China, the United States and others through security, infrastructure and investment. The danger begins when that competition shapes our domestic choices and the stories citizens tell about their country. A nation loses sovereignty not only when foreign soldiers cross its border, but when its leaders can no longer tell the national interest from someone else’s. Sri Lanka’s task is not to choose between New Delhi, Beijing or Washington. It is to keep the independence to decide what serves its own people.
That independence is tested at home too.
The government promised to repeal oppressive counterterrorism law. In October it tabled the Protection of the State from Terrorism Bill(PSTB) to replace the Prevention of Terrorism Act. Critics point out that it allows detention for up to a year without charge, followed by up to a year of pretrial detention, and that a magistrate cannot overturn a detention order. The Bar Association of Sri Lanka has urged the government to withdraw this bill and the Prevention of Organised Crimes Bill, citing the lessons of the old Act.
The Twenty-Second Amendment deserves the same scrutiny. It raises the retirement age of Supreme Court and Court of Appeal judges. The government presents it as a way to strengthen judicial independence and clear the backlog of cases. But the Bar Association notes that the sitting Chief Justice would be the first Supreme Court judge to benefit directly, and a UN Special Rapporteur Margaret Satterthwaite has written to the President with serious concerns.
Days ago, Gampaha Magistrate Bandula Gunaratne, who had asked the President of the Court of Appeal to begin contempt proceedings against the Inspector General of Police for failing to comply with a court order, was transferred to the Judges’ Training Institute with immediate effect.
The state has a duty to protect its people from terrorism and organised crime. But a law must be judged by what it lets a future government do, not by the intentions of the present one. A government elected on the promise of greater freedom owes the public an explanation of why its laws seem to narrow it.
I have now lived more years without my father than with him. In Washington I was returned to the sixteen-year-old who believed death was history’s last word. Time has taught me otherwise. The questions remain, patient and unanswered.
My father believed politics could be an act of love: the difficult kind that demands sacrifice and defends human dignity. As I prepare to launch the Sinhala translation of Winds of Change, I hope more Sri Lankans will read it in their own language and ask these questions for themselves.
My father died believing Sri Lanka could become a more just country. Our duty is to see that it also remains a free one.
The lead up to the festive season is now in full swing with entertainment galore!
In addition to the numerous musical concerts, dances, too, are very much in evidence, and that means we all have a choice!
What is also so special about these dances is that the old boys’ associations of some of the leading schools are in a celebration mood — and this year, De Mazenod College, Kandana, lit up the season in the grandest style!
The De Mazenod College Old Boys’ Association held its annual dinner dance, ‘Luminaria: MazenodiaNite ’26,’ on Saturday, 24 October, 2026.
The “Blue, White & Gold Gala” took place at the Grand Ballroom of Waters Edge, Battaramulla — and what a night it was!
It was a sold-out event and there was fun and excitement right throughout the night. From the moment the doors opened, the ballroom sparkled in blue, white and gold — the colours of Mazenodian pride!
Everyone present had a gala time and guests were heard to say it was a lovely night, meeting up with old friends, lots of laughter, and great memories. Old classmates hugged, teachers were remembered with love, and stories from schooldays flowed like fine wine.
It was truly a night for alumni, family and friends — generations of Mazenodians under one glittering roof.
The crowning of the queen of the night generated lots of excitement, and so did the baila competition.
Niduki Perera was crowned Mazenodian Queen 2026, while the baila competition was won by Ruwantha Cooray and Ranusha Wijesinghe.
Niduki got the nod from the judges as she was charming and strikingly lovely. She did sparkle under the lights — a true queen, graceful, radiant and unforgettable.
Ranusha Wijesinghe and Ruwantha Cooray: Baila champs
Akasha Senavirathne was the 1st Runner-up, while Ranusha Wijesinghe was placed third — a double celebration for Ranusha, who also shone on the dance floor!
According to reports, there was thrill and joy when the baila competition got under way as there was plenty of energy and action on the dance floor, with Ruwantha Cooray and Ranusha Wijesinghe emerging as baila champs. The crowd cheered, clapped and danced along — pure Sri Lankan baila magic!
Guests say it was a night of light, a night of elegance, an unforgettable night.
Musical sets by C-Plus and BLACK, kept the guests dancing until dawn, while renowned compere Faizal Bongso anchored the celebration with his trademark charm and wit.
From slow romantic numbers to foot-tapping baila, from golden oldies to modern hits — the dance floor was never empty!
Numerous alumni batches, including representatives from the 2001 batch, and others celebrating generational Mazenodian spirit, made up this memorable occasion. Fathers and sons, brothers and batchmates — all dancing together as one Mazenodian family.
As the night drew to a close, one thing was clear — ‘Luminaria: MazenodiaNite ’26’ was not just a dinner dance. It was a celebration of friendship, of brotherhood, of memories and of Mazenodian pride.
A night of Light. A night of Love. A night to Remember!
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