'A tulip in Lotus Land': the rise and decline of Dutch burgher ethnicity in Sri Lanka

Henry, Rosita Joan (1986) 'A tulip in Lotus Land': the rise and decline of Dutch burgher ethnicity in Sri Lanka. Masters (Research) thesis, Australian National University.

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View at Publisher Website: http://hdl.handle.net/1885/11251
 
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Abstract

[Extract] This study on the Burghers of Sri Lanka addresses itself to the problem of social identity, the idea of race, and the concept of ethnicity. In particular the thesis focuses on the institutionalisation in 1908, of Dutch Burgher identity, as opposed to Portuguese or other 'non-Dutch' Burgher, in the form of the Dutch Burgher Union of Ceylon (DBU). Although the thesis is based mainly on a literature study, my argument does not depend on an exhaustive catalogue of texts dealing with Sri Lanka and the Burghers. Rather, the focus is on one particular text - the Journal of the Dutch Burgher Union - in order to analyse how a group has semantically constructed a distinctive identity category for itself, as well as to delineate structural conditions that have led to that construction in the first place.

Item ID: 9288
Item Type: Thesis (Masters (Research))
Keywords: Dutch Burger, Sri Lanka, ethnicity, anthropology
Additional Information:

This thesis is openly accessible from the link to Australian National University's institutional repository above.

Date Deposited: 21 Sep 2010 22:41
FoR Codes: 16 STUDIES IN HUMAN SOCIETY > 1601 Anthropology > 160104 Social and Cultural Anthropology @ 100%
SEO Codes: 95 CULTURAL UNDERSTANDING > 9505 Understanding Past Societies > 950502 Understanding Asias Past @ 100%
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