Cricket is language-blind
C. Wijeyawickrema, LL.B.,
Ph.D.
I thank Gamini Gunawardane for his beautiful reply on the evolution
of Sinhala-Cricket (Island, 8/15/2008). If Ajantha had to pass an English-test
before he was allowed to play cricket he would have missed the bus,
and with teams of English-speaking cricketers Sri Lanka would not have
won a place in world cricket. I see a personal connection here because
I was able to become a college professor and a director of research
in USA because of the language-blind university entrance exam in 1960-61.
In fact, I did not take even Sinhala as one of the four subjects!
Because of Gamini's reply and because of Bandula Abeyewardene's (BA)
total misunderstanding of my response (Island, 8/2), my task is reduced
to answering a few, below-the-belt personal and private issues raised
by BA.
Because of his first mistake or his inability to understand the message
in my letter BA now made another mistake by placing patriotism and fluency
in English on a collision path (Island, 8/9). I see no direct connection
between the two except that I know that some people stress the fact
that when two Tamils meet or when Indians meet each other they always
speak in Tamil or Hindi respectively but when two Sinhalya meet they
tend to use English. I do not worry about such habits. SWRD who helped
Sinhala people had a 3rd grade student's ability in either reading and
writing in Sinhala.
I was only challenging BA's idea that 'a Sinhala cricketer who might
become a cricket hero at a future date could avoid the "embarrassment"
of not being able to speak in English if cricketer-training includes
tutoring in English' (Ideas Run the World). I did not oppose English
or people learning it as a second language. The gist of my letter was
to tell not to take the raft (English) on to your shoulders after using
it to cross the river. Learning English or any language for that matter
is like learning how to swim or how to ride a bicycle. We do not carry
the bicycle on our back when we walk.
The problem in the former colony called Ceylon is that those who had
money could learn English and they used it as an extra weapon in their
hands to oppress those who could not learn it. I wrote two essays previously
on this subject (Grulugomi to the rescue: the re-enthronement of the
English language (Island, 4/13/2001) and Empowering law students with
an English language tool (Island, 3/19/2008)) and BA would be able to
better handle his English syndrome if he cares to read them. Suffice
it to say that Language (English) is innocent, people abuse it (black-whites?)
is not.
I labeled him a black-white and a person with a colonial mentality
because of the statements I saw in his responses (I have not seen the
response of Daya Ranasinghe as I do not know when it appeared in the
Island) revealing a mind blocked with an English-based inferiority complex.
He sank further and deeper with his new theory that the language of
cricket is English. So if Susanthika wins an Olympic Gold Medal, then
what would be the language of running according to BA? If the American
wins 8 gold medals in swimming then what will be the language of swimming—American—because
American English is different from Queen's English.
I went to the Peradeniya University in the Sinhala medium and studied
law later in English. Dr. Joe Silva, who was a past Law College principal,
was my classmate. As a grade school student I went to a night school
in Panadura to learn English. My father used to tell me that he too
learned his English by attending a night school.
This brings me to the questions BA has about my name. Like Don Baron
Jayatilleke, my father's name was Gilton Don Manis. My mother's name
was Dona Baby Manamperi. My mother was a teacher and named me Chandrasiri
(in the birth certificate it appears in English as Chandarasiri) not
Conrad. What BA needs to understand is that the name given to one by
his or her parents has nothing to do with what that person does later
in his or her life. SWRD did so many things that his parents or relatives
never expected him to do. Parents in the past gave their children one
Sinhala and one English name—Chandra-Richard, Ananda-Edward, Cyril-Banda
are examples. I knew personally how Cyril-Banda used his names. Depending
on who was talking with him he used either name.
African Americans faced a dilemma because they were forced to copy
as their names the names of their slave masters. This was why the black
leader Malcolm used the name Malcolm X.
BA also needs to understand that because he was related to Sir DBJ
he cannot have an automatic share of DBJ's past glory. BA has to earn
his own place by his own work. No doubt the connection to DBJ helps
but it is not a free lunch. During the past 10 years, by way of marriage
relations, I came to know closely about the second or third generation
DBJ relatives, and I found that they had nothing of their own of serving
the public that would have made DBJ felt proud of them. It is called
"vanse kabal gaama."
BA's story reminded me the stories I heard about Anil Munasinghe when
he was Chairman, CTB. He had a life-size picture of the Anagaarika Dharmapala
on the wall behind his desk. The uncle and nephew, however, were world's
apart.
Whether tuition masters are doing a social service (how about bus drivers
and three-wheelers?) is a debatable matter. About 8 years ago I helped
to begin an evening English school (two days of the week) at the Siri
Siddhartharamaya, Walana, Panadura for the poor children who did not
have money for English tuition classes. It now has about 100 students.
I did this because when I was growing up in Walana my mother had a hard
time in giving me the monthly tuition fee of five rupees for my English
tuition. Rather than feeling embarrassed BA could have contacted Ajantha
Mendis privately and offered him free tuition. I hope BA could find
time to visit the temple at Walana (Ven. Walane Siddhartha was the one
who started the Parama Dhamma Chethiya Piriven at Ratmalana from which
came the two monks who started Vidyodaya and Vidyalankara Privenas)
and start a similar free English school in his temple.
According to BA patriots are those who stay in the country. If that
is the case then Sri Lanka already has over 18 million patriots! Black-whites
frequently use two interrelated phrases—greener pastures and second
class citizens—to sling mud at people who for various reasons left
Sri Lanka on a temporary or permanent basis. Those who went to universities
in swabasha mediums left Sri Lanka in frustration after failing to serve
the motherland, and USA took them in without a language test. This group
is now Sri Lanka's Seventh Great Force (sixth force is janitors and
maids toiling in Arab lands pumping money for the Colombo people to
import BMWs). They became successful in their lives after hard work
and personal sacrifices and if the Sri Lanka government is ready there
will be thousands of them who will come back to help their villages.
Just like the black-white phenomenon whether or not one is a second
class citizen in a new country is a state of mind. For example, in my
country of birth in Sri Lanka with caste and class discrimination and
nepotism, so many times I felt that I was a second class citizen. I
was often asked I were from Galle because of my last name. I had to
tell them that my parents were from Horana and that my last name was
spelt as Wije-ya-wickrema not Wijewickrema. In USA I felt I was different
in an ocean of white people but did not feel that I was second class.
I have white and black Americans working under me and I got my jobs
after country-wide competition. If I go to a KKK meeting may be they
will treat me as a second class citizen but I can live freely selecting
what I want or do not want to do. Did BA feel first class or second
class if he went to a western embassy in Colombo to get a visa?
Ceylon (Sri Lanka) has had two countries, not Sinhala versus Tamil,
but English-speaking Colombo country and Sinhala-Tamil Speaking non-Colombo
country. In 1956 this began to change. After 1959 both UNP and SLFP
Colombo politicians mismanaged the country and after 1977 the country
fell into a hell. After 1978 one by one country went back to the pre
1956 era and fortunately a reverse gear is on after November 2005. BA
is a person caught in this transition but making money out of it. I
know some outrageous stories of how English tuition masters suck money
out of poor mothers who are led to believe that if their children know
English the nirvana is just around the corner for them. If this is the
case then the English-speaking countries in the world should not have
all kinds of problems including poverty and misery. The plight of poor
Americans around me is even worse than the struggles of Sri Lankan poor
that I heard of.
I feel sad when I see Sri Lanka is copying bad things coming from
the West which the West itself is trying to get rid of including Kentucky
Fried Chicken, Coke and Hamburgers. The bath kade idea of BA is an example
of copying the unhealthy American fast-food business chains to save
time to do what, watch TV? No wonder 30-40% of Sri Lankan people are
now suffering from diabetics. Free trade, globalization, privatization
took mung beans, kadala and kurakkan away from homes. We, the Seventh
Great Force of Sri Lanka, not the English tuition masters, are in a
better position to take an enlightened approach to help Sri Lankan masses.
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