Aluth Avurudda - A Celebration of Life

The Aluth Avurudda – A Celebration of Life

(This article was first published in The Island of 13th April 2001; it has later appeared in a number of international online publications at various times over the last decade. I notice that the published version of the article has acquired certain errors and omissions not found in my original. Here is the same article as I wrote it before offering it for publication, unaltered except for a few emendations. But I don’t claim that my article is now perfect; the shortcomings that still remain are mine. I have added some pictures to this version, by courtesy of Google Images.)

The Sinhala Hindu New Year – the Aluth Avurudda in Sinhalese – is celebrated in the month of Bak according to the Sinhalese calendar. The name ‘Bak’ derives from the Sanskrit word ‘bhagya’ meaning ‘fortunate’. The month of ‘Bak’ corresponds to April in the Gregorian calendar, which is commonly used in Sri Lanka today as it is in other parts of the world. Although there is usually little conspicuous seasonal change experienced in the course of the year in tropical Sri Lanka except for a relatively hot August and a relatively cool December, the month of Bak is associated with a delightful vernal atmosphere, and an unusual freshness in nature enhanced by spring blossoms and azure
skies despite occasional showers. This is also the time that the ripened paddy is gathered in, which gives rise to a pervasive sense of plenty, especially to rural Sri Lanka.

The Bak festive seaon centres around a national cultural event which is unique in a number of ways. The Sinhala Hindu New Year is probably the only major traditional festival that is commonly observed by the largest number of Sinhalese and Tamils in the country. Its non-ethnic non-religious character is another distinctive feature. This festival cannot be described as ethnic because it is celebrated by both the Sinhalese and the Tamils, yet not by all of them either: only the Sinhalese Buddhists and the Hindu Tamils participate in it, the Christians in both communities having nothing to do with it. On the other hand, it is a non-religious celebration in that not all Buddhists nor all Hindus in the world take part in it; only the Sinhalese Buddhists and Tamil Hindus do. {I owe this description of the non-ethnic, non-religious nature of the Aluth Avurudda to Professor J.B.Dissanayake’s explanation of the subject in his booklet The April New Year Festival (Pioneer Lanka Publications. London.1993)}.

In terms of traditional astrological beliefs, the sun is said to complete one circular movement across the twelve segments of the zodiac in the course of the year, taking a month to traverse each constellation. The arbitrary beginning of this circular solar progress is taken to be Aries (Mesha), which is conventionally represented by the zodiacal sign of ‘the ram’. Having travelled from Aries to Pisces (Meena usually represented by the drawing of ‘two fish’), the sun must pass from Pisces to Aries to begin a new year. The solar new year (known as the Shaka calendar) is reckoned from this transit (sankranthi), which comes a week or two after the beginning of the new year according to the Sinhalese calendar. The Vesak Festival, which marks the dawn of the Buddhist new year, comes at least another month later. The Aluth Avurudda centres on the ‘transit’ of the sun from Pisces to Aries. It is remarkable for Sinhalese Buddhists to thus celebrate the beginning of the solar new year, rather than their own Buddhist new year. So the Aluth Avurudda appears to be in homage of the sun god, which is significant for an agrarian community.

Because of the increasing popular attention that it receives in Sri Lanka nowadays, the first of January seems to eclipse the New Year in April in terms of the popular recognition it enjoys. Those of us who enjoyed the Sinhala Aluth Avurudda as the main secular festival of the year may wonder with some justification whether it is now beginning to be shelved as yet another “cultural anachronism”.

This is indeed a regrettable state of affairs. Institutions such as the Aluth Avurudda and the various Esala Peraheras are vitally important cultural legacies we have inherited from the past, and they help sustain and define our identity as a people. In the face of the inexorable advance of modernism and globalization, the threat of cultural obliteration and loss of national identity is very real.






The Aluth Avurudda is a part of our rich cultural heritage, which includes among other similar treasures the historic dagabas, tanks, sculptures, paintings, and specimens of ancient literature. Who among us the inheritors of such an age old culture can be indifferent to the loss of this incomparable legacy? True, we must modernize, and participate in the emerging world order so as to keep pace with the rest of the international community in science and technology, and in the advancement of the general quality of living that it makes possible; yet, it would be most unfortunate if we were so foolhardy as to throw overboard the cherished possessions from the past in the name of progress.

These things have come down to us through the ages because they are ingrained in our history and culture. For thousands of years our ancestors – the inhabitants of this island - built up a highly organized agrarian civilization based on the principles of harmonious co-existence with nature, non-violence, tolerance and peace. The Aluth Avurudda wonderfully demonstrates our national ethos with its characteristic emphasis of the renewal and reaffirmation of goodwill within families and among neighbours, and in the series of ritualistic practices and observances that are meant to revitalize an essential link between human beings and nature.





I have vivid memories of how the Aluth Avurudda festivities were held in the remote villages of the Nuwara Eliya District in the late fifties and early sixties when we were young children. The Avurudda was an event we looked forward to for a whole year through interminable months of school, and ups and downs of childish fortunes (such as exam success or failure, friendship or fighting among playmates). At this time of the year we were invariably aware of a general awakening in nature. It was the time when the paddy was harvested and the fields were left fallow for a few weeks, allowing us children to romp about and play ‘rounders’; it was the time when exotic birds with bright plumage like the golden oriole sang from the flower-laden trees; it was the time when the humble dwellings of the peasants were cleaned and whitewashed, adding to the sunny brilliance of the surroundings. Unlike children today, we had more time to play, because tuition and cramming was almost unknown then and nature had not yet been replaced by TV and computer in engaging the aesthetic sense of the young. The impression we got from observing the multitude of ‘beauteous forms’ in the environment was that even nature joined us in our joy – a very positive sort of ‘pathetic fallacy’!

The sighting of the new moon was the first of the Avurudda rites. Then came ‘bathing for the old year’ as it was called, followed by the ‘nonagathe’ period (literally, a period without auspicious times); being considered inappropriate for any form of work, this idle period was entirely devoted to religious observances and play. Cooking and partaking of milkrice, starting work for the new year, anointing oil on the head, and leaving for work were the other practices. All these rites were performed at astrologically determined auspicious moments. Although belief in astrology and other occult practices is contrary to the spirit of Buddhism, in the villages it was the Buddhist monks themselves who prepared the medicinal oils in the temples and applied these on the heads of the celebrants, young and old, while chanting ‘pirith’ so as to ensure their good health for the whole year. In this way, the Aluth Avurudda traditions touched every important aspect of life: physical wellbeing, economy, religion, and recreation.

Children and adults walked in gay abandon about the village dressed in their new clothes visiting friends and relatives amidst the cacophony of ‘raban’ playing and the sound of firecrackers set off everywhere. The aroma of savoury dishes and smell of sweetmeats arose from every household. Visitors were plied with all sorts of sweetmeats. Amidst all this visiting, playing and merrymaking everybody was careful to be at home for the observance of the rites at appointed times.




It never occurred to us (or to our parents, I am sure) to question the necessity, or disbelieve the efficacy, of these rites. The sun was a god; the shining thing in the sky was not him, though; it was only his chariot! We really sympathized with him over the uncertainty and anxiety he was supposed to undergo during the interregnum between the demise of the old year and the dawn of the new, i.e. the period of ‘transit’ (sankranthi). The ‘Avurudu Kumaraya’ – the New Year Prince – was as real in our imagination as the Sun God. That we didn’t see him in flesh and blood was in the nature of things, too.

Today the Aluth Avurudda means much less to us than it did in the past. Our response to the theme of the festival has lost much of its emotional content. Those rites, auspicious times, and astrological beliefs are nothing more than irrelevant superstitions to many. Most of those who still follow the customs associated with the Aluth Avurudda do so as a concession to tradition, out of a sense of nostalgia. Our failure to participate in the joyous experience which the Aluth Avurudda was in our childhood is a very significant loss. The mystique charm and the sense of the
numinous (holy, divine) which informed the event have evaporated. This, in large measure, is due to our ineluctable sophistication.





Not all is lost, though. The Sinhala Hindu New Year still remains a powerful symbol of the renewal of hope for the future and a reaffirmation of our bond with nature and our commitment to the time-honoured values of our forefathers. It is truly a celebration of life.


Rohana R.Wasala

Literacy or Transliteracy?

Literacy or Transliteracy?
(This first appeared in The Island on Wednesday 3rd March 2010)
Literacy in the new media age involves much more than what its conventional definition says. Traditionally it is defined as the ability to read and write. A person is said to be literate if they can read and write in their first language at a basic level. Here reading is taken to mean decoding a piece of writing by analysing graphic symbols, and writing to mean encoding meaning in the form of a text by the opposite process. Reading and writing are not limited to this today since technology has opened up new and exciting possibilities for both. Any modern description of literacy should comprehend this technological and conceptual sophistication.

(As the reader may remember, there are ‘dynamic’ definitions of literacy today to replace the conventional ‘static’ definition suggested above. However, these are outside the scope of this essay.)

The criticism of a perceived ‘decline of the reading habit among the youth of today’ could probably be substantiated in terms of the traditional view of reading, i.e. reading a printed text off the page of a book. But we know that people, particularly young students, still do a lot of reading sitting before their computer screens. True, a few of them may be merely playing games; but the majority use the computer to do more serious work either studying or doing a job. And students who are serious readers and writers do occasionally transfer a substantial part of their work from the computer screen to the book page to continue their academic, literary, or professional pursuits at a more leisurely pace.

This occasional shuttling between electronic and paper texts reminds us that the historical shift from the page to the screen is by no means complete, and , probably, will never be for the foreseeable future. However, the innovations that have accompanied this ongoing change (from the paper text to the electronic) are the most significant in their implications for the relative richness of the experience of reading and writing that has been achieved through the application of technology. On the face of it, reading still remains nothing more than running one’s eyes through a script, and writing nothing more than making certain marks on a blank surface either by pushing a pen across a piece of paper or tapping some keys on a keyboard (which view is, of course, not correct: reading and writing are highly demanding, complex intellectual feats). Yet the recent advent of technology in the sphere of written discourse has brought about many refinements in comparison with which the various improvements achieved over millennia in this area seem mere ripples in an otherwise placid sea of slow progress.

The first decade of the new millennium that we are just passing saw these changes accelerating. As early as 2002, Colombi and Schleppegrel were tempted to write: “In today’s complex world, literacy means far more than learning to read and write in order to accomplish particular discrete tasks. Continued changes in technology and society mean that literacy tasks are themselves always changing.” as quoted in ‘Tips for Teaching with CALL’ by Carol A. Chapelle and Joan Jamieson (Pearson Longman, 2008). The obvious direction of change was noted in the following words of Sue Thomas, Professor of New Media in the Faculty of Humanities at De Montfort University, reporting on the ‘Tranliteracies’ Conference held at the University of California at Santa Barbara on June 7-8, 2005: “Unfortunately for some, however, this new literacy is not about reading fixed type, but about reading on fluid and varied platforms – blogs, email, hypertext and, soon, digital paper and all kinds of mobile media in buildings, vehicles, and supermarket aisles. Although text still dominates at the moment, it is possible that it might come to be superseded by image, audio, or even ideogram as the medium of choice. Hence ‘transliteracy’ – literacy across media.”

The shift from reading from a paper text to reading from an electronic text represents a significant change in our experience of reading. This is due to a number of reasons. The most obvious of these is the rich blending of different modes of communicating – audio, video, graphic, pictorial, etc - that an electronic text usually represents. A writer can achieve, and a reader can respond to, amazing results in the written exchange of ideas. Its multimodality invests an electronic text with a power to energize, shock, and galvanize the readers!

Another powerful concept that is being practically realized is the device known as hypertext. This is a way of patterning information in a database (a collection of data or facts stored in a computer to be accessed, used, and if necessary augmented by users) in such a way that certain key words in a text can be elaborated by individual readers by following the links given, depending on their needs and choices; these links lead the investigating readers to other texts on the Web which enable them to further define the meaning/significance/content/relevance of the original words for them. This means that readers can avail themselves of valuable information without having to read whole texts for the purpose. How useful hypertext could be in reading, especially in academia, goes without saying.

Of course, there’s the criticism that hypertext links sometimes lead the readers from text to text in a labyrinthine trail, and thus constitute a danger to them, and that students can be thereby inveigled into a wasteful academic wild goose chase. However, in reply one could say that reading in any context means reading intelligently, and critically for a specific purpose; serious readers know how to construct their meaning out of a text that is the most authentic, plausible, and credible, and relevant to them by following only the reliable leads, and by circumventing pitfalls.

Just as readers can thus engage in very constructive and fruitful interaction with an electronic text, so can writers work with the computer in numerous creative ways for producing an effective piece of writing. For example, consider how a computer allows you to check your spelling and grammar, to use different fonts, and font sizes, to enliven your text with pictures and graphics, with animation, and what not.

Not long ago, doing reference reading was a laborious process. Apart from the hassle involved in physically accessing the sources of information, one had to endlessly pore over tomes of literature about various subjects following (sometimes outdated by decades) references given by tutors. Today, a few clicks with your mouse on a computer screen bring you face to face with a wealth of information that is up to date, and authoritative. Of course, it is up to the discerning reader to sort the wheat from the chaff, sifting through the abundance of materials on offer.

The plethora of information available online is open to anyone. This tends to close the traditional gap between teachers and students, scholars and informed laypersons, and professionals and amateurs. Teachers and scholars need to be always extra rigorous in safeguarding their authority. They are obliged to cultivate a sense of modesty in the face of what looks like an inevitable depreciation of scholarship. However, true scholars need not worry, because mere learning – being well informed- is not knowledge. Teachers and scholars will never go out of business simply because modern technology makes the dissemination of information so easy.

The new digital culture is obliterating the boundaries between the academia and the general public, for no longer is academic research the exclusive preserve of ‘academics’. Interested non-specialists among the wider public can engage with academic research. This is a boon to people, who, though intellectually gifted, have been denied an opportunity to realize their potential due to unpropitious circumstances. The new kinds of reading and writing can help such people realize their academic ambitions with greater ease and probably less expense than in a print environment.

Literacy in the digital age, or preferably ‘transliteracy’, is thus a gateway to knowledge and education. For us in Sri Lanka English is the key to this kind of literacy. As in the case of many other countries, English as a second language is both a means and an end here. On the one hand, English is the medium through which to access global knowledge and technology, and also to achieve academic success in other subjects; on the other hand, a knowledge of English is being pursued for its own sake. English is a tool that is indispensable in the digital age.

Language is unique as a tool. It is unique in that the more you use it seriously, creatively, and intelligently, the sharper, and the more reliable it gets, whereas other tools get wasted and worn out with use. Literacy in the digital age has a special connection with English for us because of this reason.

As far as English language learners are concerned, interacting with digital texts provides a context for the active use of all the four basic language skills (reading, writing, listening, and speaking), something recognized as a basic principle involved in creating an effective second language learning environment. Much modern research suggests that reading and writing assignments, along with listening, thinking, and speaking activities are essential for the development of second language proficiency in learners. This is a condition that developing ‘transliteracy’ eminently fulfils.

Ref:
Words attributed to Prof. Sue Thomas (2005) retrieved from http://www.english.heacademy.ac.uk (01.03.2010)

Rohana R. Wasala