A study on feminist literature in the postcolonial era in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Postcolonial literature in Sri Lanka explores the lasting impact of colonialism. In postcolonial Sri Lanka, feminist literature provides an essential forum for examining how women's voices emerge from the historical margins to subvert prevailing narratives influenced by national politics, patriarchal conventions, and colonial legacies. In addition, Sri Lankan women writers have created new avenues for expressing their lived experiences through literature, ranging from domestic life to the traumas of war. The study examines how language, ethnicity, and class interact to shape feminist viewpoints, concentrating on works written in Sinhala, Tamil, and English. This body of literature exposes the often unseen burdens that women bear in postcolonial and post-war contexts and challenges the constraints imposed by tradition by highlighting the everyday struggles and resiliency of women. With close readings of a few chosen literary works that demonstrate how storytelling turns into a tool for reclaiming agency, the analysis is based on feminist and postcolonial theory. This study examines how colonialism and its legacy impact women’s lives and representation in literature drawing on postcolonial theory, textual analysis. Also this evaluates the key authors and the reception of feminist literature in Sri Lanka. This paper investigates how the women portrayed through a patriarchal lens in literature. By doing this, it illustrates how Sri Lankan feminist literature serves as a vibrant forum for cultural resistance, introspection, and reimagining, making a significant contribution to national discourse as well as more general discussions within the framework of global feminist thought.