Abstract:
Sri Lankan culture has been a major attraction to the tourists who visit Sri Lanka.
Sometimes, culture is also the main identity of a community. Ceylon Kaffir
community is also a group of people with a unique cultural heritage and an identity.
They are a modern-day community who are descending from the African people
brought by the Portuguese. Today most of these Kaffir live in Sirambiadiya village.
Among the heritage values they were endowed from their homeland, art is the only
legacy that is remaining today. Today, many tourists visit here to experience the
Kaffir culture in their village based on the Ceylon African Manja Group. Similar to
how other cultural contexts were approached, tourist industry approached the Ceylon
Kaffir culture as well, some time ago and was an influence in changing their
lifestyles. The purpose of this research is to study how tourism affected their
lifestyle. A qualitative research design was used to advance this research study. The
data were gathered through interviews with Seven Ceylon kaffir people in
Sirambiadiya, using the convenient sampling techniques. These data were then
categorized under four parental themes. Those themes were life before tourism,
involvement in tourism, life with tourism, and tourism in Sirambiadiya. Those
themes were identified using a thematic analysis. Findings show that their past lives
were difficult in comparison to what they are today and that they used their art to
temporarily escape from their oppressive lives. Although many of them were
employed in the government sector, in the past, they have been persecuted on many
occasions due to past life story related to slavery. They turned to the tourism industry
to preserve their traditional art. In doing so, the communities have been advised and
guided by tourism experts. Their communities have had different opinions about
tourism at the beginning. Although their art has been a tourist attraction, they have
had issues about controlling tourist arrivals and inequality of the income distribution.
However, with tourism they exposed their culture to outside and they could build
new positive relationships with other cultures as they happily interacted with tourists.
They all have ideas to develop the tourism in Sirambiadiya but there is lack of
assurance as to whether the new generation will continue to engage in tourism.
According to the results, tourism has affected positively as well as negatively over
the lifestyle of the Kaffir community. The finding of this study can be applied to
develop tourism in Sirambiadiya village while protecting the Ceylon Kaffir tradition
by addressing the problems and issues faced by the community.
