33 Countries of Origin’ Profiles

SRI LANKA Produced by the University of Coventry (UK) FAST FACTS • Sri Lanka is an island nation south of India. There are two official languages: Sinhala and Tamil . English is spoken competently by approximately 10% of the population, and mostly used in government. • Sri Lanka is religiously diverse . Just under three-fourths of the population follow Buddhism , and around 12% are Hindu . • The civil war ended after 25 years (in May 2009), after growing tensions between the Sinhalese and the Tamils. • Religion pervades many aspects of life and constitutes a basic element of Sri Lanka’s cultural diversity. • In Sri Lanka, there is a strong tradition of both men and women working, with men focusing more on income opportunities and women focusing on the household . • Currently, women's participation in the paid labour force is significant, although not evenly distributed, concentrated in professions such as nursing, teaching, tea picking, and garment construction. • There has never been the practice of child marriage or the burning of widows in Sri Lanka. • Sri Lanka elected the world's first female prime minister in 1960 , Sirimavo Bandaranaike, whose daughter is the current president of the nation. While this is not indicative of the political power of women in general, Sri Lankan women have held voting rights since they were instituted in 1931 and have long held certain property rights . Most religious leaders and officiants are also male, while women tend to be overrepresented among their followers. • Even though most groups on the island prefer for new brides to move into their husbands' homes, women traditionally retain strong ties with their own families. • Women consistently defer to men across all domains of life, including the workplace and the home. Women also bear the greater weight of social expectations and sanctions for noncompliance. • Violence against women is widespread in Sri Lanka, and is considered in many areas a part of daily life. Including incidences of rape, sexual harassment, domestic violence, incest, assault, obscenity against women, unwanted advances, perverted acts, forced pornography, forced prostitution and media violence.