Tamil Muslim in Sri Lanka A significant Tamil-speaking Muslim population exists in Sri Lanka; however, unlike Tamil Muslims from India, they are not culturally linked with ethnic Tamils, they are therefore listed as a separate ethnic group in official statistics.[4][5] The Moor community of Sri Lanka also consists of Tamil Muslims migrated from Tamil Nadu region of India and converts from Sri Lankan Tamil community. The Moors had better social and economic mobility, thanks to the historic headstart they had in getting education and government jobs under British colonial rule.[14] Typical early 20th century Moor gentlemen The Sri Lankan Moors make up almost 9.2% of the population of the country. They are predominantly Sunni Muslims of Shafi School. The Moors trace their ancestry to Arab traders who settled in Sri Lanka some time between the seventh and eighth centuries. The Arabic language brought by the early merchants is no longer spoken, though various Arabic words and phrases are still employed in daily usage. Until the recent past, the Moors employed Arwi as their mother tongue, though this is also extinct as a spoken language. Currently, the Moors in the east of Sri Lanka use Tamil as their primary language which includes many loan words from Arabic. Moors in the west coast are fluent in Sinhala, an Indo-European language spoken by the Sinhalese majority in Sri Lanka, but use English within the community. Thus, the Moors are a multilingual ethnic and religious group. The Sri Lankan Moors lived primarily in coastal trading and agricultural communities, preserving their Islamic cultural heritage while adopting many Southern Asian customs. During the period of Portuguese colonization, the Moors suffered from persecution, and many moved to the Central Highlands and Eastern Province, where their descendants remain. Main article: Sri Lankan Malay Muslim The Malays of Sri Lanka originated in Southeast Asia and today consist of about 50,000 persons. Their ancestors came to the country when both Sri Lanka and Indonesia were colonies of the Dutch. Most of the early Malay immigrants were soldiers, posted by the Dutch colonial administration to Sri Lanka, who decided to settle on the island. Other immigrants were convicts or members of noble houses from Indonesia who were exiled to Sri Lanka and who never left. The main source of a continuing Malay identity is their common Malay language (Bahasa Melayu), which includes numerous words absorbed from Sinhalese and the Moorish variant of the Tamil language. In the 1980s, the Malays made up about 5% of the Muslim population in Sri Lanka and, like the Moors, predominantly follow the Shafi school of thought within Sunni Islam. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Sri_Lanka
Posted on: Sat, 24 Aug 2013 09:44:25 +0000