University of Peradeniya
The University of Peradeniya is the heir to the
oldest university tradition in Sri Lanka as the
successor to the University of Ceylon, the first
institution of its kind in the country. Its founding, on
July 1st 1942, as an autonomous corporation was the
fulfillment of hopes and expectations of many who had
been campaigning for a university in this country. It is
located on a site of great natural beauty, just 8km from
the city of Kandy - the historic capital of the last
independent kingdom of Sri Lanka, and 100km from
Colombo, the current capital of the country. The
university covers about 700 hectares of land located on
the flood plains of Mahaweli river as well as on the
lower slopes of the Hantana range. The developed area,
known as the University Park, is about 150 hectares
while the rest of the land remains forested. The
university consists of eight academic faculties. About
1800 undergraduates enter the university annually, to
make up an undergraduate student population of 6600, and
the total number of postgraduate students registered is
over 1200. Out of the total undergraduate student
population, about 5100 are provided accommodation on and
around campus. The University celebrated its Golden
Jubilee in 1992.
Faculty of Arts
The history of the Faculty of Arts dates back to the early beginnings of
university education in Sri Lanka. The predecessor to the Faculty of Arts in
Peradeniya University was established in Colombo, as part of the University of
Ceylon, as two faculties called the Faculty of Arts and the Faculty of Oriental
Studies. These two faculties were moved to Peradeniya in 1952, and were
amalgamated in 1972 to form the Faculty of Arts.
The twenty years from 1952 to 1972 saw the expansion of the Faculty of Arts and
Oriental Studies. The original seven departments of study of the two faculties
were Classics, Economics, English, Geography, History, Oriental Languages and
Philosophy. The Department of Oriental Languages was divided in 1943 into the
four separate departments of Sinhalese, Tamil, Pali and Sanskrit.
This was followed by the addition of several other academic disciplines to the
faculty: Law and Arabic in 1945; Sociology, Education and Modern Languages in
1949 (French and German had been taught for many years as subsidiary subjects);
Archaeology in 1959; and Buddhist Philosophy in 1964. The most recent additions
to the faculty are the departments of Fine Arts, Management Studies and Law
established respectively in 2001, 2002 and 2009. A sub-department of English for
the Teaching of English as a Second Language was set up after non-English medium
students entered the university. In addition, French is available as a subject
to students following the General Degree Programme.
The Faculty of Arts of the University of Peradeniya is one of the premier
centres of teaching and research in the Humanities and the Social Sciences in
Sri Lanka. It has a long established research tradition and a highly respected
publication record. It also conducts the oldest continuing Academic Seminar
Series in the Sri Lankan university system, the Ceylon Studies Seminar. In 1942
the faculty brought out the first academic journal in the Social Sciences and
the Humanities to be published in Sri Lanka, the University of Ceylon Review.
After the publication of this journal was discontinued in 1965, the faculty
commenced the publishing of two separate journals, the Sri Lanka Journal of the
Humanities and Modern Sri Lanka Studies. In 2002 the faculty commenced
publishing two new journals, Sambhavana (in Sinhala) and Palkhalai (in Tamil).
Individual members of the academic staff of the Faculty of Arts participate in
projects funded by many local and foreign agencies. Members of the faculty also
provide consultancy services to various organizations. The Department of
Archaeology cooperates with the Government Department of Archaeology in many
activities, including the Cultural Triangle Project. The Departments of
Economics, Geography, Sociology, Political Science, and Pali and Buddhist
Studies, among others, also provide expertise and consulting services to various
government agencies.