The effect of cultural diversity and cultural changes for moulding personality: With special reference to wanathawilluwa in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Culture is a unique concept in social sciences. The study about man leads us to the study of its culture. The society cannot be studied properly without understanding of the culture of that society. The culture and society are interconnected and interconnected. They are inseparable. All they are moulding the personality of persons in the society. All most every person in the society is completely different and unique. No two people can ever have the same experience of life, the same perspective, the same mind. Personality is about our different ways of being human. How we are all variations on the same themes. Every person shows different styles of thinking, feeling and acting. In this study it was studied the interrelationship in between cultural diversity and cultural changes in the Wanathawilluwa village in Puttalama. Moreover, their effect on moulding personality was studied. This research was done on Wanathavilluwa of Puttalam district in Sri Lanka. This village is situated from the capital city more than 150km ahead. Our whole research was connected with three villages of Wanathavilluwa. They are Gange Wadiya, Herathkuliya and Karathiw. The study was launched while adopting qualitative approach. It was used primary and secondary sources for collecting relevant literature. Basically primary data was collected through interview method. Apart from such methods conducted in depth interviews with informants as like as scholars, university lecturers who are interested on this topic. The whole study was take place around three villages namely Gange Wadiya, Herathkuliya and Karathiw. Through the research of these villages we were able to identify how the change of the culture and the variety of the culture affect those peoples’ personality. According to the findings most elders didn’t have a proper education but young children having their primary and secondary education. It was revealed people that belonged to Catholic and Hindu and it was not found any Buddhist person from the village. Fishing is the inherent occupation of these villagers, but it is being rejected by young generation. So their inherited culture has been endangered. It was found that there is a tendency to leave the village and establish in the capital city. Influence of new technology such as internet facilities and mobile phones has become a major reason for changing attitudes of younger generation. But also still there are traditional elements in this society. Using traditional ways like Theppam for catching fish, raring domestic animals such as pigs and cocks for having meat and eggs. When study about their economic aspect it was found that they didn’t have a belief in saving accounts and other banking activities. But younger generation is maintaining a positive idea on this with the influence of socio cultural change. Accordingly, it, was found that globalization, modernization was straightly affected to these villages and it has become a major reason for moulding their personality differs from their traditional generations.