THE MALAY WORLD, EXPANDED

Abstract

Sri Lanka is a land of Asian crossings and contacts, epitomised in the history of the country's Malay community. Within that history the year 1869 was especially momentous. This was when the Suez Canal opened, significantly easing the hajj pilgrimage route from Southeast Asia and resulting in many a pilgrim ship docking at Sri Lanka's shores en route to Mecca. On another, no less revolutionary front, 1869 saw the publication in Colombo of the world's first Malay language newspaper, the Alamat Langkapuri. These developments transformed the relationships Sri Lankan Malays had with communities throughout Southeast Asia and beyond due to the flow – or crossing – of people and information brought about in their wake. Through an exploration of articles, essays and letters appearing in Alamat Langkapuri in 1869-70 I consider the ways ideas about, and attitudes towards travel, mobility, exchange, contact and distance were shifting at the time. Such an analysis opens a window to debates within a trans-local Muslim community whose changing lives were both shaped by the newspaper's introduction and reflected, debated and contested between its pages.