About

Nalaka Gunawardene in Chiang Mai, Thailand, Sep 2010 – Photo by Indika Wanniarachchi

This is my personal blog. There is nothing official about it. I’m a private individual. While I hold some honorary positions, the views expressed here are entirely mine. I can only speak for myself, and that too, just barely…

More about myself: Nalaka Gunawardene profile

This blog collates my columns and op-ed essays published in public media (newspapers, magazines, websites) as well as online videos of my broadcast output and documentary productions. It also has occasional reflections not published anywhere else.

The blog, started in early 2007, has evolved — as indeed have I. From a focus on moving images, the blog has become a repository for my musings on science, development, information society and media. The original name is now a misnomer, but retained as changing it poses technical difficulties.

Most blog posts are in English, which is effectively my mother tongue and certainly my working language for 25 years. I started writing also in my local language (Sinhala) in 2011, so posts from then onwards include some that are not in English (but always with a brief English annotation).

For those who might be puzzled or confused by what appears here, I can only quote a favourite poet in my defence:

“Do I contradict myself?

Very well, then I contradict myself.

I am large, I contain multitudes.”

– Walt Whitman, in Song of Myself