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Research Journal of the University of Ruhuna, Sri Lanka- Rohana 12, 2020

anthropologists trained in Euro-America e.g., Sri Lanka (Perera 2012, Hettige 2010).
These sociologists see such a rupture as the cause of stagnation in sociology’s

forward march.

Many local sociologists in the region do not even link up with global sociology or
active sociology associations in their own countries - not to speak about producing

globally relevant sociology from the periphery. Instead, they are playing the role of
semi-colonial academics in the internal academic milieus. They are removed from

the social and cultural contexts they live in while functioning as middle-class

academics whose positions are secured by the state funded universities
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supplemented by NGO research and consultancies . Those affiliated with political
parties are even pretending to be intellectuals in the political and social space while
seeking legitimacy not from the sociology profession but from the politicians and

significant others in the national affairs.

Misra also discusses the de-linking of the Global and the national-local by South

Asian sociologists (Misra 2005:101). He states that ‘despite the growing importance
of globalisation, some aspects of society and changes have been neglected by

sociologists. These include ‘The sociology of the interconnectedness of the global,
the national and the local, the dynamics of this interconnection, and the implications

of this interconnection has on the present and future lives of different social

categories such as regions, classes, genders, ethnic groups, caste groups, the poor’
(Misra 2005: 101). Sociologists and anthropologists in Nepal often visualise ‘the

evolution of specific structures and processes which shape the polity, economy and
culture’ as local products. The macro and the long run remain highly

underemphasized both in the syllabi and the research agenda’ (Misra 2005: 101).
This is a trend observed by others like Vasavi and Patel in relation to sociology in

India.

5 There are country specific variations in such practices in the region, meaning that this happens
more in some countries and less in others.
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