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The Afterlives of Tamil Tigers: Fighters’ Memories of War and Survival

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Volume 36

War and Genocide



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The Afterlives of Tamil Tigers

Fighters’ Memories of War and Survival

Giacomo Mantovan

244 pages, 4 illus., bibliog., index

ISBN  978-1-83695-455-2 $135.00/£104.00 / Hb / Not Yet Published (April 2026)

eISBN 978-1-83695-456-9 eBook Not Yet Published


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Reviews

“This is a major contribution to the study of contemporary armed conflicts. By contrast with many previous studies on the topic, it does not narrate this war story at a distance but at close-range, through gripping narratives of former fighters. This exceptional, often poignant first-hand material not only illuminates the story of the armed struggle for an independent Tamil state in Sri Lanka, but more ambitiously fuels a theoretically sophisticated discussion of one of the major armed conflicts of our times.” • Dr. Laurent Gayer, Center for International Studies, Paris

Description

The Afterlives of Tamil Tigers explores the experience of war, defeat, and exile among former fighters—both men and women—of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), through the testimonies of veterans now living in France. Moving beyond the organisation’s reputation for violence, Giacomo Mantovan sheds light on the everyday lives, emotions, and ideological commitment of its combatants. By tracing their life trajectories—from military training to exile, through combat, torture, loss, and survival—he examines how these experiences have left a lasting imprint on their identities and ways of being in the world.

Giacomo Mantovan holds a PhD in Social Anthropology from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) and is a researcher at the Centre for Research in Anthropology (CRIA), ISCTE-IUL, in Lisbon. He has been a visiting fellow at Stanford University and the University of Edinburgh, and a research fellow at the International Institute for Asian Studies. His research focuses on political violence, militancy, and the experience and memory of civil war and exile among Sri Lankan Tamils, particularly former LTTE fighters. Dr Mantovan has published extensively on the narration of the self and the production of political subjectivities during war and migration, as well as on the social consequences of defeat and the commemoration of martyrs.

Subject: Anthropology (General)Genocide HistoryHistory: 20th Century to PresentSociology
Area: Asia


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