Workshop on ‘Tracing the African roots of Sri Lanka Portuguese’
PROGRAMME on Monday 11th May 2026
10.00–10.30 am
Introduction & Welcome
Ioanna Sitaridou (University of Cambridge)
10.30–11.00 am
Tracing the African roots of Sri Lanka Portuguese: a forgotten community
Ioanna Sitaridou (University of Cambridge)
Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya (University of Cambridge & Institute of Commonwealth Studies)
Chapane Mutiua (Universidade Eduardo Mondlane, Mozambique)
11.00–11.30 am
Coffee/tea break
11.30–12.00 pm
Video excerpts of Manja performance from field recordings of the project
Ioanna Sitaridou (University of Cambridge)
Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya (University of Cambridge & Institute of Commonwealth Studies)
12.00–12.30 pm
Tracing the African roots of Sri Lanka Portuguese: how to reconstruct the manjas
Ioanna Sitaridou (University of Cambridge)
12.30–2.00 pm
Lunch break
2.00–2.30 pm
Theorizing contact-induced change in creoles: Diachronic data from Louisiana
Oliver Mayeux (University of Cambridge)
2.30–3.00 pm
Language ecology and divergent trajectories of the Chavacano varieties
Rhoel Tupaz (University of Cambridge)
3.00–3.30 pm
Tea/coffee break
3.30–4.30 pm
INVITED LECTURE
Echoes from the past: What mixed functional and lexical categories can reveal about the origins of Kriolu’s first speakers
Marlyse Baptista (University of Pennsylvania, USA)
4.30–4.45 pm
Conclusion and Looking Ahead
Ioanna Sitaridou (University of Cambridge)
Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya (University of Cambridge and ICwS)
From 10.00 am to 4.45 pm
Bowett Room, Queens’ College, Silver Street, Cambridge CB3 9ET