“The Quality that Comes from Oral Tradition is the Trend and Luxury.” Indigenous Hand-Loom Textiles Show Potential Towards Sustainable Development

This chapter highlights that oral tradition holds the identity of indigenous cultural textiles, which shows that the quality that comes from tradition is the trend and luxury and gives insights towards sustainable development. The village of ‘Thalagune’ in the Central hills of Sri Lanka has earned a long reputation for identical hand-loom textiles since ancient times. Today, ‘Thalagune’ textile productions are known as one of the best commercial cultural products among locals and foreigners. They are a community with 8 families living in an interconnected society and selling their skills. The research found that indigenous weavers have improved their quality of life by understanding and realising their potential in the art and craft of traditional hand-loom weaving. The way of life contains the capacity for continuance, which is bound with the inheritance memory. Folk poems/verses, stories, ritual recites, and beliefs show their valuing system of life and occupation. Oral tradition reveals the whole product development procedure. From cultivation of raw materials, preparation of cotton yarn, dyeing, feeding to weaving machines to weaving patterns, traditional design and motifs and a variety of products were recorded in their oral tradition. Many factors cause inequalities in the textile industry, such as gender wage, trade liberation, technology, lack of competent labour, and erratic yarn supply. The inability to make a livelihood from one’s skill also causes inequality in the textile industry. Besides, Luxury brands look for identity and uniqueness. The process of design in traditional hand-loom weaving shows the potential to provide firm alternatives. Traditional weaving shows unique aesthetic expression as they have been inherited from generation to generation. To strengthen the livelihood from one’s skill, it is suggested to develop local perspectives, have the service of traditional artisans’ skills, and let them earn. When designers join the instinctive with the mechanical, the hand-crafted and the technological, the result can be magical. This chapter found its close relation with sustainable development goal 10, which reduced Inequalities: Getting a better life and well-being would help reduce inequalities in the textile industry.