Maldives Information Culture

Maldives by Tom Masters (2006)

2008-11-25T18:23:00.000-08:00

Following are some snippets from the book Maldives by Tom Masters (2006) that I found noteworthy for my study. Some very interesting observations:

Arts

Though performances of traditional music and are not everyday events, contemporary Divehi culture is strong and adaptive, despite foreign influences, which range from martial arts and Hindi movies to Eminem and Muslim fundamentalism. Western and India fashions, pop music and videos are highly visible, but on public occasions and festivals the celebrations always have a Maldivian style. Three daily newspapers and several magazines are published in the unique national language and rock bands sing Divehi lyrics. It’s remarkable that such a tiny population maintains such a distinctive culture. (p. 34)

Literature

Despite the unique Maldivian script that dates from the 1600s, most Maldivian myths and stories are from an oral tradition and have only recently appeared in print. Many are stories of witchcraft and sorcery, while others are cautionary tales about the evils of vanity, lust and greed, and the sticky fates of those who transgressed. Some are decidedly weird and depressing, and don’t make good bedtime reading for young children. Novelty Press has published a small book
called Mysticism in the Maldives, which is still available. The Hammond Innes thriller The Strode Venturer is about the only well-known novel that is partly set in the Maldives. (p. 34)

Visual Arts

There is no historical tradition of painting in the Maldives, but demand for local art (however fabricated) from the tourist industry has created a supply in the ultra-savvy Maldivian market, with more than a few locals selling paintings to visitors or creating beach scenes for hotel rooms. Some islands were once famous for wood and stone carving – elaborate calligraphy and the intricate intertwining patters are a feature of many old mosques and gravestones. A little of this woodcarving is still one, mainly to decorate mosques. The façade of the new Majlis building in Male’ is decorated with intertwines carvings. (p. 35)

Local Beliefs

On the islands, people still fear jinnis, the evil spirits that come from the sea, land and sky. They are blamed for everything that can’t be explained by religion or education. To combat jinnis there are fanditha, which are the spells and potions provided by local hakeem (medicine man) who is often called upon when illness strikes, if a woman fails to conceive, or if the fishing is poor. The hakeem might cast a curing spell by writing phrases from the Quran on strips of paper and sticking or tying them to the patient or writing the sayings in ink on a plate, filling the plate with water to dissolve the ink, and making the patient drink the potion. Other concoctions include istiri, a love potion used in matchmaking, and its antidote varitoli, which is used to break up marriages. (p. 31)

Engaging place(s)/engaging culture(s)

2008-11-04T23:42:00.000-08:00

HGSO Annual Conference : Engaging place(s)/engaging culture(s)
5-8 November, 2008

Faculty of Humanities, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia

The Ninth Humanities Postgraduate Conference
What now are place and culture? Encompassing the themes of engaging place(s)/engaging culture(s), this interdisciplinary conference seeks to open spaces for the presentation and discussion of the full range of topics and methodologies through which Humanities postgraduate students now journey and interrogate worlds and texts: to provoke conversations about local spaces, diasporic spaces, sites of subjectivity, cultural knowledges, place as urban streets, as words on a page, as paint on a canvas; culture as translocal, transnational, multi-national, global, local ...

Conference Abstracts

My Abstract
Issues in applying western research methods to a non-western culture
This paper explores the practical difficulties of applying western research survey methods to close-knit communities in both an urban and rural setting in the small island developing state of the Maldives. The research project is an exploratory study of
information provision and access in this small island developing state, undertaken because an improvement in information service provision is considered necessary for its development. A survey questionnaire was chosen as one research component in the study and covered matters including level of information access, use, and awareness of information sources. The survey included participants from the urban island community, Malé, and a selected rural island community. It was planned to take a purposeful stratified random sample from both communities inviting both a male and a female from every fifth household from both communities with a target recruitment of fifty participants from each community. The practical difficulties in this approach were different in both communities ranging from the physical infrastructure, timing of the survey, and the mindset of the people. The implication of this outcome questions the
applicability of established western research methods to non-western cultures.

Traditional Maldives architecture - a book

2008-10-20T01:25:00.000-07:00

I was just working on my discussion chapter and wanted to describe the activity of women at the household chores “outside” the “house”. I wanted to make a point about how people in rural islands, even if they are “home” are actually not home and will miss out on broadcast news as they are not glued to the TV or Radio as we do in Malé.
Many people in the islands spend time right outside on the joali making or preparing their cooking, washing their clothes or simply minding their children; all done in a very social environment and away from electricity needed for the TV and Radio sets.

I just wanted to find an authoritative source of information to back my claims. However, I haven’t been able to find any – because I am just Googling. I am sure there must be some snippets of information in books which I do not have access to because they are not online. All this searching without much luck really keeps saying to me that someone should be writing a book on:

Traditional architecture of the Maldives

Wouldn’t it be fascinating to read something about the physical layout of the traditional houses in Maldives? I doubt if Malé has any of this traditional houses now. But in some islands (I haven’t visited too many) there still exists houses with the badhige (kitchen) as a separate annexure to the dwelling, and the huge gifili (open-air toilet) also sperate from the main dwelling. With the wave of modernisation taking place in the country, soon these will be replaced with “modern” houses. With it will be lost the ways of living that our mothers and grandmothers had experienced. I am sure there would be special meanings attached to the architectural layout (if I may call it that) of the traditional houses.

I have seen glimpses of this discourse in some of the historical accounts written by foreigners. The following is a snippet from the The strode Venturer / Hammon Innes . _ Collins, 1965.

Don Mansoor’s gai or house was built like the rest of coral cement with a palm-thatched roof. There was a well in the forecourt and the interior was lit by a roaring pressure lamp that cast giant shadows with every movement of the occupants. There was a table, chairs and a big, ornate mirror, a dresser with cheap English china displayed. But the thing I remember most clearly was a great swinging bed slung by ropes from the balm bole roof beams. His wife greeted us, slight and dark with doe-like eyes and a beauty that was clearly driven from Ceylon. There were other, older women in the background, and as I sat down a young girl brought me a glass of some pale, amber-coloured liquid. He soft nubile features smiled at me shyly as she moved back into the shadows with a glint of gold at waist and throat. (p. 112).

The family atmosphere, the sense of order and neatness, of a culture and a way of life nurtured and maintained in absolute isolation; it was impressive and strangely attractive so that I felt relaxed and at ease, and as I sipped my drink I found myself falling under the spell of the island. (p. 113)

Isn’t it time that a Maldivian – who is specialised (maybe) in architecture, study the traditional layout of houses and see how well they fitted with the traditional way of life – especially on the islands; and try to understand if there are lessons to be learned from this architecture before we barge into modernising our houses. More importantly, it will be an important addition to our historical collection and an important contribution to our future generation.

I can visualise that book:
Pictures of traditional houses, limestone walls with their myriad designs, their layout, the neat and tidy sand floors, how these designs ventilated and lighted the houses, and the sustainable nature of these designs, etc.

Writing up the results chapter

2008-08-20T01:19:00.000-07:00

The date of thesis submission is getting closer. Still a few more months left. But I guess getting it all together and getting all the separate bits of work that I have been working with during the last two years will take considerable time. Especially in terms of getting it to flow coherently linking back and forth and also using the same style of writing throughout.

At present I am working on finalising the results chapter, which has taken me the good part of three months. I started off with the idea of having one chapter for the results but as it progressed, both my supervisor and I realised that it will need to be in two chapters as both needed an introduction and a conclusion. Moreover, the first draft of the survey results went on to 60 pages. So I started off the interview results as a new chapter and today I handed in a complete draft of this chapter to my supervisor.

Looking back at the last three months, I should say the writing up of the results has been harder than I ever expected it to be. It wasn’t as hard as the initial few months where I was struggling to give shape to my research topic and putting in the candidacy proposal. That was one stage in this journey which took a lot of reading (in terms of literature) and writing.

The survey results was at some stages exciting as I was finally looking at some trends, confirming things that I have always known and bringing up things that I haven’t expected to emerge. At other points, it was really tedious as I had to methodically analyse the data, prepare tables, write about the figures, present them graphically and then talk to them. Ploughing through the 60-question long survey questionnaire really tested my patience. The analysis was done using SPSS and I used excel to create the graphs as I wasn’t too happy with the graphics of SPSS.

Writing up of the interview results wasn’t any easier or cheerier. Since it was only 6 interviews, we decided that we did not need computer software to code it for me. And it wouldn’t even have been that practical because the interviews were conducted in Dhivehi language and then transcribed word-to-word in Dhivehi. So for it to really work with something like NVivo I would have had to translate very accurately which would take more time than it would to analyse it manually. The fact that two interviews were not recorded (because they did not consent for it) did create a few problems in the writing up as I must have missed some important points in my note taking.

However, it was also not too bad, because otherwise I would have had to spend more time in transcribing than I did. As it was, I spent over a month on transcribing the 4 recorded interviews. The actual interview durations were approximately one hour for each interview.

I started off writing the interviews thematically according to the interview guide. But then later realised that not all interviews went according to the interview guide and also since the four organisations were different, in their information approach and services, there were no real common themes. So I ended up changing the format of the presentation a few times and in the end I have 4 major sections–which also reflects the 4 main questions on the interview guide –with all the other information coded thematically in one large section.

At first I started retrieving relevant sections from all the interviews going back and forth between the six. But this strategy soon proved fatal as I was only confusing myself by going in all directions by working on 7 different word documents at the same time. Alternatively, I tried going by interview at a time and writing it up and then crossing it out on the transcription so that I know I have already talked about it. Then took the next interview transcription and talked through it, putting it together where appropriate with what I have already written. It was tedious but when I was through with the 4 transcriptions and the other 2 interview notes I was happy with the outcome. I guess I could have done save a lot of time if I had actually translated even the transcribed interview to English in at least summary form. I found it was easier to deal with the interview notes, that I made of the unrecorded interviews than it was with the transcribed ones.

Anyway, the draft looks alright. Now I wait for Kerry to read it and advice me on modifications.

The next step in this journey is writing up the discussions which looking at my track history will require at least 1 month of dedicated work to have a rough draft and another half a month to polish it up.

A promising platform for Maldives’ scholars

2008-07-02T23:40:00.000-07:00

It is heartening to see that things are progressing in Maldives in the area of scholarly communication. A major step has been taken by MaldivesResearch in this endeavour.

The first issue of the International Journal of Small Economies is planned to be published in November/December 2008.

This will be a promising scholarly platform for all the Maldivians who have the potential and yet lack the necessary means of publishing, most probably due to the long wait periods to publish in other international journals.

I am sure, in the past, there has been a number of initiatives like this to establish a journal for Maldivian scholars.

For instance, the Maldives College of Higher Education has had plans to establish a multi-disciplinary research journal. This plan has been there for quite some time. But action has not been forthcoming for reasons that I am unaware of.

The one incident that I am very familiar with is that of Maldives Journal of Health Sciences.
An editorial board was established in 2002 with the help and guidance of two academics from the University of New Castle, Australia. The editorial board was made up of qualified Maldivians and a great deal of an effort was put into it by all the members to get the journal going.

However, for some reason which was not clearly communicated, the journal did not get the official backing from the government. In general terms, the gist of the reasoning was that there was no guiding policy in allowing this kind of publication. That if the Maldives Journal of Health Sciences gets the approval, many others will start requesting for the endorsement to publish...

At the same time when these official communication was going back and forth between the relevant government authorities and the Faculty of Health Sciences, work was in progress in enticing the academics/scholars in the health sector to contribute to this journal as the editors was anticipating a positive response for the approval of the journal.

As things turned out, it was temporarily rejected by the government authority. However, keeping an ever optimistic mindset, after a lot of deliberation with other relevant officials from the College and the health sector, the editorial board decided to publish its first issue as planned. However, it was published as an internal document hoping for a positive outcome, from the discussion that was still ongoing with the government, in time for its second issue.

The first issue was published and distributed freely to the health sector and various sections within the College and work was in progress in compiling the second issue. However, there was a loud and definite signal that scholarly publication cannot be formally published, especially in a field like public health issues. This was discouraging to the editorial team as the credibility and visibility of the scholarly output is very much reduced. It was not unnatural that the work of the editorial board finally dwindled and faced a premature death before it reached its third year of existence.

Coming back to the point of this post, about the International Journal of Small Economies, I applaud the trustees and the editorial board for the selection of the name that does have a broad possibility of topics as well as authorship. And given its international outlook it has reduced the bureaucratic processes of approval and opened up for scholarly contribution internationally. And with a title like 'small economies', I am assuming, papers do not necessarily have to be predominantly on Maldives. A very promising journal.

Maldives policy on censorship

2008-06-25T22:32:00.000-07:00

Does censorship have implications for intellectual development?

In Maldives people have practiced self-censorship for a long time. People have been, in general, very cautious about what was expressed, especially in the written form. However, this situation is changing and has been on a roll for a few years now. This is evident in the number of newspapers and magazines that has been added in the last few years. And with the advances happening on the Internet with the likes of blogs, writing has reached a new height.

A few years back it would have been difficult, if not impossible to find any written material criticising government policies. But now, this is a common practice. True, the common folk show signs of intimidation when handling anti-government material.

My point here is to say that self-censorship has been in place for a long time and it is practiced by writers themselves, publishers, and also the readers. This situation still prevails with people who do not have access to the internet. And at the next level there is censorship imposed by governing authorities.

But is there a point in censorship? Censored or not, people will read and access what they want; if not openly then, in secrecy.

A few weeks back, the issue of censorship in Maldives emerged up with the book on apostasy co-authored by Dr. Saeed. This was published in 2004 and it has taken over 3 long years for the religious authority in Maldives to say that this book cannot be allowed to be freely circulated and read; that the book carries inappropriate information.

This incidence alone has shown what the information culture of Maldives is about. It is controlled and it is reactionary. A proactive community would have sought out the book sooner since we do not have too many scholarly books published in Maldives or abroad by Maldivian scholars. In an ideal scenario, the National Library of Maldives should have purchased it for their national collection at least within the first year of its publication.

And if, it was a book on religion, which it is - based on the policy on religious books being censored and approved by the religious authority, it should have been passed on to the mathee majlis (or the relevant body) and they would have either approved or disapproved of the book and this whole process should have, in an ideal world, taken the most of 4 months. And this whole process would have happened back in 2005, or 2006 at the least.

But as things happen in Maldives, the book has been out there for quite sometime, and all of a sudden someone contests for a job that many people are eyeing and there had to be some dirt pulled up against this contender. This dirt finding process brought up a book which is on a religious topic and all of a sudden this book comes in to the picture.

The book attracted the attention of everyone and something had to be done to this book. And I suppose mathee majlis did the most sensible thing (for them) that can be done under the circumstances.

Now the book is officially banned. This would mean that the National Library will not hold it in the national collection; which I personally think is very unfortunate as it is a national treasure for the simple reason that it was written by a Maldivian.

People should have the freedom to read whatever they want. I personally believe it should be the individual’s freedom to decide if the content is right or wrong. But of course, it is the responsibility of the concerned authorities to “educate” the public on what is right and wrong.

The most disturbing aspect of all this is that a good piece of writing is banned and from the looks of it nobody is concerned about it – that is other than the few blog entries that was written about it.

The general public is not concerned since, for them a book is a book and is not important as people don’t have time to read books and/or don’t have the money to spend on books. The reading body of Maldives is not too concerned either, because the chapter in question is available online. The Ministry of Information or the National Library does not seem to be concerned either.

Some questions that need clarification are:
Where does free flow of information fit in with this kind of censorship?
What does the censorship policy serve really?
How well defined is this censorship policy?
Is it relevant to the current online environment?
Does this control of what can be read and what cannot be read border on individual human rights?
Doesn’t this sort of censorship restrict intellectual output and lead to intellectual stagnation by the learned?

Help me pls!!!

2008-06-13T11:36:00.000-07:00

i need to know how many newspaper/magazines are published in Maldives at present. pls help. I have listed those that i am aware of or heard of from others. some might even have slipped my mind. pls help me fill in the questions and to add those i have missed. many thanks.

Haveeru - daily newspaper
Aafathis - daily newspaper
Miadhu - daily newspaper
Minivan - daily newspaper
Hamaroalhi - daily newspaper?
Haama - ?
Adduvas - weekly magazine
Udhares - weekly magazine
Fiyes - ?
Huvaas - ?
Dharuma - monthly magazine?
Jazeera - ?
Sandhaanu - ?
Dheenuge magu - weekly newsletter
Hukuru - ?
Manas - ?
Hafthaa - ?

(post edited on 15 june) The following is what is listed on wiki. but as we can see this is not accurate. the only thing i am sure about is that Monday Times stopped publishing a few years back. what else is incorrect?

Daily Newspapers
Aafathis Daily
Haama Daily
Haveeru Daily
Jazeeraa Daily
Miadhu Daily
Minivan Daily

Weekly Newspapers
Adduvas Weekly
Fiyes Weekly
Huvaas Weekly
Manas Weekly
Monday Times (English)
Udhares Weekly
Evening weekly(english)

I guess I will just have to try and contact the information ministry for this!?

Summary of proposal

2008-05-25T20:17:00.000-07:00

Title
The information culture of the Maldives: an exploratory study of information provision and access in a small island developing state

Abstract
The aim of this study is to explore the relationship between information culture and development and to highlight areas in information provision and access that need to be addressed in the small island developing state of the Maldives. As Gathegi (1990) states “development is related to knowledge. Knowledge is derived from information. Knowledge and, therefore, information are vital to the development efforts of any country” (p. 1). It is therefore, proposed to undertake this study by evaluating the existing information culture in the Maldives and investigating the relevant information initiatives in place and those which are planned for the country. This will be compared with the information needs and information use of the urban community and one rural community to identify the challenges associated with the implementation of information services. The outcomes of the study will be reported and recommendations for further endeavours will be made.

Objectives
The aim of this study is to explore the relationship between information culture and development and to highlight areas in information provision and access that need to be addressed in the Maldives. The research questions for this study therefore are: (1) How effective are the existing and planned information initiatives in place in the Maldives? and (2) What changes are required in the information culture of the country to lead to development?
The specific objectives of this study are to:
1. define and evaluate the present information culture of the Maldives;
2. investigate the relevant information initiatives in place;
3. investigate the relevant information initiatives planned;
4. identify the information needs of the people of the Maldives;
5. identify the challenges associated with the implementation of information services; and
6. draw up recommendations for future direction of information initiatives.

References

Gathegi, J. N. (1990). Policy on the creation of scientific and technological
information in developing countries: the case of agricultural information in
Kenya. PhD Thesis. University of California, Berkeley.

Where I am with the thesis

2008-05-25T20:14:00.000-07:00

When I submitted by candidacy proposal my research design involved document analysis, survey questionnaire and interview. These methods were used in a recent similar research by Iqbal (2004).

Did not have too much time to delve into the detail of the methods to get a good grip on what it entailed. For a research masters we get 3 months to submit the candidacy proposal. The candidacy proposal should include the objectives, research question/s, background to the literature, research methods, ethics, facilities & resources required, and of course the reference list.

Quite a considerable amount of time was spent on narrowing down my topic, and finding my little gap in the literature. Well that gap for me is quite huge and I am still not too sure if I am doing the right thing.

Those three months involved a lot of reading, writing, re-writing, more reading, and writing, and scrutiny into what I was proposing to study. It also involved a lot of sleepless nights, plenty of coffee, and foreboding thoughts of impending doom as I thought this whole thing was going to end up in a disaster. Many a times I questioned my decision to go ahead with a research degree.

Most of my effort was placed on the objectives, research questions and the background section. The methodology section and the rest took a back seat. This is proving to be a fatal mistake at this point in my journey. Kerry is having this notion of case study when I cannot understand how it can happen. We are also having an issue with methodology versus methods. Life would have been easier if these have been settled early on. But I guess this is a learning process and in the end things will work out just fine. The first hurdle was the candidacy approval, followed by ethics clearance which went hand-in-hand with the instrument design and all, this was followed by the actual data gathering and now the final and the largest challenge of all is getting it all together and telling my story.

The candidacy application went in smoothly, the detailed literature review again took lots of reading and writing and re-writing, the questionnaire design was time consuming but was enjoyable after all that reading, the actual data collection went alright (even if nerve racking at times), writing up of the methodology chapter was not too hard but it brought major issues in my research design that needs to be considered before I reach the finish line.

With the draft version of introduction (the proposal itself I guess), lit review, situation analysis, and research design (some on the latter half of drafting, and some in their infancy stage) I am now tackling the results chapter. And this is proving to be very challenging. It does not involve too much reading but involves a lot of patience, monotonous routines, and just sheer will to sit in front of the screen and report on all the 60 questions methodologically. It is taking its toll on me.

One semester to go and I guess I need to get things into full gear now.

The Strode Venturer - a novel set partly in Maldives

2008-04-24T11:15:00.000-07:00

Masters (2006, p. 34) in his book on Maldives writes that:

Despite the unique Maldivian script that dates from the 1600s, most Maldivian myths and stories are from an oral tradition and have only recently appeared in print. Many are stories of witchcraft and sorcery, while others are cautionary tales about the evils of vanity, lust and greed, and the sticky fates of those who transgressed. Some are decidedly weird and depressing, and don’t make good bedtime reading for young children. Novelty Press has published a small book called Mysticism in the Maldives, which is still available. The Hammond Innes thriller The Strode Venturer is about the only well-known novel that is partly set in the Maldives.

The following is a look at The strode Venturer written by Hammon Innes and published in 1965.

The story is set in 1960 and in the southern tip of the country, Addu atoll. The description of Maldives and Addu seems a bit farfetched to a 32 year Maldivian, especially one who has been born and bred in the capital island Malé. However, this story illustrates the plight of the Maldivian people a mere 48 years ago. The contrast between Malé versus outer atolls is quite paramount. It also epitomizes how far Maldives has come in terms of technology and transport in these 48 years. The important question here would be if it is good enough, or is there scope for improvement?

Snapshot of the novel (from the dust cover of the book)

Geoffrey Bailey is a man in search of a new job – a new life. Then Strode & Company, City shipowners, make him a curious offer: find Peter Strode, the family black sheep, and make sure he returns to the fold. Bailey’s acceptance of this assignment plunges him into a world where the smiling face of the Maldive Islands masks unseen terrors. But the lethal dangers of the coral reefs and the remote islands are pale in comparison with the civilized jungle of high financial warfare. And the directors of Strode & Company have too much to lose, and too few scruples, to care about one man’s life – or his death.

Preface (from the book)

Very little is known or has ever been written about the Maldives due to the difficulties of getting there. These coral atolls, running south from Ceylon 500 miles into the Indian Ocean, are like a great barrier reef, and even to-day communication with the mainland is by sailing vessel. On one of the southernmost islands, however, an R.A.F. staging post has been established and its is to the Royal Air Force that I am indebted for the unique opportunity of visiting these remote islands on the equator and getting to know the people who inhabit them. A novel that is partly about these people, and the impact of the twentieth century upon them, must naturally include the R.A.F. who have brought that century into the islands. I should like, therefore, to make it clear that the characters of serving officers and others are entirely imaginary, though ranks and titles have, of course been adhered.

Today, Maldives is a popular tourist destination and it is well known for its beautiful white sandy beaches and crystal clear water. Getting to Maldives is not too difficult and inter-country transport is relatively easier than it was in those days. However, have we developed intellectually, or more importantly have we moved away from the oral tradition, and have we preserved the oral culture?

Interesting snapshots from the novel as I read:

He also gave me my first briefing on Addu Atoll. I had never been there. All I knew of it was a description given me by one of the Britannia pilots – ‘Like a huge aircraft carrier stranded on a coral reef.’ But that was just the island of Gan, not the whole atoll. Alec, on the other hand, had been on a destroyer that had refuelled there during the war when it was known as Port ‘T’. ‘It’s the finest natural harbour I’ve ever seen – a hundred square miles of water entirely protected by reefs and only four navigable channels between them.’ He hadn’t been there since, but without my asking he had borrowed from a destroyer the Admiralty Pilot for the West Coast of India which includes the Maldives. He had also borrowed charts 2989 and 2067 – the first a general chart of the whole 500-mile chain of islands, the second a large-scale chart of Addu Atoll itself (pp. 80-81).

The charts were like no other charts I had ever seen before, for the Maldives are not islands in the normal sense, but groups of coral growth forming lace-like fringes around shallow seas dotted with islets. There were altogether nineteen groups extending from Addu Atoll, which was almost on the equator, 470 miles north to a position west of Ceylon. Some of these groups were over a hundred miles in circumference. It was a great barrier reef with only a few deepwater channels through it – the Equatorial Channel, the One and Half Degree Channel, the Eight Degree Channel (p. 81).

The Adduans were described as ‘great navigators and traders’, but the only things they exported were dried fish and cowrie shells, their existence dependent on what they harvested from the sea and from the soil of pitifully small islands that were nowhere more than five or six feet above the sea level. There was nothing there to attract the attention of a trading concern like Guthrie’s – the islands were far too poor, far too remote. (pp. 81-82)

‘This is one of their big inshore boats – a bondo-dhoni,’ Strode said. ‘With a good sailing breeze like this we’ll be there in under the hour.’ (p.102)... The boat itself was quite different from any I had ever sailed in before. It was home-made, of course, but running my hand curiously over the rough, sun-worn surface of the wood, I found each morticed joint as tight as any boatyard could have made them, the planking copper-fastened and neatly stopped below the paint. The oars consisted of a bent blade of wood with the shaft socketed into a hole in the middle and bound with coir rope through two small holes. The hole pins were of wood, too, and the oars were strapped to them with fastening of twisted rushes. In a manner of moments it seemed, I had been transported back in time to another age where men existed by what they could make with their own hands. It was primitive and yet, glimpsing the line of coral islands ringing the horizon, conscious of their remoteness, their isolation in the enormous wastes of the Indian Ocean everything about me in the boat seemed essentially right, a part of man’s creative genius, his ability to survive. (p. 103)

The art of building this impressive vessel known as dhoni is an oral tradition. Shouldn’t there be illustrative and detailed written texts on this art form?

‘You’ve only just arrived and you know nothing about these people – how they’ve always been different from the rest of the Maldives, how the little they’re able to produce for export has always had to be sold through Malé. That’s the Sultan’s capital. It’s nearly three hundred miles north of here and the Malé Government doesn’t give a damn for the welfare of the Adduans. Exploited, living near the edge of starvation, T.B. and elephantiasis rife – you’ve only got to look at the size of them. You see what you think is a ten-year-old boy and you find he’s eighteen, possibly twenty. It’s pathetic.’ (p. 105)

The Maldives government has done a number of works in addressing these health related issues with the assistance of international aid agencies. However, is it properly documented? Has there been a scholarly communication process? Does a scholar or a researcher interested in these kinds of information have the access to this information? Has it been collected and collated? Is it accessible?

‘Two years ago the Adduans set up an independent People’s Republic. A couple of gunboats were sent down from Malé and if it hadn’t been for the R.A.F. there’d been a bloody massacre. The island group to the north was brought to heel, but these boys still have their own government. They are free. But they’ve had to pay a high price for their freedom. You’ll see when we land. I’ll show you something that as a sailor will make you heart bleed.’ (p. 106)

Isn’t this an important piece of information that citizens need to know about? An average high school student, by the end of their 10 years of education in Maldives would not know about this. Shouldn’t this be important information that needs to be incorporated in the teaching of national history so that lessons can be learned from that incidence?

In less than half an hour I could see the land curving round ahead of us. The dark blur became steadily blacker, more pronounced. Suddenly there were palm trees, the dark outline of thatched houses and then the shadow of a coral reef was slipping by and the crew were lowering sails as we glided into a white sand beach where men stood in the shallows waiting for us. Strode touch my arm and pointed. ‘See those?’ (p. 107)

‘I want you to meet Don Mansoor.’ The man in the linen jacket shook my hand. ‘I am very pleased to meet you,’ he said in precise English. ‘Happy to be welcoming you to the island of Midu.’ There was dignity and an old-world charm in the manner in his welcome, but his gaze was shrewd and his hand, though small, had a powerful grip. 'Don Mansoor is a great navigator,’ Strode said. ‘Probably the greatest in Addu.’ The long, rather sad face broke into a smile that sent little lines running out of the corners of the eyes. ‘I am sailing very many times to Ceylon.’ (p. 108)

Passages like these illustrates how well Hammon Innes captured the essence of Maldivian culture, the way of living, behaving and talking.

Don Mansoor’s gai or house was built like the rest of coral cement with a palm-thatched roof. There was a well in the forecourt and the interior was lit by a roaring pressure lamp that cast giant shadows with every movement of the occupants. There was a table, chairs and a big, ornate mirror, a dresser with cheap English china displayed. But the thing I remember most clearly was a great swinging bed slung by ropes from the balm bole roof beams. His wife greeted us, slight and dark with doe-like eyes and a beauty that was clearly driven from Ceylon. There were other, older women in the background, and as I sat down a young girl brought me a glass of some pale, amber-coloured liquid. He soft nubile features smiled at me shyly as she moved back into the shadows with a glint of gold at waist and throat. (p. 112)

The family atmosphere, the sense of order and neatness, of a culture and a way of life nurtured and maintained in absolute isolation; it was impressive and strangely attractive so that I felt relaxed and at ease, and as I sipped my drink I found myself falling under the spell of the island. (p. 113)

‘I don’t care where he finished up. He caused me one hell of a flap. And the situation here is almost as tricky. As you know, the Maldivian Government had the question of Addu Atoll raised in the united Nations. Contrary to what they claim, we did nothing to encourage the Adduans to form a break-away republic. One may sympathise with
them privately, but officially it’s been a damned nuisance.’ (p. 124)
Inevitably I thought, and fretted whilst he showed me the Government building, the house of the man who had styled himself President of the Adduan People’s Republic, the neat ordered streets of the capital: and then we were whirring low over the reefs, heading east. There was a batteli fishing in the Kuda Kanda Channel, the curve of its white sail like the wing of a bird, and shoals of big fish – bonito – just beyond Bushy Island; and the far side of the Man Kanda Channel he came down low to follow four big rays winging their was with slow beats across reef shallows that were shot with all the hues of coral growth. (p. 128)

He was silent then and I waited, listening to he liquid sound of the Adduans talking amongst themselves. In the end it was Don Mansoor who answered. ‘You must understand that we are very poor peoples here in Addu. Very poor indeed before the R.A.F. are coming to the island.’ His was soft and gentle, his English nearly fluent. Later I discovered he has been educated at Bombay University. ‘We are always very distant from Malé and the government. But we have nothing but fish and cowrie shells to sell to the world outside. We wish to be less independent upon the R.A.F. They are our friends. They have been very welcome to use. They raised our conditions of living so that we have lamps and oil to put in them, flour and cigarettes, even radios. But what happens next year or the year after? We do not know. We want independence for all times, but we are not being certain of our independence if we are not having – if we do not have ...’ ‘Resources,’ Peter Strode said. (p. 137)

... ‘Storms aren’t very common – no storms of any duration. But he [Don Mansoor] hit one and it carried hi'm into an area that he’d never been in before. Probably no one has. It’s right off the tract of any shipping, away from any route that aircraft take, even R.A.F. planes.’ He paused there. I think he was afraid that he was being betrayed into telling me too much. ‘An undiscovered island?’ ‘Perhaps.’ He picked up one of the lumps of ore and held it in his hand, staring at it as though it contained some magical property. (p. 140)

‘I suppose you could call it an island, yes. It was the bed of the Indian Ocean really.’ He’d come straight from the airport, his tropical suit still rumpled from the journey, but he didn’t seem tired and he wanted to talk. ‘Never seen anything like it. All grey slime and weed and the empty cases of shellfish, and stinking like a dirty harbour at low water.’ The description, the atmosphere of the place came pouring out from him compulsively, leaving me with the impression of a dark whale shape about three miles by two, a dead decaying mass from the ocean depths lying stranded in a flat calm oily swell a thousand miles from anywhere. He had seen the manganese lying exposed in drifts like banks of black metallic shingle. And here and there were outcrops of the basalt from which the nodules had been leached by the sea’s action. But most of the island was overlaid by sediment, a grey slime baking under a blazing hot sun. He wouldn’t tell me where the island was. “It’s way off any steamer track, clear of the flight path of any plane.’ (p. 172)

Nobody said anything. We just stood there, too dazed, too mesmerised by what we had seen to speak. Lennie Porter was the first to find his voice. ‘What was it? What the hell was it?’ But nobody could explain it. We looked it up in the Pilot. The master of the Ariosto had seen very much what we had seen, but off the coast of Kutch in India more than fifty years ago. In his case the phenomenon had lasted twenty minutes with the appearance of very high seas. He had described them as so agitated that they appeared ‘like a boiling pot, giving one a most curious feeling 0 the ship being perfectly still, and expecting her to lurch and roll every instant.’ And his report added, ‘It turned me dizzy watching the moving flashes of light, so that I had to close my eyes from time to time.’ On leaving it in the line of light had presented the same appearance as on entering, as of breakers on a low beach, and after steaming through bright, clear, cloudless night for a further twenty minutes, the whole thing had been repeated, but if anything slightly worse. The Pilot recorded two other instances, both reported by naval vessels – in 1928 and 1933. But it offered no explanation, merely observing that the phenomenon could occur in the open sea as well as near land and either in calm or stormy water and that it might be caused by ‘the presence of confervae or other organic matter in the water.’ Peter had heard about the ‘white water’ from Don Mansoor during his voyages from Mukalla to Addu Atoll. ‘He told me he had seen it twice and each time his crew had been very frightened, thinking it was Ran-a-Maari.’ Ran-a-Maari, he explained, was apparently some sort of jinn or devil, and he added, ‘The first man the Adduans recognise is Adam, the second Noah and the third Solomon, whom thy call Suleiman. According to legend, Suleiman made a copper ball and confined Ran-a-Maari inside it, but wasn’t big enough to encase the jinn’s legs.’ He smiled, the lines at the corders of his eyes deepening, Suleiman threw the copper ball with Ran-a-Maari inside it into the sea and it’s their belief that the white water is the threshing of the jinn’s legs as he struggles to release himself.’ A pleasant enough story to chuckle over beside a winter fire back in England. But out there in the Indian Ocean, in seas that were virtually unchartered, the superstitions of a primitive people seemed less absurd. (pp. 220-221)

The white waters, and the appearance of high seas – is this what is described as kandumathi elhun? Wonder how much has been written about these phenomena by Maldivians. I have heard people talk about this. People who have actually been in this situation. But how well has this information been collected and disseminated? Has there been any attempt by Maldivians to understand this phenomenon or is it yet another unknown and unexplained occurrence left to the fanditha verin for the mere reason that it is not readily explainable?

‘They’re not helpless.’ He turned on me furiously, his eyes glittering in the sun so that for a moment he really did look mad. And then in an even tone he said, ‘They’re an intelligent, highly civilised people, an island race that understands the sea. And they’re tough.’ (p. 240).

The vedis came down on us under full sail, heeling to the breeze and the water bone-white in front of their blunt bows. They were doing a good six knots and as they came abreast of us, so close we could have tossed a coin on to their decks, their crews began to sing – a sad, strange chant. Both chips were flying the blue, green and red flag of Adduan People’s Republic and when they were past and showing us their blunt, dhow-like sterns, the crews moved to their stations. They stood in as far as the first shoal, and just beyond it they turned as one with their bows facing into the wind and the sails came down with a run as the anchors were let go, I shall never forget the arrival of those first two vedis. It wasn’t just that they looked so magnificent, coming in like that without engines, their decks littered with the bits and pieces of the boats they had brought with them. It was the behaviour of their crews. After such a long and dangerous voyage they might have been expected to rest or embark in a
leisurely exploration of the island. Instead, they went to work at once, unloading gear and stores, getting their dhonis launched. Their urgency and enthusiasm was so immediate that we just stood there, watching spell-bound, so that it was some time before we got into a boat and went across to them. (p. 410)

The Adduan flag was then run up on the spar they had brought from Midu. It was an impressive, very colourful flag – blue, green and red in horizontal stripes with white stars in opposite corners and white star and crescent in the centre. Peter then produced a new ship’s log book and everybody signed their name in it as witness to the formal annexation of the island by the Adduan People’s Republic. (p.412)

They would still need sugar, rice, implements, but they knew now that the island was viable. They had the illusion, if not the actuality, of independence. And in the stockpile of ore on the quay they had the assurance that there was something else beside cowrie shells and dried fish that they could trade to the outside world. (p. 413)

This has been a fascinating read. Above I have only highlighted some texts that relate to Maldivian context. The rest of the story about the family feuds, boardroom dramas, and the voyages itself present an interesting mixture of a journey.
What is noteworthy is the fast paces that Maldives has taken in decreasing the differences between her and other countries.

This is a must for the Maldives national collection. I wonder if they have it. I wish I could check their catalogue online.
Note: These are the sorts of things that need to be improved in the Maldives information culture: a more proactive approach in information collection, preservation and dissemination from the information providers, a more open environment of information exchange and use by the wider community, a curiosity in discovering the unknown and unexplained, a desire to advance knowledge...

Source:
Innes, H. (1965) The Strode Venturer. Collins.
Masters, T. (2006) Maldives. Lonely Planets.

The Maldive Islanders by Romero-Frías

2008-03-30T06:55:00.000-07:00

I finally got the opportunity to read Xavier Romero-Frías work on Maldives culture. It is a fascinating read. I am enjoying reading it and it has also intrigued me. Having had little exposure to the outer islands, for me this is a discovery.

The following is an extract from The Maldives Islanders. Romero-Frías narrates stories from a variety of sources, mostly from the southern islands, and presents the fast-modernizing country and its younger generation with a glimpse of ancient times of Maldives. Many stories revolve around the supernatural -jinni, fanditha (sorcery), and also of epidemics that wiped away entire island populations during various times – some resettled later, and some left uninhabited.

As my main interest in this text was to get an idea of the “information culture” of earlier times, one of the prominent sections that caught my attention was the story about Rekifutu, the newly returned young scholar, and his plight at the hands of the locals in his attempt to save the people from ignorance.

Extract from Xavier (2003, page 148)

The main aim of diyōge kuli and other esoteric rituals practiced in the Maldives was to secure special powers for a reduced circle of participants. As we have seen above, within the Tantric context –the Goddess’ explanation to Vaśista – the implication that mere conventional knowledge is not enough is stated in very clear terms. This leads unavoidably to the suggestion that there is an aura of naivety and incompleteness about what can be termed as ‘average learning’, like the following story shows (Told by A. Nasīm I. Dīdī, Nūdalhī, Funādo village, Fua Mulaku).
The Man Who Learned From Two Books
Having completed his education in the continent, a young man called Rekifutu returned to his island in Addu Atoll. He was handsome, from a good family, and was now well versed in the Qurān, Arabic and certain sciences. His parents were very proud of him, for he was their only male child, and his four younger sisters had missed him sorely and were very happy to see him back. The girls kept flattering their brother and fussing about him all the time, and the truth is that he himself could not hide his pride at his achievements.
Soon after arrival, Rekifutu went to the main mosque for the Friday prayers. The island chief was leading the prayers and, in the customary sermon, this cunning man asserted that all islanders had the obligation to be very kind to their island chief and bring him money and presents whenever they could. God didn’t want the island chief to be poor; instead He was pleased to see islanders treat their chief well. The sermon went on for quite a while, with the chief praising himself and bragging about his goodness.
Rekifutu was dismayed to hear these words. As soon as the sermon concluded, knowing that the islanders couldn’t understand Arabic, he rose and directly addressed the boastful chief in that language; saying: “What kind of sermon is this? You use your craftiness and the name of the God to become richer at the expense of people who are quite poor. It is wrong to do that! Surely God is not pleased with your behavior.”
The chief was surprised, but he quickly smiled and replied in not-so-perfect Arabic: “Look here, my son, don’t get angry. These people are like animals, ignorant and stupid. If I can get revenue from them, I will do it. I am the chief of this island and I must be wealthy. I deserve it! It is difficult and boring to rule over them all the time.” Finally, with a wink, he offered: “We can both benefit from this situation. If you are smart and don’t tell any body about this, I shall give you part of my wealth.”
Rekifutu did not reply and the Friday prayer went on. At the end, when everyone was leaving the mosque, the young man stood at the gate of the compound, gathered the people about him and told them that their chief was a deceitful man, who was abusing his authority over them to increase his wealth. He declared: “God never said that chiefs should become rich at the expense of poor people.”
Furiously, the island chief elbowed his way through the crowd, demanding in a very loud voice: “Who is this insolent young man talking to you and insulting me? I have known this Rekifutu since he was a baby. What does he know about life? He went to a foreign country, and already thinks that everything can be done here as foreigners do. Now he has come to our island and has become so arrogant that wants to turn you against me. This impertinent youngster is not interested in the welfare of our island! His only aim is to put me down, I who have been so good to you, so that he may become a tyrannical ruler over you. If you listen to his subversive words, all of you will suffer. Think of me. You know me. I am your chief and I have always been good to you.”
Reacting angrily, the islanders became a blind mob who beat Rekifutu savagely. When they had had enough, they left the poor young man unconscious and bleeding at the gates of the mosque…

The story goes on to tell how Rekifutu left Addu and went to Male’ and lived among some dubious characters and came back to Addu after some time. And it continues …

Friday came and Rekifutu, impeccably dressed in white, went to the mosque. There the chief gave his usual boastful, greedy and self-serving speech. Rekifutu said nothing and smiled confidently. The Island chief studied him with slight pprehension. But after a while, as Rekifutu just kept smiling, he was pleased. He assumed that the learned young man was now his supporter. Once he had finished his sermon without any unpleasant interruption, the chief thought “good! I gave him a good lesson. He has finally learned to respect his elders.”
At the end of the Friday prayer, Rekifutu very politely requested the chief for permission to speak. The island chief became alarmed and wonderd, “What is he up to now?”
Rekifutu quickly calmed him saying he just intended to make a little speech to tell the islanders how fortunate they were to have such a good leader. As the chief was a very vain man, he felt flattered and gave his permission eagerly.
Rekifutu addressed the crowd praising the chief in the most exaggerated
terms. The unsuspecting island chief, standing beside him, was immensely satisfied. At the conclusion of his speech the young man emphatically assured the islanders that their leader was such a worthy and holy man, that if one of them was lucky enough to get hold of a droplet of his blood, or a pieve of his clothing, or a tuft of his hair, the gates of heaven would be surely open for that person.
Suddenly, all the people turned towards the island chief and started to look at him with relish. Calmly detaching himself from the crowd, Rekifutu walked back home without hurry.It is said that the chief didn’t make it to the gates of the mosque. The mob, in the ensuing frenzy, tore him to pieces. Some even used knives. Soon nothing was left of the island chief, not even a single blood droplet in the sand.
Though it is meant to be a light, humorous story, ‘The Man Who Learned From Two
Books’ is actually a cynical illustration of how firmly Maldivians believe that mere religious and scholarly studies –represented by the ‘first book’ –cannot make a man powerful. Accordingly there is a general acceptance among islanders of the fact that a person not possessing ‘special’ esoteric knowledge –the ‘second book’ of the story –will not be successful within the community (p. 149).

Romero-Frías, X. (2003) The Maldive Islanders : a study of the popular culture of an ancient ocean kingdom. (3rd revised ed.). Spain: Nova Ethnographia Indica.

getting back on track

2008-03-26T07:28:00.000-07:00

It has been a long time since I reported here. I went off for data collection early Nov 2007 and spent almost 3 months in Maldives. On our return in Feb 2008 the initial few weeks were spent on just settling in, organizing accommodation, sorting schooling issues, waiting for a place in the day care, seeking out a part-time job and just enjoying being back.

Now after two months of ‘the settling in process’ I am ready (really pressed and pressured) to get my gears in action and to focus. Since I returned I have met my supervisor twice, first 4 weeks back and again today. When I went in today, I was a bit unsure of the structure of what I was doing. I had a clear structure earlier but then I started reading up this book “How to Write a better Thesis” by Evans & Guba and I have been trying to restructure my thesis according to their advice.

Which basically was (among other things of course) that I have a research design chapter describing and justifying the methodology and methods, and since I am using multiple methods, to have a results chapter for each method and to describe the research instrument in the respective results chapter. If it was a one method piece of work then they suggest having it all in the research design chapter and the result itself in the result chapter. So, I was trying to conform to this style and I guess things got too complicated for me. I talked to Kerry about this and she said to forget about it. She wants me to go back to my initial structure. But mind you Evans & Guba’s book is a good read. And I guess the structure advice would be very suitable for a longer piece of work.

The other issue that I needed to clarify was to once and for all decide where the document analysis part sits. Initially I had proposed it as a method. But as things progressed it really became background to the literature. Hence had doubts as to where it suits better. So today, we agreed to move it up to sit after the lit review chapter to read as a review of Maldives situation. And of course it might change later.

Another thing that came up in today’s discussion was to view my research as a case study. Now we have never looked at this research from that angle before. So this is an interesting twist.

I got more reading from Kerry’s collection which includes:
Research methods in library and information studies / edited by Margaret Slater
Research methods in librarianship: techniques and interpretation / Charles H. Busha & Stephen P. Harter
Research methods for students and professionals: information management and systems / Kirsty William

And from the library, more readings:
Research methodology : a step-by-step guide for beginners / Ranjit Kumar
Mixing methods : Qualitative and quantitative research / edited y Julia Brannen
The landscape of qualitative research / Norman K. Denzin & Yvonnas S. Lincooln

Some of these books I have referred to before when writing up the candidacy proposal. But I guess I need to read more to write up the methodology or research design chapter. I might have been better off actually writing up this chapter before I went off for data collection. But I guess it all comes down to the available time. Before I went off was busy cleaning up the lit review chapter and preparing the research instruments, clearing ethics, and making arrangement for the field activities.

Doing research and writing it up is indeed "a funny business"!
Moore (1990,p.1) [in Research methods in library and information studies / edited by Margaret Slater]

People of the Maldive Islands by Maloney

2007-10-24T23:39:00.000-07:00

From the preface of

Maloney, C. (1980). People of the Maldive Islands. Bombay: Orient Longman.

The twentieth century was but a faint breeze blowing over the Maldive Islands until the 1970s; now it is coming in rush…

It was only in the 1970s that Māle, the capital, was linked by regular air service to Colombo and
Trivandrum. Now, nine islands have modern tourist hotels, and specialists from United Nations agencies and Colombo Plan countries are descending on the country.

All these foreign contacts, the tourists, and the new sources of money, are drawing the Maldives into the matrix of world-wide communication. And the old culture is being stirred to its depths.

But that culture has rarely been described because these islands have been virtually ignored by travellers, journalists and scholars alike. How different from the tropical coral islands of the South Pacific and the Caribbean, which have been romanticised and anthropologised for decades! This book is the first substantial scholarly work published on the Maldives since H.C.P. Bell prepared his book on Maldivian antiquities fifty years ago. It is time to catch up on our negligence of this southern extremity of South Asia…

There are three book-length old sources on the Maldives which provide the main points for tracing the evolution of its culture. First, is the account of Francois Pyrard, a Frenchman wrecked there in 1602 and detained for five and a half years. He learned the language (called Divehi) well, and his work, perceptive and accurate, is rather like an ethnography written before the concept of ‘ethnography’ was invented. It is cited frequently in this book. Second, is the account of two Englishmen, Young and Christopher, deputed to the Maldives in the 1930s as part of a marine survey team, and they recorded information of interest to the British in India. The third work is that of H.C.P. Bell, who made a brief stay in 1879, when shipwrecked, and visited again in 1920 and 1922, deputed by the Government of Ceylon to study Maldivian
Buddhist antiquities. Bell had long experience in the historical archaeology of Śrī Lankā. In his later years, as a labour of love, he devoted much scholarship to the Maldives. His book, prepared in the 1920s, but published posthumously, has a wealth of data on the language, Buddhist remnants, Sinahala affinities and history of the Islamic period of the Maldives. He also published twelve articles, Excerpta Maldiviana, on diverse antiquarian subjects. None of these
three works, however, describe or analyse the cultural system, and almost all the old works are based on data obtained in Māle.

The main new findings of this book are as follows:
The sub-stratum of population, before the arrival of Divehi-speakers from Śrī Lankā, was Dravidian-speaking; the islands were settled originally from Kērala, which is evident in the language, place names, poetry forms, dance forms, relics of Hinduism underlying Buddhism, local political organisation ant the like.
The kinship system was formerly matrilineal and kinship terms are mostly derived from Malayālam. The kinship system has been modified by Divehi (from Sinhala) influence and has slowly crumbled under eight centuries of Islamic social ideals.
The myths regarding origin are related to those of Sinhalas.
The islands are referred to in early Buddhist literature.
Traditional counting was with 12 as base number, which has interesting historical implications.
Islam provides the teleological component for both the highly organised political system and the social rules of behaviour.
Parallel with Islam is a magico-religious system, fanditha, having great importance to individual perception of the world and to psychological adjustment with the environment.
The former caste system evolved into a highly politicised traditional class system, now using modern mechanisms to maintain itself.
In every hundred marriages, there are eighty-five divorces; this is an adaptation to psychological needs arising from the settlement pattern and political and social system.
Behaviour has been adaptive to the constraints and needs of people living a lifetime a lifetime on tiny islands with inter-action limited to a few score or a few hundred
co-islanders.
Population growth and density is the most serious problem.
The new foreign money, the new elite symbols, and the new tourism, plus population growth, are straining the values of the old cultural system.
... Since 1974-75 when the author was in the Maldives there has been a change of government, and the country has been increasingly affected by political and economic currents from abroad...

The Maldives are experiencing intensified contact with the wide world… Now jet planes unload tourists to Hulule airport, which was extended by dirt and stones shipped from India… Māle had about 20,000 people when I was here, now I hear it has newly 40,000 and the consumer tendency is increasing…There are few places in the world that have experience outside influence as rapidly as the Maldives did in one decade during the
1970s.

Clarence Maloney

Informatization

2007-10-24T00:18:00.001-07:00

This study sounds ever more important in the current political, social and religious dilemma that the country is experiencing and has been going through for the last few years. The situation seems to have escalated within the last few months and no sooner than we think that there can be nothing worse, something else comes out of the blue.

Any news that I read about Maldives over the Internet, may it be local websites, local online newspapers or official or personal blogs, there emerges one common theme, a theme of despair, lack of trust in the whole social structure. This raises the question of how well-informed or ill-informed Maldivians are.

Have Maldivians been too passive in their world-outlook. Have Maldivians been taught to be passive. Does it have reflections on the current information culture in the Maldives. Can a solution to the dilemmas be sought by equipping the public with information literacy?

On another line of thinking, I can’t help but believe that Maldives is going through similar changes to any other country. Informatization, which is referred to as the process by which information technologies transform social relations which minimises the cultural and economic barriers, with its advantages also brings with it vulnerabilities. The situation looks severe in Maldives in contrast to other countries due to the narrow economic base, the geographic dispersion of the islands, geographic isolation from other countries, and the historically close-knit island communities. People have been exposed to opposing views quite swiftly through the emergence of the web which has been made accessible to the wider public only in the past few years. This coupled with the lack of the necessary education to deal effectively with opposing views; people succumb to it or find themselves in flux with the situation.

Yet again, I see the solution for the existing predicament in enhancing the existing information culture. When or how or by whom, are all questions that need to be tackled.

Promoting Maldives information culture

2007-10-17T22:16:00.000-07:00

In Maldives are we doing anything to cultivate an information culture?

Information culture cannot exist ex nihilo. It should be nurtured, and its elements must be taught as with other cultural aspects, such as arts or social norms. This must be done at all staged of education, explaining the complexity of the modern period of transition to electronic means of communication. It is important that university students understand the social laws of intellectual communication. (p.41).

It is true that we do not have a university per se at the moment. However, the Maldives College of Higher Education does offer undergraduate as well as Masters level courses. Do they incorporate information culture components in their curriculum?

Information culture is, among other things, insight into the underlying information mechanisms regulating human behavior and social development. Today, the traditional information pattern of society is changing drastically under the influence of information facilities and by technology rapidly changing and coming into household use. (p.40)

Information culture is seen as a major component in social development. And in Maldives, we are seeing the emergence of information exchange through the Internet. In the absence of a publishing culture, given the small population base, the Internet has paved ways for the general educated public to express their world views through the web and now commonly in personal blogs. The internet has also facilitated the information exchange because of the uncontrolled nature of it. This is especially significant in Maldives where censorship of thought is widely exercised through self-censorship (for the prompt publishing or even trepidation of being subjugated) or authoritative censorship before anything goes out to the public.

This free flow of information which has emerged within the last few years is promising as well as detrimental. Promising as it generates intellectual curiosity which is important for developmental outcomes. Detrimental because of the strong opposition to general beliefs and customs that Maldivians have held strong for a number of decades. The unity of the country, mainly based on its common language and on common religion, is on the verge of being shattered as there is a strong undercurrent of arguments going forth about freedom of religion.

It will be inevitable to hold on to one religion if the current situation persists. Maldivians for so long has been an isolated island in terms of challenging religious perspectives and people have followed in the path of Islam, to some extent, in the namesake of doing it without totally believing it or strong feeling for the religion.

This is where a strong information culture is important. It is important to have access to a wide variety of information and the public to be educated in using this information to make individual informed decisions.

Restricting access to certain kinds of information material, through either restriction on distribution or use or public access in libraries, is not going to stop people from getting access to controversial ideas as information is out there on the web for anyone interested enough to pursue it. Here again, there is a need to educate the users on authoritative information sources.

Information and library culture includes studying such notions as writing, books, documents, library, intellectual communication, information services, intelligence, data, information, knowledge, librarian, bibliographical, archival, and information activity, and informatics. In the course of studies [in information culture], students are given a general idea of electronic information technology and the latest changes in the knowledge dissemination paradigm. Special attention is paid to the regularities of document development and ageing, article distribution over journals, assessment of journal significance, and the time of response to published articles. (p. 41)

Today we live in an information society also increasingly considered as knowledge societies. And information culture is the fundmanetal component of the modern civilised world.

Ref:
Gilyarevskii, R. S. (2007). Information culture in higher education. Scientific and Technical Information Processing, 34(1), 40-43.

Mv Blog culture

2007-10-16T22:24:00.000-07:00

The last few weeks have been a strange time. I have gone through so many blogs by Maldivians on all sorts of topics. There are serious posts and some posts just for the sake of posting something. There are also posts for entertainment, keeping up-to-date on a given topic, sharing information with others, different hobbies, random reflections, personal musings and the like.

In terms of the Maldives culture, this shows that Maldivians are no different from any other country or community. There are people who have been bloggnig for quite some time and blogging is part of their daily life. And quite clearly there are Maldivians who have no idea what a blog is; and also there are those who know what it is and does not see any worth in it.

Maldives Bibliography - linguistics

2007-09-30T20:59:00.000-07:00

A bibliography of Maldives Linguistic publications:

Bell, H.C.P. 1919. “Appendices.” W. Geiger, Maldivian Linguistic Studies, Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 27 (extra number), edited by H.C.P Bell. Reprinted in 1986. Male, Maldives: National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research
Bell, H.C.P. 1922-35. “Excerpta Maldiviana.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Ceylon Branch, 29.75: 99-104, 29.76: 194-214, 29.77: 283-303, 30.78: 132-42, 30.79: 257-70, 30.80: 436-47, 31.81: 180-95, 31.82: 400-15, 31.83: 539-78, 32.84: 76-123, 32.85: 226-42, 32.86: 372-87, 33.87: 47-90. 33.88: 169-91. Reprinted as one volume in 1998. New Delhi: Asian Educational Services. Page references are to reprint edition
Bell, H.C.P. 1940. The Maldive Islands: Monograph on the History, Archaeology, and Epigraphy. Colombo: Ceylon Government Press. Reprinted in 1985. Male, Maldives: National Centre
for Linguistic and Historical Research
Cain, Bruce. 1995. “Maldivian prototypical passives and related constructions.” Anthropological Linguistics 37: 524-40
Cain, Bruce. 1999. An OT Account of Coalescence and Compensatory Lengthening in Dhivehi (Maldivian). To appear in Working Papers of the Cornell Phonetics Lab
Cain, Bruce. 2000. Dhivehi (Maldivian): a synchronic and diachronic study. Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University
Cain, Bruce & J. Gair. 1995. Sinhala and Dhivehi comparative syntax: some questions about questions. Paper presented at South Asia Linguistics Association XVII
Cain, Bruce & J. Gair. 2000. Dhivehi (Maldivian). München: Lincom Europa (Languages of the World/Materials 63)
Chitty, S.C. 1830. “On the affinity between Maldivian and Sinhalese languages.” Ceylon Government Gazette, December 11, 1830
De Silva, M.W.S. 1969. “The phonological efficiency of the Maldivian writing system.” Anthropological Linguistics 11.7: 199-209
De Silva, M.W.S. 1970. “Some affinities between Sinhalese and Maldivian.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (Ceylon Branch), n.s. 14: 20-27
De Silva, M.W.S. 1970. “Some observations on the history of Maldivian.” Transactions of the Philological Society of London
De Silva, M.W.S. 1979. Sinhalese and Other Island Languages in South Asia. (Ars Linguistica, 3).
Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag
Dhivehi Bahuge Gavaaidhu. (Grammar of the Dhivehi Language). 1984. Published in four volumes. Male, Maldives: National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research
Dhivehi Bas Foiy. (Dhivehi language book). 1985-1991. Male, Maldives: National Centre
for Linguistic and Historical Research
Disanayake, J.B. 1986. “Maldivian and Sinhala: some phonological observations.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (Sri Lanka). 30: 81-100
Disanayake, J.B. & Hasan A. Maniku. 1986. “Isdhoo Loamaafaanu.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka, 32
Disanayake, J.B. & G.W. Wijayawardhana. 1987. “Some observations on the Maldivian Loamaafaanu copper plates of the twelfth century.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka, 31: 62-71
Fritz, Sonja. 1993. “Wilhelm Geigers Beitrag zur Erforschung des Dhivehi, der Staatssprache der
Malediven.” (Wilhelm Geiger's Contribution to Research on Dhivehi, the Official Language of the Maldives.) Münchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft 54: 15-32
Fuller, Simon. 1985. DhivehiEnglish Dictionary and EnglishDhivehi Dictionary. 2 vols. Ms
Gair, James W. & Bruce D. Cain. 1996. “Dhivehi writing.” Peter T. Daniels & william Bright (eds.). The World's Writing Systems. Oxford Press
Geiger, Wilhelm. 1900-1902. “Maldivische Studien IIII.” Sitzungsberichte der phil.hist. der Kgl. Bayer. 3 vols. Akademie der Wissenschaften. Munich
Geiger, Wilhelm. 1902. “Etymological vocabulary of the Maldivian language.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Great Britain and Ireland. 1902 (third series). 909-38
Geiger, Wilhelm. 1919. “Maldivian linguistic studies.” (trans. of Maldivian Studien by J.C. Willis), Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 27 (extra number), edited by H.C.P. Bell. Reprinted in 1986. Male, Maldives: National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research
Gray, Albert. 1878. “The Maldive Islands with a vocabulary taken from Farancois Pyrard de Laval, 16021607.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, new series, 10: 181-2
Gray, Albert. (ed. and tr.), assisted by H.C.P. Bell. 1889. The Voyage of Francois Pyrard of Laval . Vol. 12. London: Hakluyt Society
Institute for Teacher Education. 1991. Glossary: English-Dhivehi, Dhivehi-English. Male, Maldives: Institute for Teacher Education
Loamaafaanu: Transliteration, Translation and Notes on Paleography, Vol. 1. 1982. National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research
Maloney, Clarence. 1980. People of the Maldive Islands. Madras: Orient Longman
Maniku, Hassan Ahmed. 1995. “Minun.” (Measurement). Vanavaru, 5
Maniku, Hassan Ahmed & J.B. Disanayake. 1990. Say it in Maldivian (Dhivehi). Colombo: Lake House Publishers
Maniku, Hassan A. & G.D. Wijayawardhana. 1986. Isdhoo Loamaafaanu. Colombo: Royal
Asiatic Society of Sri Lanka
Reynolds, C.H.B. 1974. “Buddhism and the Maldivian language.” L. Cousins et al. (eds.). Buddhist Studies in Honour of I.B. Horner. Dordrecht-Holland: D. Reidel Publishing Co. 193-8
Reynolds, C.H.B. 1978. “Linguistic strands in the Maldives.” C. Maloney (ed.). Contributions to Asian Studies, Vol. II: Language and Civilization Change in South Asia. Leiden: E.J. Brill. 156-66
Reynolds, C.H.B. 1993. Maldives. (World Bibliographical Series, Volume 158). Oxford: Clio Press
Saeed, Bodufenvalhugey Seedhee. 1959. Dhivehi Akuru (Dhivehi Letters). Male, Maldives
Saudiq, Abdullah. 1993. Bahuge Hamaige Aiymatee Foiy (Handbook on Correct Language). Male, Maldives: National Centre for Linguistic and Historical Research
Shishido, Masahiro. 1985. English Dhivehi Dictionary. Male, Maldives: Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers (JOCV). Photocopied
Vitharana, V. 1997. Sri Lankan Maldivian Cultural Affinities. Mattegodagama, Polgasovita, Sri Lanka: Academy of Sri Lankan Culture
Wijayaratne, D.J. 1956. History of the Sinhalese Noun: A Morphological Study Based on Inscriptions. University of Ceylon
Wijesundera, S., G.D. Wiyayawardhana, J.B. Disayanaka, H.A. Manik & M. Luthfie. 1988. Historical and Linguistic Survey of Dhivehi: Final Report. University of Colombo. Photocopied
Wilson, J. 1841. “Vocabulary of the Maldivian language, compiled by Lieut. W. Christopher.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 6: 42-76

Source: http://www.southasiabibliography.de/Bibliography/Indo-European/Maldivian___Dhivehi/maldivian___dhivehi.html

Maldives Bibliography LOC

2007-09-30T20:29:00.000-07:00

I just wanted to have a link to a list of all the Maldives publications. But I also want to keep a record of where I got the citations , so am adding this as a post.

I will have a seperate post where I will keep compiling all the citations I find.

Abeysinghe, Arilya. "Development, Underdevelopment and Dependent Development in Atoll Environments of Selected Indian Ocean and South Pacific Basin Countries," Scandinavian Journal of Development Alternatives [Stockholm], 6, December 1987, 125-42.
Adeney, M., and Carr, W.K. "The Maldives Republic." In John M. Ostheimer (ed.), The Politics of the Western Indian Ocean Islands. New York: Praeger, 1975.
Butany, W.T. Report on Agricultural Survey and Crop Production. Rome: United Nations Development Programme, 1974.
Chawla, Subash. The New Maldives. Colombo, Sri Lanka:Diana, 1986.
The Encyclopedia of Islam. Leiden, the Netherlands: E.J. Brill, 1993.
The Far East and Australasia, 1993. (24th ed.) London: Europa, 1992.
The Far East and Australasia, 1994. (25th ed.) London: Europa, 1993.
Farmer, B.H. "Maldives: Physical and Social Geography." Pages 543-50 in The Far East and Australasia, 1993. (24th ed.) London: Europa, 1993.
Haaland, Gunnar. Evolution of Socio-economic Dualism in the Maldives. Bergen, Norway: Michelsen Institute, DERAP (Development Research and Action Program), 1987.
Heyerdahl, Thor. The Maldive Mystery. London: Allen and Unwin, 1986.
Lateef, K. An Introductory Economic Report. Washington: World Bank, 1980.
Luthfi, M., and Zubair, H. Innovation in Primary School Construction: Maldives Community Schools. Bangkok: UNESCO Regional Office for Education in Asia and the Pacific, 1987.
The Maldive Islands: Monograph on the History, Archaeology, andEpigraphy. Colombo: Government Printer, 1940.
Maldives. Department of Information and Broadcasting, The Constitution of the Republic of Maldives. (Unofficial translation; Trans., Ibrahim Hilmy Didi.) Male, 1975.
Maldives. Department of Information and Broadcasting. Maldives:Development Cooperation. Male: 1989.
Maldives. Department of Information and Broadcasting. Maldives: An Economic Brief. Male: 1985.
Maldives. Department of Information and Broadcasting. Maldives: A Historical Overview. Male: 1985.
Maldives. Department of Information and Broadcasting. Maldives: Social Development. Male: 1985.
Maldives. Department of Information and Broadcasting. Maldives: Year Book, 1988. Male: 1988.
Maloney, Clarence. People of the Maldive Islands. Bombay: Orient Longman, 1980.
Maniku, Hassan Ahmed. Changes in the Topography of the Maldives. Maldives: Forum of Writers on the Environment, 1990.
Maniku, Hassan Ahmed. The Maldives: A Profile. Male: Department of Information and Broadcasting, 1977.
Munch-Peterson, N.F. Background Paper for Population Needs Mission. Rome: United Nations Development Programme, 1981.
Phadnis, Urmila, and Ela Dutt Luithui. "The Maldives Enter World Politics," Asian Affairs, 8, January-February 1981, 166-79.
Phadnis, Urmila, and Ela Dutt Luithui. Maldives: Winds of Change in an Atoll State. New Delhi: South Asian, 1985.
Reynolds, C.H.B. Linguistic Strands in the Maldives. London: School of Oriental and African Studies, 1978.
Reynolds, C.H.B. The Maldive Islands. London: Royal Central Asian Society, 1974.
Smallwood, C.A. Visit to the Maldive Islands. London: Royal Central Asian Society, 1961.
UNESCO Principal Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific. Status of Women: Maldives. Bangkok: 1989.
Webb, Paul A. Maldives: People and Environment. Male: Department of Information and Broadcasting, 1989.
Williams, Freda Britt. Island World of Maldives. Male: Media Transasia (for Ministry of Tourism, Maldives), 1988.
Willox, Robert. Maldives and Islands of the East Indian Ocean: A Travel Survival Kit. Berkeley, California: Lonely Planet, 1990.
World Health Organization. Office of the WHO Representative to Maldives. Twenty-Four Monthly Report on Technical Aspects of Programme Implementation. Male: 1989.

Source: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/madagascar/mg_bibl.html

Maldives: "a terra incognita for European scholars"

2007-09-25T14:32:00.000-07:00

This situation needs to be taken as a national priority. The MaldivesCulture.com is doing a superb job of bringing it together. However, for researchers in the west, accountability and authority of material from dot com domains remains questionable.

Maldives: Research perspectives by Leonard Kulikov

Despite the fact that the Maldives were mentioned as far back as before the christian era, they still remain a terra incognita for European scholars. Even in the last 150 years, although a few scientific expeditions have investigated the islands, the Maldives have mostly been the object of study of enthusiastic individual scholars.
...

No scientific grammar of Maldivian has so far been published in any European language. Only a few conversational guides and short dictionaries for tourists have been issued. A comprehensive report of a linguistic expedition to the Maldives compiled by Sri Lankans (S. Wijesundera, G.D. Wijayawardhana, J.B. Disanayaka) and Maldivians (H.A. Maniku, M. Luthfie) is still unpublished. This is an almost unique situation since this is also the only official language of an independent state, but it should change in the very near future: S. Gippert-Fritz (Germany) and B. Cain (USA) are going to publish grammatical descriptions; and C.H.B. Reynolds (London) has prepared a Maldivian-English dictionary still remains unpublished.The anthropological and ethnographical aspects of the Maldivian culture have been studied by C. Maloney (who published the monograph People of the Maldive Islands, Orient Longmann, in 1980 which is the most detailed description of the country), N.F. Munch-Petersen (Denmark) and B. Koechlin (France). Some problems of the Maldivian history are dealt with in a few papers by A. Forbes who, however, no longer seems to be working in this field.Some archaeological excavations have been carried out on the islands. J. Carswell (USA/Great Britain) discovered fragments of Chinese pottery on the islands; a few more short reports mention some single finds. In the eighties a Norwegian archaeological expedition (O. Johansen, E. Mikkelsen, A. Skjolsvold) under the guidance of T. Heyerdahl obtained rich additional evidence about the ancient character of the Maldivian history.Many sources related to the history of Maldives are still unpublished. The Tarikh, a chronicle of the sultans in Arabic, was published by the Japanese scholar Hikoichi Yajima, unfortunately without an English translation. Only some of the numerous Old Maldivian texts (mainly copperplate grants, the so-called lomafanu, the oldest of which date from the twelfth century) have been published by H.C.P. Bell and, recently, by H.A. Maniku, G.D. Wijayawardhana, and J.B. Disanayaka.For more detailed information about publications dealing with the Maldives, the reader is referred to the excellent recently published bibliography by C.H.B. Reynolds (Maldives, by Clio Press, 1993).
...

In my opinion, in this situation the best way of co-ordinating research and making the rich resources related to the Maldives available for all interested scholars would be probably to organize an international Journal of Maldivian studies, which would publish not only new papers and more extended works but also would permit unpublished materials, the interesting unpublished manuscripts of such eminent Maldivianists as H.C.P. Bell (Bell's collection still waits its researchers in the Colombo Archive!), and translations of papers written in Divehi and (old) Divehi to see the light of day
Source: http://www.iias.nl/iiasn/iiasn5/insouasi/kulikov.html

Broadband in the outer islands transforming education

2007-09-23T16:00:00.000-07:00

Literacy level has historically been high in Maldives compared to other developing countries. However, this literacy does not accurately translate in to functional literacy (my opinion).

The following news brief (some text omitted – to read the full article please follow the link) touches on the basic difficulties of accessing education in outer islands.

Broadband revolutionizes education on remote Maldives atolls Posted on Thursday, August 16, 2007 (EST)

Literacy rates in this Indian Ocean archipelago exceed 90 percent, with nearly all children receiving some form of primary education, but the quality of teaching remains low, partly due to the low skills of the teachers themselves...The UN Children's Fund UNICEF estimates that more than 30 percent of Maldivian teachers are untrained with many islands having up to 100 pupils
per trained primary teacher. "It's down to basics. Transport is costly making it expensive for children to travel between islands to get a better education and for teachers to upgrade their skills," said UNICEF representative for the Maldives, Ken Maskall. Basic services are expensive, given the geographic nature of this nation of 1,192 tiny coral islands scattered some 850 kilometres (550 miles) across the equator.
UNICEF estimates that islands with the lowest population still do not have access to secondary school and around 12 islands provide schooling only up to grade five.
"People are so scattered in different little islands that this type of teaching method helps schools and communities to develop," Maskall told AFP during a tour of the island. UNICEF has spent more than two million dollars to set up broadband-enabled learning centres which will link 20 atolls in the Maldives by the end of this year. Rashdoo, one of the Maldives' 200 inhabited islands, is among the 11 islands to be connected so far.
"The smart board has brought the world to children's feet," said Rashdoo Island chief Mohamed Shafi, a former teacher himself. "I can sense the frustration of learning is quietly reducing."
©AFP http://news.sawf.org/Lifestyle/41229.aspx

Maldives Leading in Second Life?!

2007-09-23T15:30:00.000-07:00

At first i couldn't help but question the credibility of this news taken from Minivan News.
But further online search has proved this to be right.

Times Online says Tiny island nation opens the first real embassy in virtual world

The Maldives has become the first country to open an embassy in Second Life, an
internet-based three-dimensional virtual world inhabited by more than 6.6 ...

The Local Sweden News in English says Sweden trumped by Maldives in Second Life

The Maldives has pipped Sweden to the post by unveiling the world's first
virtual embassy in Second Life just days before the Scandinavian country's
planned launch.
Published: 22nd May 2007 15:59 CETOnline: http://www.thelocal.se/7379/

Maldives Opens World’s First Virtual Embassy
By Will Jordan in Male' May 22, 2007 Source: Minivan News

The Maldives has become the first country in the world to open a Virtual Embassy in Second Life, the online virtual world.

Second Life (SL) is a fast-growing virtual community with more than six million “citizens.” It has its own currency, the Linden Dollar, which can be exchanged for US dollars. SL citizens own property, socialize, learn and interact in SL.
The Maldives Virtual Embassy is located in the Diplomatic Quarter of Diplomacy Island in Second Life, an on-line space designed to allow new avenues for diplomatic representation and negotiation, especially for small and developing countries that have limited diplomatic outreach in the “real” world.
The embassy building features a notice board with detail on “democratic and human rights reform” in the country. “The Maldives is a small country but that does not mean we do not have a valuable contribution to make in international affairs,” said Abdulla Shahid, Minister of
State for Foreign Affairs.
“The Virtual Embassy offers another channel for us to provide information on the country, to offer our viewpoint on issues of international concern, and to interact with our partners in the international community,” he said.
Diplomacy Island is the brainchild of Diplo Foundation, a nonprofit organisation which works to assist developing countries participate meaningfully in international affairs.
The official inauguration ceremony took place simultaneously in the real world (Geneva) and in the virtual world (Second Life), with participants in both “place” and “space” able to watch the speeches, interact with each other, and explore the Maldives Embassy and the rest of Diplomacy Island.
The Maldives Virtual Embassy will soon be followed by embassies representing Macedonia and the Philippines. Sweden has also announced plans to open a Virtual Embassy.

Maldives History?!??

2007-09-23T14:46:00.000-07:00

I am still grappling with historical accounts of Maldives, trying to understand the origins of our culture of information. Trying to study if we have evolved over time in the ways we learn, deal with information, value information, and/or use information.

A very comprehensive historical background of Maldives history, of people, language, origins, and society is presented in an article on the International Institute for Asian Studies website. The article titled Where Did the Maldives People Come From? By Clarance Maloney writes that:

The Maldives people are a clear ethnic category, having a unique language derived from Sinhala but grafted on to an earlier Tamil base, and they have a homogeneous cultural tradition. In early medieval times they followed the Sri Lanka type of Buddhism, but in 1153 were converted to Islam by order of their ruler. There is another island located to the north of Maldives territory that belongs culturally to the Maldives, Minicoy (properly, Maliku), which because of events during the colonial period is now held by India as part of its Lakshadvip Island group. Most of the Maldives islands are tiny, less than a mile long, but Minicoy is the largest island populated by Divehi people. The Indian government does not allow foreigners to visit this island.
…

Early references to the Maldives are found in the Commentary on the Bharu Jataka and the Khuddapatha, early Buddhist texts, and the Dipavamsa, the earliest Sinhala epic (4th century BC), and the Mahavamsa (3rd century BC). The country was probably overrun from
Kerala in the Sangam Period of South India (1-3 century AD). It is mentioned in the Greek text Periplus (1st century AD), by Pappas of Alexandria (4th century), and several fifth century Greek authors. The islands are mentioned by the Chinese travellers Fa Hsien (5th century) and Hsuan-Tsang (7th century), and in a document of the Tang Dynasty (8th century). The country was conquered by Tamil Pallavas from neighbouring Madras (late 7th century).
Islamic records start with an account by Sulaiman the merchant (c. 900 AD), and Al-Mas'udi (916), Abul Hassan the Persian (1026), Al Biruni (1039), and Al-Idrisi (c. 1100). In the meantime, the country was reconquered by the Tamils, namely by Rajaraja Cola (1017). Europeans are on a more familiar territory when they read the account of Marco Polo (1279- 92). Ibn Battuta made two visits and spent a year and a half in the Maldives as an Islamic legal advisor (1343-46).
Portuguese accounts begin from about 1500. In the brutal competition for control of ocean routes they invaded the Maldives in 1588, killed the sultan, and established Portuguese rule, but that only lasted for fifteen years. Most interesting is a lengthy three-volume account by François Pyrard of Laval, who was held captive in the Maldives (1602-07) and learned Divehi. It is a gold-mine of original Divehi history, customs, and language.
British interest dates from the early 1600s. The Divehis had always managed to remain essentially independent, except for the brief Portuguese occupation, but in 1887 the sultan formally accepted British suzerainty. The only sustained historical work of the Maldives done in the British period was that by H.C.P. Bell, a British antiquarian who studied the Buddhist remains, texts, and coins. The British did not leave an administrative or cultural stamp as they did in India, except for their base in Gan in the south. The Maldives became independent in 1965 and joined the United Nations.
…

Education has expanded very rapidly, and the Divehis, who were so long isolated from the wider world, are quickly adapting to their expanded opportunities. These changes have brought population growth through a decline in infant mortality, and a population shift to Male. The main long-term worry however is the rising level of the ocean, which threatens to obliterate the country within one or two centuries.The Maldives is an exceedingly interesting country, and merits more attention from specialists on South Asia and the Indian Ocean area.

Read more with just a click: http://www.iias.nl/iiasn/iiasn5/insouasi/maloney.html

Francois Pyrard in Maldives

2007-09-21T15:39:00.000-07:00

Well here I am again. In my search for historical documents, yet again I happened to come across a pot of gold!!!

In Simon’s blog the entry titled An important journal for us is the pot. Or is it Simon's blog itself that is the pot? The gold, definitely, is the historical accounts of Francois Pyrard.

The voyage of Francois Pyrard of Laval to the East Indies, the Maldives, the Moluccas and Brazil, v.1 / Payard, Francois. _ London : Printed for the Hakluyt Society, 1887. _ 524 p.

Full text is online – how exciting! A little cumbersome to read as it has been scanned page by page.

Simon’s blog actually is quite interesting as it has given me a glimpse of the information culture of Maldivians. I can safely say that we are a reading public – the only thing missing was quality material to read.

Maldives History

2007-09-21T13:50:00.000-07:00

Sitting here in Oz land, it really is difficult to get reading material on Maldives’ history. In fact, I was up last night trying to see if I can get my hands on any online documentation that talks about the reading, writing and learning habits of Maldives, today and yesterday.

And that is how I stumbled upon an article about a book called ‘Iyye’ (meaning Yesterday) about the history of some prominent political figures. Apparently, the book was considered defamatory to the national heroes and was banned from distribution by the government. Read more on ‘Banning scholarship in Maldives for 'peace and harmony' @ http://www.maldivesculture.com/maldives_censorship_history02.html

It apparently happened in 1997, which makes me wonder where I was, what I was doing, why I was not aware of it. ‘Cause I certainly was no longer a child then!!! Shows how ‘uninformed’ we are of the happenings in our own country (If anyone thinks I am the only ignorant soul – then I am just talking about myself)

“In many ways, the circumstances of this banning recall the events of 1997, when Abdul Hakeem's Iyye was confiscated within days of its release. Both Iyye and Dhandikoshi discussed in detail the twentieth century history of Malé with reference to earlier periods, and the rule of the country's first President Mohamed Ameen. Iyye included a lengthy section on President Ibrahim Nasir.”

In Iyye, Abdul Hakeem Hussein Manik writes:

“Young Maldivians under the age of thirty are being misinformed. I embark on this work to clear away a tangle of obfuscation.”

I don’t know the gravity of that statement, but it would nevertheless be interesting to read it. The preface and introduction of the book is available on: http://www.maldivesculture.com/history/iyye_yesterday_maldives_history_intro.htm

I also happened to be directed to the following page: http://www.maldivesculture.com/histor01.html They have a wealth of information and I think it really is a good place to start to get a grasp of Maldives culture. Also make a point of reading what is available on Dhivehi Bahaa Thaareekhah Khidhumaiykuraa Gaumee Marukaz’s website: http://www.qaumiyyath.gov.mv/history.php
I would simply love to have all the time in the world to sit and just read forever!!!

2007-09-04T09:00:00.000-07:00

I just received this great article about information culture by Robert W. Bauchspies. Citation is given below.

Bauchspies, R. (1998). Considering information culture: Examining individual, organisational and societal forms. Svensk Biblioteksforskning/Swedish Library Research(3-4), 5-31.
Abstract:
Information culture is defined as information activity understood in cultural context. Chiefly, the creation, dissemination and dissolution of information and beliefs. Moreover, as a precursor to understanding information creation, transfer and valuation, it is asserted that the cultural context in which such activity is augmented , is central to understanding the motivations involved in individual and collective information behavior. A hierarchical scale from individual to global community is presented to demonstrate the multiplicity of cultural relevance in information studies. Revolutionary developments in information technology, while dramatically influential on our social structures and individual behaviors, are not seen as necessarily inherent departures from the primacy of cultural influences. Conceptual frameworks for identifying information culture in diverse environments and settings suggest areas of applied research which are still wanting in the literature and provide a means fr further inquiry. Case studies employing participant observation methodology are suggested as one means of extracting date for further analysis.

This is the most relevant article I have found so far which is similar to my area of research. However, it would be great to find something more recent.

information culture

2007-08-25T10:58:00.000-07:00

I am interested in studying the information culture in Maldives.
The term 'information culture' is proving to be an interesting concept.