Xavier Romero Frías (born 1954) is a Spanish writer and scholar. He lived among the

Maldivians Maldivians (, ) are an Indo-Aryan peoples, Indo-Aryan ethnic group and nation native to the Maldive Islands, constituting the Maldives, Republic of Maldives and the island of Minicoy (within Lakshadweep, a union territory of India). They share ...

over a 13-year period. His present residence is in

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estim ...

, Thailand. Xavier Romero Frías' books on local legends and traditions have been banned by the government of the

Maldives The Maldives, officially the Republic of Maldives, and historically known as the Maldive Islands, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in South Asia located in the Indian Ocean. The Maldives is southwest of Sri Lanka and India, abou ...

Works

Xavier Romero Frías investigated the

folklore Folklore is the body of expressive culture shared by a particular group of people, culture or subculture. This includes oral traditions such as Narrative, tales, myths, legends, proverbs, Poetry, poems, jokes, and other oral traditions. This also ...

and

oral tradition Oral tradition, or oral lore, is a form of human communication in which knowledge, art, ideas and culture are received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another.Jan Vansina, Vansina, Jan: ''Oral Tradition as History'' (19 ...

of the Maldives beginning in 1979. To achieve his goal he learned two dialects of the

Maldivian language Maldivian, also known by its Endonym and exonym, endonym Dhivehi (, ''Dhivēhī'', ), is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language belonging to the Indo-Iranian languages, Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European ...

fluently and understood well others, gaining also deep knowledge of the

Maldivian writing systems Several Dhivehi scripts have been used by Maldivians during their history. The early Dhivehi scripts fell into the abugida category, while the more recent Thaana has characteristics of both an abugida and a true alphabet. An ancient form of N ...

and

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

. During his years in the Maldives, Romero Frías took a special interest in compiling the traditions of the Maldives by becoming friendly with the elders of the islands he visited. Before Romero Frías did this work, very few of the Maldivian stories and legends were in written form. Romero Frías completed the English translation of about hundred Maldivian legends and tales about local ghosts and semi-historical myths from many

atoll An atoll () is a ring-shaped island, including a coral rim that encircles a lagoon. There may be coral islands or cays on the rim. Atolls are located in warm tropical or subtropical parts of the oceans and seas where corals can develop. Most ...

s of the Maldives, but mainly from the South of Maldives and from Male. After this he lived twelve years in India studying

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

and researching the origins of the Maldivian cultural heritage. During this time he published a

monograph A monograph is generally a long-form work on one (usually scholarly) subject, or one aspect of a subject, typically created by a single author or artist (or, sometimes, by two or more authors). Traditionally it is in written form and published a ...

with his research on the Maldivian ancestral identity. This monograph was published as ''The Maldive Islanders, A Study of the Popular Culture of an Ancient Ocean Kingdom''. Another publication released in 2012 is ''Folk tales of the Maldives'', a compilation of folk tales illustrated by the author. According to Sri Lankan scholar

Rohan Gunaratna Professor Rohan Gunaratna (born 1961) is a threat specialist of the global security environment. Professor Gunaratna has over 30 years of academic, policy, and operational experience in national and international security. He is Professor of Se ...

, Romero Frías "followed the steps of British scholar

HCP Bell Harry Charles Purvis Bell, CCS (21 September 1851 – 6 September 1937), more often known as HCP Bell, was a British civil servant and the first Commissioner of Archaeology in Ceylon. Early life Born in British India in 1851, he was sent to ...

." Roland Silva, the Director of the Archaeology Department of Sri Lanka between 1983 and 1992 compared the pioneering work of Romero Frías with that of Henry Parker, a British anthropologist who compiled the folk tales of the villages of Sri Lanka around 1880. Romero Frías gave lectures at the

University of Madras The University of Madras is a public university, public State university (India), state university in Chennai (Madras), Tamil Nadu, India. Established in 1857, it is one of the oldest and most prominent universities in India, incorporated by an ...

in the 1980s invited by Professor V. Sudarsan, head of the Department of Anthropology. During the past thirty years, he has written many articles and commentaries, as well as given lectures on Maldivian traditional

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

religious syncretism Religious syncretism is the blending of religious belief systems into a new system, or the incorporation of other beliefs into an existing religious tradition. This can occur for many reasons, where religious traditions exist in proximity to each ...

and the causes of

Islamic terrorism Islamic terrorism (also known as Islamist terrorism, radical Islamic terrorism, or jihadist terrorism) refers to terrorist acts carried out by fundamentalist militant Islamists and Islamic extremists. Since at least the 1990s, Islami ...

. As an artist he has illustrated books for the EDC (Educational Development Center) of the

Ministry of Education An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...

Malé Malé is the capital and most populous city of the Maldives. With a population of 211,908 in 2022 within its administrative area and coterminous geographical area of , Malé is one of the most densely populated cities in the world. The city i ...

, the Maldives, and painted the fish as well as the legends of the Maldives and the sailboats of previous times. There was an exhibition of some of his works in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

, Austria, in 1987.

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Regarding the difficulty for Maldivians to wholeheartedly embrace their own

national identity National identity is a person's identity or sense of belonging to one or more states or one or more nations. It is the sense of "a nation as a cohesive whole, as represented by distinctive traditions, culture, and language". National identity ...

, Romero Frías wrote, "In every Maldivian mind there is a sharp struggle between inherited customs and Muslim ideology. Since this conflict remains unresolved, there is a widespread feeling of guilt and frustration at being unable to adjust the ancestral cultural heritage to the Islamic ideological pattern."Lateefa Tahir. ''Politicizing Religion: A Dangerous Game''. Minivan News. Male' 2009

Notes

Sources

Xavier Romero Frías at Academia.edu

List of books

''Dhivehi Observer'' 9 December 2005 * Blasco, Roge (2000) "Xavier Romero: Tras las leyendas perdidas de las islas Maldivas" '' Gara'' 3 September 2000
Husna Razee, ''Being a Good Woman': Suffering and Distress through the voices of women in the Maldives''Scott M. Fitzpatrick, ''Seafaring simulations and the origin of prehistoric settlers to Madagascar''Hasan Amir, ''Islamism and radicalism in the Maldives''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Romero Frias, Xavier 1954 births Spanish male writers Culture of the Maldives Myths of the Maldives Living people Anthropologists from Catalonia Spanish expatriates in the Maldives Spanish expatriates in India

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Sources