A nostalgia for Spain
February 4, 2007 | 12:00am
Authentic Though Not Exotic–Essays On Filipino Identity
By Fernando Zialcita
Ateneo de Manila University Press, 340pp
It takes a bourgeois Manileño with almost no roots in the lower classes, city-bred and city-smart, to write so knowingly about the Filipino – who he is, what he is, and perhaps, where he is headed. A doctorate in social anthropology helps, but not much. The trained eye, the capacity to understand those nuances left by history, geography, religion, and how they shaped the Filipino identity – these are what Fernando Zialcita abundantly shows in this book.
The shaping of the Filipino continues to this very day and so, too, this country that became a modern state before its disparate peoples were blended together to form a nation. Will Filipinos ever blend? Or will the Philippines fragment as, indeed, other older states in Europe and elsewhere have already fragmented?
How is a nation created?
The artist creates myths to ennoble a people; the scholar deconstructs the myths to expose the bones. Both artist and scholar serve functions, not only as they see themselves or reality, but in exploring the unending contradiction of life itself. I am for the mythmaker for as long as his myths help in the social cohesion of a people. Who can find, for instance, the proof that George Washington really did chop down that cherry tree and wouldn’t lie about it? Who could verily state that he saw William Tell shoot an arrow at the apple on top of his son’s head? Who really believes that the Japanese are born out of Amaterasu, the sun god?
So, too, the Code of Kalantiao, which purports to show that ancient Filipinos were moral, never really existed; and that sterling woman warrior, Princess Urduja – was she a real historical figure?
Zialcita insinuates answers to timeless questions about culture change. He also adds to what several students of our history have said before – Nick Joaquin, Benito F. Legarda Jr., Alfredo Roces and students of architecture like Fr. Rodrigo Perez III. He enlarges and deepens their perceptions, and in the process, has come up with some lucid explanations as to how certain misconceptions have become conventional knowledge.
Filipinos want to glorify the barong tagalog as a racial reaction against the Spaniards who tucked in their shirts. But Zialcita says that never really happened. The proof of the pudding, it is often said, is in the eating. Do such myths benefit a people or do they negate their sense of worth? If myths do not negate a community or a nation, then let them be.
Zialcita brings Marxism into his discourse with probing insights. He is right in assuming that in the study of Filipino society and why Filipinos are poor, Marx does not provide all the answers; that Filipinos interested in changing this society should go beyond Marx.
Well said, but this does not mean Marx is completely irrelevant now. Wealth means power and power has to be translated, not just in the distribution of wealth itself, but in the provision of justice. In this global economy, development is the basis of wealth and to achieve it, it is imperative for a government to fuel the engines of growth, bringing forth the fullest use of resources – not just material wealth itself but the wealth that is not materially measured – the wealth of culture of a people united in their energies, in their vision, and most of all in their commitment to the country – the sense of nation which, alas, is missing in this country today.
Who will be the nation builders? Who else but those Filipinos willing to sacrifice – as Zialcita himself has indicated – in the upper classes of society willing to recognize the value and contribution of the masa?
In those 300 years that the Spaniards were in the Philippines, they intermarried with the Indios but not as much as they did in South America, in Mexico particularly. Countries like Chile and Argentina are basically European – and in a large country like Peru, the elite is white, not Indian. Brazil has a large black population and Portuguese descendants.
Mexicans say they are mestizos with some basis in fact. Mexico, like Peru, had a civilization of notable sophistication and strength when the Spaniards arrived – the Aztecs and the Incas had large cities, advanced science, particularly in astronomy where they excelled. Not so many Spaniards came to dominate the Philippines because of the distance from Spain. Spanish was not taught to the natives on the scale that it was in South America; hence, Spanish became the lingua franca of that continent.
We are not all mestizos as Zialcita claims, although there were many notable Creoles who were in the vanguard of the revolution against Spain. If this so-called mixing of Spanish blood with the native breed is quantified, what would clearly show is that the dilution was not all that widespread, although, in the end, the higher up the social and political ladder, the whiter one became – Spanish white, not American white, because the American colonizers did not stay long enough. This ratio is changing, though, for the elite is slowly but surely being diluted by Chinese yellow.
And the Malay brown?
The weakness of so many studies on the nature of societies is that they are based on history, religion, geography and all those anthropological constructs, which the economists consider micro. They have very little consideration for the greater influence by what Marxists or other scholars interested in the formation of nations would highlight – power, economic strength, which, in the long run, is the ultimate shaper of societies.
It is not the manner of cooking, for instance, that is studied, but the why of it – why certain countries have such sophisticated cuisines. It is because of the existence of powerful regimes, monarchical dynasties, which dictate such refinements – the imperial court of China, the datus, the kings and their desire for more finesse, comfort and luxury.
In architecture, it is the power of the colonizers, the rulers, which dictates what the structures should be. Take for instance the nipa hut – it is the power of the landlord, the encomiendero, which demanded that the nipa hut be light, moveable, cheap, so that the peasant could easily build one if the landlord ordered him to move.
It is when we peruse such elements that we come to the crucial question of our laggard development, why our government is corrupt, why Filipinos are poor.
Zialcita concludes that we should have stronger ties with Mexico, the South American countries and, inferentially, Spain. Again, nostalgia for Spanish colonialism. Sure, we should have better relationships with these countries, but we are in Southeast Asia, hostage to developments here and to the hegemonic ambitions of China and, of course, the shadow of the United States.
I cannot see any economic or even cultural reasons for us to strengthen ties with Mexico or with the countries of South America other than nostalgia. It is with our immediate neighbors that we should build such ties, particularly Indonesia, and of course with the economic behemoths like Japan, South Korea, India, and the Middle East countries on whom we are dependent on oil. And there is that specter hovering over us – the reality of all Southeast Asia being Sinicized in the future.
Spanish, for all the advantages it gives, is important, but not as important as English, which has become the lingua franca of the world. Forget Tagalog – it is not as important as English, which makes us all equal. In the first place, whether we like it or not, it has become a real national language through actual usage. It is English that must be polished, for it is our window to the world.
Just the same, Zialcita’s essay is a most illuminating examination of Filipino culture as compared to such rash conclusions of an even greater writer like Nick Joaquin who once declared that we have a tradition of "smallness." Tradition? It is the condition imposed on all poor societies, in Africa, in Southeast Asia, in the entire Third World where people buy tingi, whether it is cigarettes, bread or other basic commodities.
It is always exhilarating for us to examine what our culture is, its origins, its uniqueness, because as Zialcita so eloquently illustrated, we have so many things to be proud of.
But let us now go into some basics. The logic of colonialism is exploitation. Whether it is propelled by whatever ideology – to make the world "safe" for democracy, to spread civilization or Christianity – the white man’s burden, whatever sugar-coated objective it is, is driven by this logic. Therefore, colonialism by any name is immoral.
Reading Zialcita’s excellent exposition, as with some of the well-researched discourses of our Hispanophiles, I get an uneasy feeling that this excellent book is one more apologia for Spanish colonialism.
The colonized intellectual must first free himself, his mind most of all, from the subterfuges of the colonizer. He must recover the pristine self even if this means, as Nick Joaquin once charged, "to be an Igorot" – as if being one is to be stigmatized. Start from the mud at our feet, from mythic incense, the life-giving impulse of the cosmos, and from this purity, recognize the inputs of history, all the precious elements that contribute to the building of a nation.
Only when the colonized has achieved this innate freedom will he then be able to assume his true identity. Otherwise, his thinking will always be a monotonous echo of the colonizer’s dulcet spiel.
So it goes today: our modern ilustrados have yet to free themselves from prisons of the past, from the chains of colonialism, particularly the domestic variety. Until they recognize this bondage and oppose it, we will continue to wallow in blissful ignorance, and worse, in the muck of spiritual poverty left by the ghosts of colonialism.
By Fernando Zialcita
Ateneo de Manila University Press, 340pp
It takes a bourgeois Manileño with almost no roots in the lower classes, city-bred and city-smart, to write so knowingly about the Filipino – who he is, what he is, and perhaps, where he is headed. A doctorate in social anthropology helps, but not much. The trained eye, the capacity to understand those nuances left by history, geography, religion, and how they shaped the Filipino identity – these are what Fernando Zialcita abundantly shows in this book.
The shaping of the Filipino continues to this very day and so, too, this country that became a modern state before its disparate peoples were blended together to form a nation. Will Filipinos ever blend? Or will the Philippines fragment as, indeed, other older states in Europe and elsewhere have already fragmented?
How is a nation created?
The artist creates myths to ennoble a people; the scholar deconstructs the myths to expose the bones. Both artist and scholar serve functions, not only as they see themselves or reality, but in exploring the unending contradiction of life itself. I am for the mythmaker for as long as his myths help in the social cohesion of a people. Who can find, for instance, the proof that George Washington really did chop down that cherry tree and wouldn’t lie about it? Who could verily state that he saw William Tell shoot an arrow at the apple on top of his son’s head? Who really believes that the Japanese are born out of Amaterasu, the sun god?
So, too, the Code of Kalantiao, which purports to show that ancient Filipinos were moral, never really existed; and that sterling woman warrior, Princess Urduja – was she a real historical figure?
Zialcita insinuates answers to timeless questions about culture change. He also adds to what several students of our history have said before – Nick Joaquin, Benito F. Legarda Jr., Alfredo Roces and students of architecture like Fr. Rodrigo Perez III. He enlarges and deepens their perceptions, and in the process, has come up with some lucid explanations as to how certain misconceptions have become conventional knowledge.
Filipinos want to glorify the barong tagalog as a racial reaction against the Spaniards who tucked in their shirts. But Zialcita says that never really happened. The proof of the pudding, it is often said, is in the eating. Do such myths benefit a people or do they negate their sense of worth? If myths do not negate a community or a nation, then let them be.
Zialcita brings Marxism into his discourse with probing insights. He is right in assuming that in the study of Filipino society and why Filipinos are poor, Marx does not provide all the answers; that Filipinos interested in changing this society should go beyond Marx.
Well said, but this does not mean Marx is completely irrelevant now. Wealth means power and power has to be translated, not just in the distribution of wealth itself, but in the provision of justice. In this global economy, development is the basis of wealth and to achieve it, it is imperative for a government to fuel the engines of growth, bringing forth the fullest use of resources – not just material wealth itself but the wealth that is not materially measured – the wealth of culture of a people united in their energies, in their vision, and most of all in their commitment to the country – the sense of nation which, alas, is missing in this country today.
Who will be the nation builders? Who else but those Filipinos willing to sacrifice – as Zialcita himself has indicated – in the upper classes of society willing to recognize the value and contribution of the masa?
In those 300 years that the Spaniards were in the Philippines, they intermarried with the Indios but not as much as they did in South America, in Mexico particularly. Countries like Chile and Argentina are basically European – and in a large country like Peru, the elite is white, not Indian. Brazil has a large black population and Portuguese descendants.
Mexicans say they are mestizos with some basis in fact. Mexico, like Peru, had a civilization of notable sophistication and strength when the Spaniards arrived – the Aztecs and the Incas had large cities, advanced science, particularly in astronomy where they excelled. Not so many Spaniards came to dominate the Philippines because of the distance from Spain. Spanish was not taught to the natives on the scale that it was in South America; hence, Spanish became the lingua franca of that continent.
We are not all mestizos as Zialcita claims, although there were many notable Creoles who were in the vanguard of the revolution against Spain. If this so-called mixing of Spanish blood with the native breed is quantified, what would clearly show is that the dilution was not all that widespread, although, in the end, the higher up the social and political ladder, the whiter one became – Spanish white, not American white, because the American colonizers did not stay long enough. This ratio is changing, though, for the elite is slowly but surely being diluted by Chinese yellow.
And the Malay brown?
The weakness of so many studies on the nature of societies is that they are based on history, religion, geography and all those anthropological constructs, which the economists consider micro. They have very little consideration for the greater influence by what Marxists or other scholars interested in the formation of nations would highlight – power, economic strength, which, in the long run, is the ultimate shaper of societies.
It is not the manner of cooking, for instance, that is studied, but the why of it – why certain countries have such sophisticated cuisines. It is because of the existence of powerful regimes, monarchical dynasties, which dictate such refinements – the imperial court of China, the datus, the kings and their desire for more finesse, comfort and luxury.
In architecture, it is the power of the colonizers, the rulers, which dictates what the structures should be. Take for instance the nipa hut – it is the power of the landlord, the encomiendero, which demanded that the nipa hut be light, moveable, cheap, so that the peasant could easily build one if the landlord ordered him to move.
It is when we peruse such elements that we come to the crucial question of our laggard development, why our government is corrupt, why Filipinos are poor.
Zialcita concludes that we should have stronger ties with Mexico, the South American countries and, inferentially, Spain. Again, nostalgia for Spanish colonialism. Sure, we should have better relationships with these countries, but we are in Southeast Asia, hostage to developments here and to the hegemonic ambitions of China and, of course, the shadow of the United States.
I cannot see any economic or even cultural reasons for us to strengthen ties with Mexico or with the countries of South America other than nostalgia. It is with our immediate neighbors that we should build such ties, particularly Indonesia, and of course with the economic behemoths like Japan, South Korea, India, and the Middle East countries on whom we are dependent on oil. And there is that specter hovering over us – the reality of all Southeast Asia being Sinicized in the future.
Spanish, for all the advantages it gives, is important, but not as important as English, which has become the lingua franca of the world. Forget Tagalog – it is not as important as English, which makes us all equal. In the first place, whether we like it or not, it has become a real national language through actual usage. It is English that must be polished, for it is our window to the world.
Just the same, Zialcita’s essay is a most illuminating examination of Filipino culture as compared to such rash conclusions of an even greater writer like Nick Joaquin who once declared that we have a tradition of "smallness." Tradition? It is the condition imposed on all poor societies, in Africa, in Southeast Asia, in the entire Third World where people buy tingi, whether it is cigarettes, bread or other basic commodities.
It is always exhilarating for us to examine what our culture is, its origins, its uniqueness, because as Zialcita so eloquently illustrated, we have so many things to be proud of.
But let us now go into some basics. The logic of colonialism is exploitation. Whether it is propelled by whatever ideology – to make the world "safe" for democracy, to spread civilization or Christianity – the white man’s burden, whatever sugar-coated objective it is, is driven by this logic. Therefore, colonialism by any name is immoral.
Reading Zialcita’s excellent exposition, as with some of the well-researched discourses of our Hispanophiles, I get an uneasy feeling that this excellent book is one more apologia for Spanish colonialism.
The colonized intellectual must first free himself, his mind most of all, from the subterfuges of the colonizer. He must recover the pristine self even if this means, as Nick Joaquin once charged, "to be an Igorot" – as if being one is to be stigmatized. Start from the mud at our feet, from mythic incense, the life-giving impulse of the cosmos, and from this purity, recognize the inputs of history, all the precious elements that contribute to the building of a nation.
Only when the colonized has achieved this innate freedom will he then be able to assume his true identity. Otherwise, his thinking will always be a monotonous echo of the colonizer’s dulcet spiel.
So it goes today: our modern ilustrados have yet to free themselves from prisons of the past, from the chains of colonialism, particularly the domestic variety. Until they recognize this bondage and oppose it, we will continue to wallow in blissful ignorance, and worse, in the muck of spiritual poverty left by the ghosts of colonialism.
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