Group 2 BSTM 1A GE ELEC 1

Andolero, Ashley Rae

Banate, Francine
Barcoma, Marian Christel
Bonaobra, Marie Kaye Anne
Bulan, Michell

PHILIPPINE POPULAR CULTURE

Chapter 2: Overview and History

Geography
 The Philippines is an archipelago of more than 7,000+ islands grouped into
three major areas—Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
 Comprised of significant areas that provides large human settlement and
agriculture.

Geograph Climate Vegetatio

y n
History

Filipinos, it has been said, are Malay in family, Spanish in love, Chinese in
business and American in ambition. History intervened in the evolution of Filipino
cultural life, intruding with a heavy hand on critical occasions, for better or worse,
irreversibly affecting the Filipino character.

• Biography of Philippine culture

The Stone Age: Hunter and Gatherers

 Theory about Negroid-pygmy group (Aeta) as the first people in the

archipelago.
 The early peoples were nomadic hunters. As recently as 1971, a band of 27
people who called themselves the Tasaday were brought to the world’s
attention because they appeared to have been a Stone Age, food-gathering
tribe living totally isolated in the rainforests of South Cotabato on Mindanao.
Stone Age people were probably both hunters and food gatherers.

The Metal Age: Bamboo People

The Metal Age, which followed around 700–200BC, further broadened cultural
horizons. That ever-handy tool, the bolo, emerged, and with this knife, bamboo could be
exploited efficiently; As Filipinos have been described as a bamboo people.
A Filipino Myth on the Origin of Man

The Filipino version of Adam and Eve,

that explains on the origin of a man
that is came from bamboo; thus were
the birth of Malakas (Strength) and
Maganda (Beauty), the first man and
woman.

Age of Trade and Contacts

Foreign traders made their way to the archipelago between the 10th and the 16 th
centuries in a period known as the Age of Trade and Contacts. At this time, the Chinese
sailed in their junks, bringing porcelain and silk in exchange for deer horn, trepang and
beeswax.Hundreds of thousands of porcelain pieces have been found, some going as
far back as the Tang dynasty (10th century), but mostly Sung and Ming ware (12th to
16th centuries), which suggesets extensive contact over hundreds of years.

Chinese Legacy

The Chinese contributed many things, including culinary techniques, such as

sautéed dishes, and a variety of rice cakes and noodles. The Chinese influence can
also be seen in some Filipino words used for various cooking implements, such as the
kawa (wok). Other evidence of the Chinese presence may be seen in the corner retail
shop and vegetable gardening. When the Spaniards moved in to colonise Manila, they
encountered a Chinese settlement there, and throughout the Spanish period the
colonisers, while wary of the Chinese, made use of Chinese skills. The Chinese in the
Philippines were, in turn, influenced by Filipino life. Those who married Filipinos had to
accept the matrilineal along with the male line in family structure. The Chinese are
patrilineal, Filipinos bilateral. For the Chinese male migrant who had little family in the
new land, the dominance of his Filipina wife’s family became absolute.
Advent of Islam

At about the same time as the Chinese, the Arabs had also come to the
Philippines to trade. In the Southeast Asian region the founding of Malacca, followed by
the conversion of its leader in 1414, spread the influence of Islam among the Malay
peoples, reaching southern Philippine shores in the 14 th century. Islam remains a
dominant influence in the southern Philippines, a factor that unified the kinship groups in
the area to resist colonisation by Spain effectively and strongly for 400 years, and put
up a strong resistance to American colonisation.

The Spanish Period

The last of the traders to sail into Philippine harbours was Ferdinand Magellan,
whose fleet was halfway through the first circumnavigation of the world. After this
landing in 1521, other Western voyagers arrived. The Portuguese, the Dutch and the
British were to be regarded as invaders because of Magellan’s touchdown on Limasawa
and ‘discovery’ of an archipelago already inhabited for hundreds of thousands of years.
When Magellan first landed, he encountered the standard kinship feud between two
chiefs. In order to ingratiate himself with one of them, Rajah Humabon, and to display
the military invincibility of Spain, Magellan offered to destroy the group under Lapu
Lapu.

The Santo Niño

While Magellan was in Cebu, Humabon’s wife (described as the ‘Queen’ by

Magellan’s chronicler, Pigafetta) became so enamoured with a small statue of child
Jesus that it was given to her as a gift. Devotion to the Santo Niño is very much alive
today. The Ati-atihan of Kalibo is a fiesta which pays homage to this image of the Christ
child.

The Virgin’s Statue

 Legazpi subsequently destroyed and captured Manila. Here again, a sailor,

wading, chanced upon another image among pandan roots. This time it was a
statue of a lady. It was declared miraculous, and this wooden sculpture has
been enshrined in Manila’s Ermita church as Nuestra Señora de Guia.
 The statue is offered as evidence that Christianity preceded the coming of the
Spaniards; in fact, Legazpi had reported an encounter with a Japanese
person wearing a theatin cap (worn by Christians) and who, when queried,
affirmed he was indeed a Christian named Pablo.
 Other images introduced developed cults, the Marian being strongest, with
the Virgin of Antipolo and the Nuestra Señora del Rosario (La Naval) drawing
large followings during the Spanish reign.
Christian Legacy

 The biggest influence on Philippine culture by Spain was the introduction of

Christianity. The layout of a typical Philippine town still reflects Spanish
Christianisation in conception and structure: a central plaza, the church at one
end, municipio or government house at the other and houses of leading
citizens on both sides. The plaza complex, in fact the creation of urban towns,
is certainly a Spanish contribution.

The Fine Arts

 Christianisation led to the building of churches, an architectural concept

previously unknown in the Philippines. The heavy massive stone structure
was grandiose, conceived to last and built on an enormous scale—very
different to prehispanic Filipino art forms which viewed rituals and related art
forms as transitory.
 Painting took such strong root that secular painting in the form of portraiture
and landscape soon graced wealthy homes. By 1884, two Filipino painters
had bagged top honours in Europe, Juan Luna unofficially gaining the
coveted Prix de Rome, the highest single art award of the time.
 The large Spanish colonial house evolved from the humble indigenous house,
the nipa hut. High-pitched roofs funnelled the flow of heavy rain. Windows
(made of capiz shell in the Spanish colonial house, and in the nipa hut,
bamboo lattice work) blocked off the glare of light but allowed the free flow of
air. The Spanish colonial house shows how Filipinos adopted Spanish ideas
and technology, shaping these towards their own special needs.
 At the beginning, art was transitory—wooden carvings, flower and leaf
offerings were left to the elements to be quickly reclaimed by nature.
However, the Spanish introduced materials devised to keep a work of art as
long as possible; stone used in church structures and sculpture, a written
literature and oil paints.
 Philippine literature, which in pre-hispanic times was oral, acquired the Latin
alphabet. Growing from religious literature, it developed in the vernacular the
pasyon (Passion of Christ), sinakulo (religious plays) and moro-moro
(Christian-Moor dramas). It also then developed awit, corrido (metrical
romances). By 1891, a Filipino named Jose Rizal had published two political
novels that shook the Spanish colonial regime in the Philippines.
 In many ways, Christian Filipinos picked up Spanish culture, selectively
absorbing what suited their lifestyle. Music, dress, dance, cuisine, ceremony,
bureaucracy, political ideas—none was borrowed in pure form; transformation
was essential.
Roots of Hispanisation

 The Spanish compadrazco system was adopted but harnessed by kinship

groups to gain powerful members. Catholicism was accepted but with
emphasis on ceremony, fiesta and the miraculous powers of many saints.
 Strict modesty became part of Philippine sexual morals. The chaperone was
very much a part of Philippine courtship practices before World War II—
sweethearts were never left to themselves during courtship. Spanish
missionaries had strong views against nudity. Modest dressing remains a
strong trait of Christian Filipinos.
 However, Filipinos were not fully hispanised, unlike some Latin-American
countries. Spain did not rule the Philippines directly but via Mexico. Many of
those who came to colonise the islands had gained from a previous Mexican
experience or were half Mexican.

Friars and Filipinisation

 The Spanish clergy became the power in provincial parishes as well as a

political force in Manila. The principalia (Filipino elite) sought to channel their
children towards the most prestigious seat of power which was the clergy,
considering higher political office would have been denied them anyway.
 The rise of a Filipino clergy ultimately led to a clash between the Spanish
friars and the new class of Filipinos who challenged the Spanish colonisers by
becoming not merely Christian, but priests. Three Filipino priests were falsely
implicated in a mutiny in Cavite and publicly executed in Manila’s
Bagumbayan (now Rizal Park).
 The first political conflict between Spain and the Philippines began with the
growing Filipinisation of the clergy, strongly resisted by Spanish friars who
refused to share their status, power, wealth and the ‘good life’.
 A wealthy native class emerged around the mid-19th century, manifested by
the rise of colonial houses in major towns. Banking was institutionalised,
landed estates carved out, sugar produced and tobacco factories erected.
The educational system boasted a university and an observatory. Children of
the elite were sent abroad to master professions, and were identified, upon
their return, as illustrados. A national political identity took shape.
THE FILIPINO EMERGES

 The term 'Filipino' was first applied to Spaniards born in the Philippines, to
distinguish them from those born in Spain; the 'luckier' ones (in their minds
anyway) born in Spain stressed the fact that they were 'Peninsulares'.
 The Filipino illustrados agitated for reforms, using their erudite training to
demonstrate that Filipinos were the equal of Westerners and capable of
representation in the Spanish Cortes, if not of self-government.
 Filipinos claim to be the first nationalist movement in Asia and the first to
have launched an armed revolution against Western colonizers in Asia.
 The sense of nationhood, the identity of the very word 'Filipino', emerged out
of the Spanish colonial experience.
 The Filipino illustrados who voiced their national identity wrote in Spanish
which was understood by other illustrados from different regions of the
country.

PHILIPPINE INDEPENDENT CHURCH

 Christianity, Spain's contribution to the Philippines, was not so much a

theological conversion as an emotional one adulterated by indigenous values
and beliefs.
 Rizal, his family a victim of land conflicts with the clergy in Calamba, attacked
the abuses of the Spanish friars in the Philippines.
 This conflict between the friars and the nationalists, with roots in the frustrated
movement for the Filipinisation of the church of 'Gomburza' days, has created
a strong schism within Philippine Catholicism.
 Thus, Christianity in the Philippines is very much a humanised one, the earthy
lifestyles of the Spanish friars vivid in the history and memory of Christian
Filipinos.
 A priest who loves wine, good food and picaresque humour has greater
acceptance than the silent ascetic or the fire-and-brimstone demagogue.

ARMED STRUGGLE

 The Armed Struggle (1896–1913) followed the Spanish colonial epoch.

 General Emilio Aguinaldo rose to power but at the expense of the military
execution of Bonifacio, the first leader to be devoured by the Philippine
revolution.
  The Philippines was a key part of the Spanish-American war that was
America's debut as a colonial power.
 The Americans refer to the subsequent battles as a 'Philippine insurrection', a
euphemism for a brutal war more widespread than the Filipino revolution
against Spain.
 The Americans referred to the Filipinos as goo-goos and niggers.

THE AMERICAN PERIOD

 The United States immediately introduced civil rights.

 In less than 40 years, a generation of Filipinos had emerged speaking English
and craving more Americanisation.
 In the 1920s, there were Filipino short story writers in English, and by World
War II, a Filipino (Carlos Romulo) had won the Pulitzer Prize.
 Filipino writers in Spanish had amassed a cultural legacy over centuries they
could not hand down to a subsequent generation.
 The American period (1900–1941) had culturally cut down entire generation
of Filipino ilustrados in full flower.

WORLD WAR II - THE FILIPINO: PRODUCT OF HISTORY

World War II: Japanese Influence

During World War II, the Japanese sought to reawaken Asian roots by making official a
national language based on Tagalog. The initial Japanese military victory proved the
military vulnerability of America. It rudely demonstrated that American interest in the
Philippines was not the absolute commitment that Filipino kinship ways viewed it to be.
When the Americans returned as liberators, they were gratefully welcomed by the
population. Americans were granted equal parity rights in the newly forged Philippine
constitution. US military bases enjoyed a 99-year lease with the right to interfere in any
situation that involved national security. The wartime collaboration issue was swept
under the rug when Roxas won the election. The United States also provided "backpay"
for recognized guerrillas, a bonanza that failed to distinguish genuine patriots from
opportunists. A resistance movement with a communist ideology had gained a foothold
during the war and was pushed underground.

Postwar Republican Government

The postwar years were filled with cynicism and disillusionment. A republican
form of government introduced a two-party system of free elections, patterned after the
American model. Patronage and utang na loob decided leadership and votes much
more than political beliefs. Mass media was one area relatively open for public
expression of grievances and aspirations, and soon enough the youth, workers, women,
everyone with an axe to grind, used the politics of the streets. At this point (1972),
President Marcos declared martial law, dismantled the legislature, closed down all mass
media and imposed his own brand of government. The incident at the thoroughfare
called EDSA caused the fall of Marcos, who fled with his family to American soil. A non-
violent solution to topple a dictatorship had been spontaneously devised. Nevertheless,
a democratic system of elections had been restored by Aquino and through this process
the nation has sought to shape its future.

Aquino’s parting political act was to endorse the presidential candidacy of her
Defense Minister, General Fidel Ramos, one of the chief architects of the Marcos
martial law regime. Fidel Ramos was sworn into office, after winning the 1992 elections.
The new president worked towards reversing the economic slide throughout his six-year
term. Fidel Ramos was sworn into office, after winning the 1992 elections. The new
president worked towards reversing the economic slide throughout his six-year term.
Fidel Ramos was sworn into office, after winning the 1992 elections. The new president
worked towards reversing the economic slide throughout his six-year term. Fidel Ramos
was sworn into office, after winning the 1992 elections. The new president worked
towards reversing the economic slide throughout his six-year term.

THE FILIPINO: PRODUCT OF HISTORY

History shapes the character of a nation. The ugly side of the Philippines a
foreigner encounters today was shaped over two colonial periods when the society's
indigenously emerging messiahs were brutalized for colonial ends. Filipinos today are
often at loggerheads over what values and virtues, and manners and etiquette, should
apply. A Filipino-style democracy is evolving, in which good can make a difference in
the dominant politics of kinship and plunder.
QUESTION & ANSWERS:

1. It was granted to the Americans in the newly forged Philippine constitution, and
US military bases enjoyed a 99-year lease with the right to interfere in any
situation that involved national security.
ANSWER: Parity Rights

2. Official date that Martial Law was established and the day that the Marcos
dictatorship began.
ANSWER: 1972

3. In this age people were probably both hunters and food gatherers.
ANSWER: STONE AGE

4. It is control, the United States intervened under the gospel of ‘manifest destiny’.
ANSWER: ARMED STRUGGLE

5. It is (1900–1941) had culturally cut down an entire generation of Filipino

ilustrados in full flower.
ANSWER: THE AMERICAN PERIOD
6. It was declared miraculous, and this wooden sculpture has been enshrined in
Manila’s Ermita church.
ANSWER: NUESTRA SEÑORA DE GUIA

7. The biggest influence on Philippine culture by Spain.

ANSWER: CHRISTIANITY

8. In this age Filipinos have been described as a bamboo people

ANSWER: METAL AGE

9. Who was sworn into office after winning the 1992 elections?
ANSWER: FIDEL RAMOS

10. The oldest church in the country?

ANSWER: SAN AGUSTIN CHURCH