"When I Get Home, I Want to Forget": Memory and Amnesia in the Occupied

Philippines, 1901-1904

The United States waged a terrible war in the Philippines from 1898 to 1902. Filipinos

craved independence after more than 300 years of the horrible Spanish-Philippines era, and the

end of it allowed U.S. leaders to take advantage of the weakness of Filipinos by masking

themselves as a beacon of hope in the darkest days. They saw a chance to seize control of the

Philippines and gain access to Asian markets by creating a community purportedly geared

toward meeting the needs of the majority, which the Filipinos saw as a form of assistance rather

than another colonization tactic. Governor-General William Howard Taft said that the Filipinos

were unable to rule themselves or defend themselves against foreign powers and so as a colonial

authority, the United States implemented measures that it rightfully believed would benefit the

social and material well-being of Filipinos. The introduction of the American educational system

was one such policy, and its impact and influence on the life and culture of Filipinos during and

after the colonial period was extensive and substantial.

During the early stages of American colonization, the colonial narrative portrayed the

Filipinos as primitive, communal, mystical, and illogical, implying that they were incapable of

governing themselves or utilizing their land, thus justifying invasion and colonial settlement. The

narrative also encouraged 'civilizing missions'—the idea that European nations and the United

States had a moral duty to civilize "backward" peoples in other parts of the world by introducing

Western culture and technology—enacted through state policies that were aimed at assimilating

natives through the obliteration of language and tradition, replacing pre-contact cultural identity

with a foreign identity.

 In her article "When I Get Home, I Want to Forget," Kimberly Alidio states that the

representations of Filipinos took center stage in how the United States understood the extent of

its power to transform individuals and "races." The racialization of the Filipino subject against

variant standards of civilization was a cornerstone of progressive ideology, implying that the

United States took advantage of the Philippines by "transforming" it to their advantage. English

thus became the only medium of instruction in the schools, the only language approved for use in

the school, work, in public school buildings, and even on public school playgrounds. Alidio goes

on to discuss the traumas caused by colonization in the Philippines, but in the end, the

Philippines agreed to a special partnership forged by Americans and Filipinos during the trials of

colonization and nation-building, which forced Filipinos to "forgive" by forgetting (Alidio 120).

This is a perfect illustration of how the authority's motives, as well as the language employed to

communicate about its history, impose a colonial identity on the colonized. As a result, it is

critical to recognize and notice how the English language can be used to resist colonialism by,

for example, speaking about Filipino identity to make room for a definition that is not anchored

in its colonization. Instead, resistance to colonial language can be used to achieve autonomy in

reclaiming one's identity.