The State and Conditions of Filipino Philosophy.

The Signifier Filipino

In the essay ‘The Primitivization of the Indio Mind and the Explosion of Rationalities: The Politics of Knowledge in the Spanish Colonial Philippines’ Feorillo Demeterio attempts, through historical analysis, to demonstrate how the Filipino mind had been “systematically made to remain pre-modern by the colonial regime” through an ideological and discursive boundary that prevented the passage of modern knowledge and simultaneously reinforced a state of mind characterized by fanaticism, superstition and absurdity. Moreover, in its attempt to legitimize its hegemonic rule, the Spanish colonizers identified themselves through the conceptual construction of the Filipino as its ontological other- the indio. Needless to say, these efforts made a profound effect in the Filipino psyche, “making this mind maladjusted to the nuances of a society that had been drastically transformed by the same regime from being tribal to modern”.   

Following this historical perspective, and in utilizing the Gramscian notion of hegemony, it is apparent that the difficulty of ascertaining what the term Filipino signifies may be traced in the colonizer’s tremendous resolve to dominate through the destruction of any unifying component that may pose a significant challenge to their hegemonic rule. It is this unifying component- either by learning the Castilian language which would give them access to the Enlightened and liberal ideas from the continent or acquiring a revolutionary ideology- that was systematically eradicated in the Filipino mind, culminating in the intention of self-definition through symbolic inversion. By eliminating and preventing the cultivation of this unifying component, the colonizers succeeded in subverting a source of unifying national identity that could jeopardize their rule. Substituting this unifying component is a fictive identity that completely misrepresents the Filipino which unfortunately has been reified in the deepest niche of the Filipino mind, ergo the establishment and legitimization- in short, the hegemonic rule- of the Spanish colonial regime.

But if this analysis is valid, following its line of reasoning, then this does not tell us what the Filipino is, but what the colonizers thought the Filipinos are. While much is revealed to us about our colonial past- while it succeeds in its intention of making the people remember- it does not, in any way, illuminate us on what the Filipino is; it only tells us what the Filipino is not. Thus, the question still persists: what does the term Filipino signify?

Identity and Globalization

Enough has been said about our colonial past. From here on, what should overtake us must already be the actual history of the Filipino people that would determine what has previously been deprived from us- the cultivation of an ideal Filipino identity.

But it seems this theme remains elusive, and that even if we are in the post-colonial period, the specter of our colonial past continues to haunt us. Whereas our identity was concealed from, and made ambiguous to, ourselves in the past, the obscurity of the same theme now arises from the assertion that “national boundaries are becoming increasingly irrelevant in a borderless world”. In simpler terms, the ambiguity of Filipino identity- or what is left of it- arising from our colonial past is threatened to fall into irrelevance and relegated into ancient history in the dawn of globalization- a world that heavily leans on global rather than national discourses. Contextualized in this paper’s present concern, the danger of globalization therefore is the threat of dissolution of a Filipino identity before it can even ossify. The question of Filipino identity therefore is now replaced by a more immediate concern: In a globalized world, in the disintegration of national communities and national histories- in short, culture- would it still be meaningful to assert loyalty and love for country? Furthermore, this question acquires a moral aspect: Is it any good to be a Filipino? To put it in stark terms, does the question of Filipino identity even matter?

In his instructive essay The Filipino Diaspora: Identity in the Global Age, Randolf David articulates the question of Filipino identity in a postmodern sociological perspective; he characterizes this phenomenon as the Filipino diaspora- “a collection of experiences arising from the ‘double relationship or dual loyalty that migrants, exiles and refugees have to places- their connections to the space they currently occupy and their continuing involvement with back home’”. Here he analyzes the effects and socio-political impact of overseas employment on the problem of a Filipino identity. What is particularly insightful is the purpose and magnitude of this phenomenon in which it is being undertaken as well as its impact on Filipino society. In not so many words, he emphasized that whereas employment abroad was pursued to alleviate domestic unemployment and help pay for the country’s oil imports in the past, in more recent times it is pursued as a popular and instant way out of poverty for millions of poor families that translates into a lucrative business for entrepreneurial recruiters and a source of foreign exchange for the government. It is interesting to observe how overseas employment triggered a domino effect in our socio-political sphere. The radical shift in preference from construction workers to domestic helpers, and from engineers to nurses, office workers and sales personnel as well as a gender shift from male OCW’s to female OCW’s seriously questioned the deep-seated traditions of the Filipino society; the traditionally home-bound women are now liberated from the constraints of obedience to their husbands and families, while social responsibility is now subverted for individual- in the sense of personal and familial responsibility- interests. Moreover, the traditional marital practices before marriage are rapidly nullified by intercultural marriage through the more recent “mail-order-bride”. And if, in the socio-cultural sense, it citizenry has been severely affected by this particular phenomenon as a result of globalization as well as historical events, then, in the socio-political sense, the state cannot be far behind. But our political sphere fares no better; a struggling nation like ours that is economically weak and politically immature can only be swept away in the global arena. And when a state such as ours cannot sufficiently address the problem of hunger, unemployment, crime and disease, then it cannot fully assert its moral and political function over its constituents.

In other words, the inexhaustible changes in our socio-cultural and socio-political sphere seem to give us less reason to identify ourselves as a Filipino. The totalizing effect of globalization has reduced our nationality (and other nationalities for that matter) as the source of our identity simply into, precisely, a signifier for “an overworked maid in European and Singaporean homes, an exploited dancer in Japan, and an underpaid seaman in some Panamanian registered boat.” To be Filipino nowadays is to be a part of a society that has failed to address the basic issues of poverty and unemployment, where graft and corruption is an everyday business in politics caused by a government that is ruled by the economic and political elite and where young boys and girls are in the middle of the streets begging alms to make it through the day. To be Filipino nowadays is to sacrifice everything we hold dear in order to be a refugee trying to carve a better life, free from economic hardship. The author puts these in the starkest terms: “If national identity refers to those salient aspects of our being by which we recognize ourselves as a distinct people… these distinguishing marks of our being only serve as reminders of the failure of the Filipino nation-state.”

And yet it is surprising how Filipinos still conflate into communities amidst exploitation and social exclusion. Despite the depressing conditions of our the Filipino nation-state,