Colonial mentality is the product of colonisation and for a country like the Philippines which has been colonised for more than four hundred years, colonial mentality has relevant influences towards shaping the Filipino culture both ancient and contemporary. It is part of Filipino contemporary culture and society and with this, I will explore how symbolic power of colonial mentality affects the daily lives of Filipinos. This essay will discuss a brief history of the Philippines under Spanish colonisation and its transition towards American commonwealth. I will explore the racial caste system during Spanish colonial period and argue on the relevance of ‘ethincisation’ and ‘racialisation’ in forming a Filipino identity using primarily the article “‘Race, ‘Ethnicity’, and Identity” by Lewis,G. and Phoenix A. It will discuss on how the American imperialism redefined the Filipino identity focusing on the westernisation of the Filipino society. Centring on the daily influences of colonial mentality on Filipino lives, I will show the prevalence of colonial mentality in Filipino mass media and the effects it has on contemporary Filipino society. Lastly, using Bourdieu’s habitus I will explore how Filipino contemporary identity is shaping and responding to its society.
The Spanish colonisation
of the Philippines started when Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese explorer was
commissioned by the Spanish crown to explore the east in search of spices. On
March 16, 1521 he landed on the shores of Limasawa, Leyte where they were
welcomed by the natives. Guided by the chief of the island of Limasawa,
Magellan’s fleet arrived in the island of Cebu on April 7, 1521. He later
entered into a blood compact with Cebu’s Chief Humabon and baptised the natives
into Christianity in honour of the King of Spain. Chief Lapu-lapu of Mactan
Island was the only chief who defied Magellan’s wish to honour Spain. Enraged,
Magellan sailed to Mactan to subdue Lapu-lapu which ended in a battle wherein
Magellan died (Arcilla 1998). After the death of Magellan on April 27, 1521
Spain sent voyages following Magellan’s route into the east. A lot of them
failed and by February 2, 1543, the fourth expedition by Rey Lopez de
Villalobos landed in Davao Oriental and named the islands; Philippines, after
Prince Philip (later King Philip II), heir to the throne of Spain. Spain ruled
the Philippines for 356 years which ended with the signing of the ‘Treaty of
Paris’ wherein Spain relinquished its remaining colonies including the
Philippines to the United States of America. A sum of US$20 million was payed
to Spain as part of the agreement (Philippine History 2014). During American
occupation, the Philippines’ transitioned into a democratic country with the
establishment of a Filipino elected legislature. On May 14, 1935, Manuel Quezon
became the first Commonwealth President and by July 4, 1946 the Philippines
gained full independence.
Prior to Spanish
colonisation the Philippines already had a social structure which comprised of
a datu (chief), timawa (warrior), and oripon(serfs
and slaves) and regardless of rank they all belonged to one class. During
Spanish colonialism a social structure was created base on superior-inferior
and civilised-primitive type stereotype (Tan 1987) wherein at the top of the
social hierarchy are the Peninsulares who
are full bloodied Spaniards living in the Philippines, in the middle are the Mestizos who are of mixed blood mostly
of Spanish-Indio (Filipino) decent, down are the Indios who are the Christianised natives and the lowest are the Moros who are the natives of Moslem
decent and the Infieles or the
indigenous natives. The coloniser insisted conversion of Christianity of the
natives for the reason of making the Philippines as ‘a strong hold of Christian
faith in Asia designed to evangelise the non-Christians of Japan and China’
(Camba 2012, p.218). Being a Christian is the first identity that the Filipino
adopted through colonisation. It also gave the Indios social rights which the Moros
and the Infieles were deprived of. In
retrospect, the natives did not had any choice but to convert because being a
non-Christian made them an outcast as well as belonging to the lowest class in
society. This social hierarchy
manifested racism for they treated natives inferior, denied their social rights
and exclusion (Lewis & Phoenix 2004). This also shows how the natives
categorised between Indios, Moros,
and Infieles were subjected to ‘racialization’ and ‘ethnicization’ because the Spanish social hierarchy placed
‘individuals and groups into racial or ethnic categories (Lewis & Phoenix
2004, p.123). Not only were the natives subjected to oppression and exclusion
by the coloniser, but the need to abandon old traditional identity to gain
cultural capital (Bourdieu 2006) was a necessity. This cultural capital was
important for it gave the Indios recognition in a society which was highly
dominated by the Spaniards.
Since colonisation was
considered a holy mission the coloniser considered labour from the Indios as a reward from God for which
the Spanish took advantage of. ‘The encomenderos,
Spanish soldiers turned land owners, had been known to overwork the Filipinos
for agricultural production’ (Camba, 2012 p. 218). This is the second identity
that the Filipino adopted, the labourer. These are the two major identities
ascribed to the Indios which is set
by the Spaniards; 1) as a Christian native and 2) labourer. As time progressed the Indios demanded more rights and freedom and being identified as a
Christian native who works as a labourer was showing its strains. Lewis and
Phoenix (2004) mentioned that ‘racial’ and ‘ethnic’
identities are produced as part of a social process, that they are collectively
produced and that they may change over time and as an example, from 1872-1892 a
new breed of Filipinos emerged who were mostly educated in Europe. One of them
was Dr. Jose Rizal, who was one of the leaders of the Philippine revolution
against Spain (Tan 1987). Spanish colonisation ended on 1898 by virtue of the Treaty
of Paris.
The end of Spanish
colonialism did not provide the independence Filipinos were longing for but it
only transitioned into American imperialism. American imperialism was veiled in
the idea that the Philippines must abandon pre-modern colonial mentality and
assimilate a new modern imperial perspective for the sake of national
development towards independence. In order for the Philippines to integrate
into the flow of time, Filipinos need to extract pre-modern stasis and must
enter into rigorous regime of evolutional change (Hawkins 2012). With this core
idea introduced by the imperialist the Filipinos accepted American imperialism.
Commerce was the first agenda that the Americans wanted to control. The
Philippines major export of tobacco, sugar and coconut oil helped the country
to grow its economy while being dependent on American investments. The educational
system changed because the American introduced secondary and higher education
with English as a mode of instruction. As a result of education Filipinos were
equipped with tools of modernization and a new cultural outlook which was
apathetic towards traditional ways. The educational system provided this
cultural orientation wherein traditional values were considered primitive and
inferior as opposed to the Western tradition which was considered modern and
therefore superior (Tan 1987). When the Philippines gained its independence on
July 4, 1946 the Filipino has assimilated much of the western culture which
gained him a new identity achieved from a new social process that assumed
American culture and values. This was superimposed by introducing American
sports, cinema, fashion and music (Tan 1987).
From 1946, an evolution
towards modernisation ran in the Philippines. Independence gave the Filipinos
freedom of controlling its own economy and government but Filipino identity was
still restrained in the confines of the attributed and assimilated identities
set by the colonisers. These identities intersected together in constructing a
Filipino identity which is highly influenced by colonial mentality. A Filipino identity therefore is primarily
(but not exclusively) a Christian who is well educated with westernised values
(Spanish and American). These attributes do not necessarily connote
restrictions but underlying colonial discourse that comes with colonial
mentality is something that I want to discuss further. Part of colonial
discourse are statements set by the colonisers regarding the ‘[r]ules of
inclusion and exclusion operate in the assumption of the superiority of the
colonizer’s culture, history, language, art, political structures, social
conventions, and the assertion of the need for the colonized to be ‘raised up’
through colonial contact’ (Ashcroft et. al 2000, p. 42). As a result of
colonial discourse colonial mentality in the Philippines is manifested into two
dimensions: first is lack of patriotism; second is an actual preference for
everything foreign (Dy 1994).
Having cultural confidence
is having a sense of patriotism and loss of patriotism in the Philippines began
when the colonisers developed an educational system which insisted as having
the colonisers’ language (Spanish and American) as mode of instructions. Since
colonisation, especially during the American period, taught the Filipino to
adapt westernised culture and values Filipino patriotism was not given any
importance. Both colonisers also ingrained into the Filipino identity that the
west is superior to everything local (Filipino) and as a result of this social
process the Filipino identity is highly influenced by colonial mentality even
in contemporary society. One of the best
manifestations of colonial mentality in the Philippines is through the notion
of ‘pigmentocracy’ or shadeism. The
term ‘pigmentocracy’ is adopted by
social scientist to describe societies in which social status and wealth are
defined through skin colour resulting from discrimination by Europeans towards
other races (Lyn 2008). The Philippines being one of these societies equates
having lighter skin tone, an attribute of the colonisers, of having wealth,
higher status, knowledge and beauty while having a darker skin tone connotes
the exact opposite. The effects of ‘pigmentocracy’ is not limited on the
epidermal because it creates meaning and discriminates Filipinos who have
darker skin tones which is a form of social, racial and ethnic discrimination
within its own society and race. This is reinforce in mass media. Whitening
products are prevalently sold and purchased everywhere and a survey in 2004
done by Synovate on the use of skin-lightening products revealed that the
Philippines has the highest rate of usage in the Asia-pacific region (Glenn
2009, p.63). Television and film industry encourages actors and actresses to
have ‘whiter’ skin tone and as a result mass media has created a massive
industry which subtly interjects discrimination that has daily effects on the
Filipino life. It implies that having ‘whiter’ skin gives the individual social
advantages and higher social status.
Recognizing that colonial
mentality as a form of social capital which is mainly interest-motivated which
perpetuates social differences and hierarchies (Bourdieu 2004) will help us
navigate on how the habitus of colonial mentality is carried out in everyday
Filipinos lives. Considering that habitus is ‘a durable set of dispositions
that are formed, stored, recorded and exert influence to mould forms of human
behaviour’ (Navarro 2004, p.16), as a
result of colonisation, Filipino identity adapted a post-colonial behaviour
which is mimicry. Mimicry describes the ambivalent
relationship between the coloniser and the colonised wherein the colonised
subject is encouraged to ‘mimic’ the
coloniser through the adoption of coloniser’s habits, values, and institutions
(Ascroft et.al 2000, p. 139). Within Filipino contemporary life mimicry is highly visible through
preference of everything foreign. This
preferential bias is not limited to imported goods and brands but it extends to
a preference of foreign culture as well. Again, this is reinforce in mass
media. The proliferation of American films to Spanish and Korean soap operas
presented in everyday Filipino cinema and television indicates that within contemporary
Filipino life is an intersectionality between being local and foreign at the
same time. Since colonial mentality is a form of symbolic power, the ordinary
Filipino is symbolically coerce and he unconsciously adapts and assimilate a
habitus for the sake of acquiring higher social status. He bleaches his skin,
perpetuates foreign products, and integrates foreign culture and values into
his identity.
Is colonial mentality
then essential and beneficial for Filipinos as an individual and as a society
in contemporary life? I believe that colonial mentality has been ingrained
thoroughly within Filipino culture that it has become part of a Filipino
identity. Noting that it constitutes a part of Filipino identity means that it
does not entirely define his whole self. Not discounting the facts that
colonial mentality limits and discriminates individuals, it also constitutes
resilience and adaptability to change, thus it is both negative and positive. Focusing
on the positive side of colonial mentality we can only hope of the possibility
of change that the Filipino as an individual and society will adapt a new
mentality which will encouraged them to appreciate their diversity, ancestry
and history which is beneficial to personal and social growth.
Scrutinizing Filipino
colonial mentality through connecting it to Filipino history gives us a better
perspective on how and why it affects the lives of Filipinos both ancient and
within contemporary society. By citing the manifestations of colonial mentality
in contemporary Filipino lives like ‘pigmentocracy’
and unpatriotic gives us an understanding on how the modern Filipino identity
is shaped as a result of colonisation which in turn is taken advantage of by
symbolic powers like mass media. The sedimentation of colonial mentality within
the Filipino identity is reinforced by habitus which is necessary in gaining
social capital.