Our cultural heritage so-called

Title

Creator

Bonifacio, Armando F.

Language

English

Source

Panorama Volume XII (No. 2) February 1960

Year

1960

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

Our (Cultural Heritage So-Galled By Armando F. Bonifacio any discussions about na tionalism involve, either implicitly or explicitly, re ferences to our so-called cultural heritage. Statements have been made to the effect that among the means that would help in the formation of nationalism is to fo cus our people’s attention on the value of our own distinct Filipino culture. There is no apparent agree ment, however, as to whether the recognition of the value of our distinct Filipino culture is ante cedent to nationalism or conse quent to it. Some even believe that it is, in itself, what we mean by nationalism. And yet, without having to deal with the verbal controversy at this level, we seem to experience a great deal of embarrassment When in doubt as to whether we have a Fili pino culture that we can call truly our own, just consult actual manifesta tions around us of what at the start had been for eign, Can we even face this fact? whenever we are asked to point to the so-called Filipino cultlire. Is there a distinct Filipino culture? The perennial exhortation seems to be that, assuming there is the Filipino culture, our main task is its preservation. We think then of our papag system in the barrios, the barber shop “filosopos”, the bakya insti tution, our strong and almost con genital familial loyalty, the unsa nitary hand-kissing as a form of respect for our elders, our cara baos and the plow and other pri mitive means of agriculture, and a host of other traditional cus 24 Panorama toms and institutions which are admittedly anachronisms in the modern world. We are embar rassed because we cannot seem to accept that these are the things we should preserve and perpe tuate, without at the same time being bothered by the thought that this might be an expression of something like a downright cultural regression. There are indeed beautiful things which we could preserve, among them the Tagalog Kundimans which are reflective of the sensitive and sentimental charac ter of our people. There is also the myth about our Filipino wo manhood and her classic shyness and tenderness. There is also something about the traditional Filipino gentleman, known for his gallantry, for his devotion and his hardworking character. These things are indeed beautiful, and' stories about them seem to sound more like fairy tales than real-life stories. What then are we to preserve and perpetuate? Most certainly not our plows, our papag institu tion, our so-called strong family ties. With respect to our family ties alone, one writer (Thomas R. Mc Hale: "The Philippine Cultural Matrix and Economic Develop ment,” Comment, Number 2, First Quarter, 1957) pointed out that this particular institution does more harm than good to our pres ent economy. Our business enter prises are family organizations. Top executives of a business or ganization are there not so much because of their competence, but because of blood-relationship with the owner-president. Thus busi ness decisions cannot be done without having to regard senti mentalities involved in family re lationships. He wrote: "A family business enterprise . . . engenders constant conflict between business and household obligations and needs. It can buy, sell, sue, invest and spend only in relationship to family condi tions. The corporation can mea sure its actions with the yardstick of efficiency, marginal-productiv ity and profitability. The family enterprise invariably subordinates such criteria to those of family rather than market values.” If what we are to perpetuate include these ridiculous and wornout institutions, then nationalism, whatever that may be, would con tribute more to the retardation than to progress of this country. here is something uncom1 fortably fictitious about our so-called culture. 'Jhere -seems ton be-a-presumption, based on fake C belief, that we do have a distinct f And thir^esumption'is 'monTrevealing of our growing dislike for things foreign than anything else. It seems that in the minds of our people there is a growing rebel lion against our pernicious colon February 1960 25 ial attitude. Our people are be ginning to realize perhaps out of sheer envy or jealousy for other more advanced Asian countries, that the so-called colonial mental ity is inimical to the progress of our nation. And undoubtedly, this realization is more pronounced in the minds of the leaders of the Filipino nationalist movement. Indian nationalistic movement seems to be in a much better state because when the leaders of this movement started to rebel against the same colonial mentality of the Indian people and urged them to regard and value what is charac teristically Indian there was some thing unique and tangible they could preserve, something still practical even in the modern set ting. The vast Indian population and land, in spite of the ruthless British exploitation, did not suf fer much transformation. Much of what is uniquely Indian remained, as the Indian character seems to be less pliable. Our cultural history, however, is quite different. There was in the first place behind us three burdensome centuries of Spanish subjugation and tyranny. The Spaniards, not caring so much for the plight of the Tilipino “na tives”, saw that it was better to keep our people in the state of ignorance and primitivism than enlightenment. Educational op portunity was limited to the weal thy class. The Educational De cree of 1863 was a royal order that contemplated the establish ment in the Islands of a thorough public school system, but for one reason or anotner, this royal or der was never put into effect. It is no wonder that our national leaders came from the ranks of the elite and educated class who had the chance to go out of the coun try to see for themselves by com parison the facts about their peo pie. But when our national lead ers agitated for reforms, such re forms were not granted and it had to take a bloody revolution to boot out the Spanish colonial power which kept a large segment of our people in complete ignorance. Throughout the three centuries of Spanish occupation, the culture to which our people was exposed was the Catholic religion and the vulgarities of the friars and the guardias civiles. Majority of our people, because they were kept in ignorance and no systematic education was introduced, were not prepared to accept a new cul ture. If they assimilated features of the new culture, it was out of blind imitation and not out of de Jiberate and intelligent choice. Cf”hus, there was the old and primitive Filipino culture and the alien and strange Spanish cul ture. Three centuries did not make “Spaniards” out of Filipinos, but at least throughout this long pe riod of cultural intercourse a pe culiar cultural synthesis resulted. Our languages became a mixture 26 Panorama of the local and the Spanish lan guage which is now the petpeeve of our linguists. The Visayan lan guage contains a lot of Spanish impurities. Many of our ways of living and thinking are charac teristically Spanish. This also goes for many of our superstitions and beliefs. This cultural anomaly was even made worse with the coming of the Americans. The Americans came to this country, not with the object of saving our people from eternal damnation, but supposedly to bring enlightenment ana demo cracy to our people. The famous Benevolent Assimilation Proclama tion of President McKinlev laid down the basic premise of Amer ican occupation, to wit: “. . . it should be the earnest wish and paramount aim of the military administration to win the confidence, respect, and affection of the inhabitants of the Philip pines : by assuring them in every possible way that full measure of individual rights and liberties which is the heritage of free peo ples . . .” This proclamation is of course only half of the truth for the other half is basically economic. ". . . hunger for markets and for opportunities to invest capital profitably . . . entered into the shaping of the Far Eastern po licy of the United States.” (Ken neth Scott Latourette: The Am erican Record in the Far East, 1945-1951, Macmillan Company, New York, 1952, p. 12) The good intentions back of the American conquest were re vealed by the fact that together with the occupation troops came the educators and legislators. The Bill of 1902 was supposed to train our national leaders in the diffi cult art of self-government. In deed the Americans were quite effective in making our people be lieve that they had an unselfish regard for the inhabitants, that thev came as "friends” and not as tyrannical and vulgar conquer ors. The effect of this trust on the Filipino psychology cannot be gainsaid. Another new culture was thus introduced to the country and the dynamics of cultural as similation began to work in a ra pid pace. In so short a time as half a century we find that many of our people are more "Ameri can” than Filipino. /□fter half a century of cultural exposure, our culture was no longer a synthesis of the so-called purely Filipino and the Spanish, but a synthesis of three forces, including now the Ameri can. Our spoken language testifies to the Spanish and American in fluences. At this point the leaders of the Filipino nationalist movement are at a loss as to which culture thev are speaking of—the Filipino cul ture before the Spaniards, or the Filipino-Spanish culture, or the Filipino-Spanish-American c u 1 - February 1960 27 ture? We could perhaps include, if we have to go further back, the Muslim and the Chinese in fluences. The Chinese influence certainly cannot be ignored in an exhaustive analysis of the so-called Filipino culture. If we should be speaking of the purelv Filipino culture, we must be thinking of the time of Lapu-Lapu or even earlier, but we cannot do so because we do not have much historical facts about this era. Our relative close ness to the Chinese and Japanese mainland suffices us to believe that even before recorded history Chinese and Japanese cultures had registered effects on the Fili pino way of life. If we have to speak of the Fili pino-Spanish culture which was relatively more advanced than the previous era, this undoubtedly is not distinctly Filipino either. In fact, if we have to be very strict with our view of culture, no cul ture is distinctively one people’s. Somehow or other, external influ ences must come in, unless we are thinking of a mythical or com pletely isolated community of men. Considering the foregoing, ad vocates of a return to our cultural heritage must therefore think twice, and determine just where we are supposed to go and which are we supposed to value. At least what is certain is that those who revere our cultural heritage are not simply interested in build ing a huge museum to house the primitive implements that sus tained the life of our people. We are not simply interested in pre serving the features of our old culture as curiosity pieces to am aze the tourists. The whole issue perhaps goes back to simple semantic distinc tion. Our culture now is not Am erican nor Spanish nor Chinese. It is a synthesis or the product of various interacting cultural forces. And if we are looking for a distinct Filipino culture, we do not have to turn to the past, mistyeyed and sentimental. A look at ourselves before an honest mirror will give us the picture of our selves, unflattering perhaps, but nevertheless of ourselves. It would perhaps take a lot of courage and integrity for us to say: “Well, this is our own. Let’s face it.”—Inquiry. ¥ ¥ ¥ “What does your husband work at? “Intervals.” ¥ 28 Panorama

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