Bryan Agliam

Study Abroad 2k14

June 30, 2014

Third Andresen/Leah Panganiban

Colonialism and Self-Identity: Because Of You I Am Me

When I got accepted to this study abroad program, I shared my excitement with family, friends, and co-workers. Unfortunately, they didn’t seem as excited as I was and rather questioned why the Philippines and not somewhere in the UK? Being born in the Philippines and leaving a piece of that identity when you were seven years old to migrate to a place called America, it questions where I was raised and what I identify more with whether I am a Filipino, Filipino-America, or an American. It has been six days on this study abroad and all that I have discovered so far is new information. From the rice terraces in Banaue, that are more than 10,000 years old, to Baguio City, which was a city demolished by American militarism in the 20th century, according to Alcantara [207]. These are some of the things that I have yet to learn about my home country. It would be shameful for me not to know anything about my home country and it would only depict the Filipino immigrants in the states who have forgotten where they come from, in negative light. As we explored these places and things we see, the topics of colonialism and self-identity come to the forefront when exploring the Philippines.

Take Baguio City for example, where it began as grassland to a popular mountain haven. As we entered the city, diversity overpopulates the area having people come all over the world to see what Baguio has to offer. In other words, the riding horses, the “selfies” [taking pictures of yourself] with indigenous costumes, or the participation zip lining at Camp John Hay, has become a socially constructed tourist attraction. However, I have learned that Americas were the ones who built Baguio but also who destroyed it. Camp John Hay was a US military base reservation created by President Theodore Roosevelt at the time. Baguio was attacked by Japan just right after Pearl Harbor happened. On December 27, 1941 Japanese flag was hoisted leading to the forty-month occupation by Japan (Alcantra 217).

With this piece of history, it explains the presence of the horses—thus used for militarism, the formation of the mountain where it was designed for targeting attacks coming from the lower end, and Camp John Hay—a place people look over when they participate in zip lining not knowing that that was a US military base. I really wonder how many Filipinos know this history about the country. The outcome would surprise in a way that we only look and learn about the things surrounding the city now and not realize how it started or why things are the way they are. This is exactly why I wanted to study in the Philippines, to learn about the history of me.

As previously stated, the topic of colonialism and self-identity has been a part of this trip in terms of how colonialism has affected my identity as a Filipino American. With colonialism, my identity as a Filipino American or even the history is subjected to suppression in our history books. According to Dr. Andresen, “Phinney’s (1989) “diffuse” identity, wherein people of color are formally educated to embrace Eurocentric cultural and historical perspectives…(67)” The reason for this study abroad is in hope to not only use it for my own self-discovery, but to educate people and dismantle this tendency of only studying Eurocentric cultures and history. As Kidlak Tahimik shared with us his artwork between battles of the wind, his purpose is to deliver knowledgeable history of Filipino identity and really go far beyond what people construct of what it is to be Filipino.  This trip continues to place me in an uncomfortable space of curiosity to really analyze and think critically of the different installations that Philippines has to offer because places like Baguio has a whole section of history that we don’t learn about. However, I continue to wonder how would colonized people form their self-identity?

Works Cited

Alcantra, Erlyn Ruth. "Looking the Other Way, The Cultural Fallout." Baguio Between Two Wars: The Creation and Destruction of a Summer Capital. Web. 30 June 2014.

Andresen, Third, Dr. "Knowledge Construction, Transformative Academic Knowledge, and Filipino American Identity and Experience." The "Other" Students: Filipino Americans, Education, and Power. Information Age, 2013. 65-85. Web. 30 June 2014.