My Response to Pepe’s “Clarifying a misconception on the definition of “‘Filipino’”

This is my response to the blog Clarifying a misconception on the definition of “Filipino” posted on August 30, 2015, by Pepe. The blog seems to be a debunking of my own blog Ang Malaking Pagkakamali ni Renato Constantino sa kanyang aklat na The Philippines: A Past Revisited, which I posted on my webpage on August 14, 2015. I will respond in English, since Pepe’s blog was written in that language. But please be sympathetic with my English, for it is not my first language and I lack mastery of it.

 

 

The Gist

 

The gist of my own blog is to point out historian Renato Constantino’s colossal blunder in his popular book The Philippines: A Past Revisited (Quezon City: Tala Publishing Services, 1975). This is what Constantino exactly exposes in the said book:

 

“There were five principal social classes in Philippine society during this period. At the top of the social pyramid were the peninsulares, Spaniards who came from Spain and who were given the choice positions in the government. Next in line were the creoles or insulares – Spaniards born in the Philippines who considered themselves sons of the country. They were the original ‘Filipinos’ (p. 124).”

 

“The first Filipinos were the Españoles-Filipinos or creoles – Spaniards born in the Philippines. They alone were called Filipinos (p. 151).”

 

The “period” Constantino speaks about was until the middle of the 19th century.

 

For Constantino, the creoles or insulares (Spaniards born in the Philippines) were the original Filipinos, the first Filipinos, and until the middle of the 19th century the only ones called Filipinos. Were this true, then the creoles or insulares were the first people to be called Filipinos.

 

Such allegation clearly rams against the records of history.

 

In the books of Spanish priests Pedro Chirino (1604), Francisco Colin (1663), Francisco Ignacio Alcina (1668), and Juan Francisco de San Antonio (1738), the natives of the Philippines were called naturales (natives), nativos (natives), indios (Easterners), and Filipinos (native-born inhabitants of the Philippines).

 

It was Chirino—in his book which he wrote beginning in 1590 and which was published in 1604—who was the first to use the term Filipino to refer to the natives of the Philippines.

 

Hence, Constantino’s allegation that the insulares were the original Filipinos, the first Filipinos, and until the middle of the 19th century the only ones called Filipinos is a fatal error.

 

 

Las Islas Filipinas

 

On his blog, Pepe says:

 

 

“To my observation, Royeca and Regalado did not tell us the complete definition of the term Filipino. Although they did share primary sources showing how the word Filipino was defined during the early years of our country’s vassalage under the Spanish monarchy, I wonder if they even bothered to ask themselves WHY the early Filipinos were called as such. I ask WHY because the name Filipino is NOT EVEN INDIGENOUS, meaning to say, the term does not come from any native language like that of the Tagálogs, the Visayans, the Aetas, etc.

 

“To further emphasize this: the term Filipino is not a Tagálog word. The term Filipino is not a Visayan word. The term Filipino is certainly not an Aeta word. And so on and so forth. The name Filipino is Spanish, thus the impossibility of the notion that the demonym used for the indios (as the indigenous were generally referred to at that time) had some natural or indigenous etymological imprint whatsoever. Due to this, Royeca and Regalado must now categorically point out WHY Fr. Chirino called the natives as Filipinos. Certainly, there must be a reason why the good friar called them as such.”

 

The Spaniards called the natives Filipinos because they were the native inhabitants of las Islas Filipinas—the official name that the Spaniards had given to the archipelago. Since las Islas Filipinas was already the name of the archipelago, it was only natural for the Spaniards to call its natives Filipinos.

 

That the term Filipino is not indigenous is very obvious because it came from the Spanish name of the archipelago—las Islas Filipinas. Its being very obvious instantly renders useless any effort of pointing out that it is not a Tagalog, Visayan, or any other native word.

 

 

Natives: “We are Filipinos!”

 

On his blog, Pepe challenges:

 

“And, to reiterate, while both of them successfully pointed out that Fr. Chirino called Tagálogs, Visayans, Aetas, etc. as Filipinos, can they also point out any indigenous individual who called himself a Filipino during the Spanish times?”

 

Jose Rizal and his fellow natives of the Philippines called themselves Filipinos while living and studying in Spain and other countries in Europe. They were the first generation of natives of the Philippines who called themselves Filipinos. In a letter to his Austrian friend Ferdinand Blumentritt dated April 13, 1887, Rizal said:

 

“They are creole young men of Spanish descent, Chinese half-breeds, and Malayans; but we call ourselves only Filipinos” (The Rizal-Blumentritt Correspondence. Centennial Edition, Part 1, Manila: Jose Rizal National Centennial Commission, 1961, p. 72).

 

 

Insulares

 

On his blog, Pepe charges:

 

“In addition, Both Royeca and Regalado are also proven wrong when they implied, wittingly or unwittingly, that the insulares or Spaniards born in the islands were not called Filipinos at any time in our history.”

 

I have not indirectly or directly made it appear that the insulares were never called Filipinos. I was disputing Constantino’s claim that the insulares were the first, the original, and until the 1850’s the only ones called Filipinos.

 

 

Peninsulares: The First Filipinos?

 

In blatantly claiming on his blog that the peninsulares were the first Filipinos, Pepe relied entirely on a poem written by an insular, Luis Rodríguez Varela of Tondo, Manila, in 1812.

 

Varela’s edict that the first Filipinos were the vassals of Spain is frighteningly incorrect. He must not have read the accounts of Spanish missionaries, which categorically proved that the natives of the Philippines were the first people to be called Filipinos.

 

Poems belong to the ambit of creative literature. They can be purely fictional. And so utilizing them as a source for one bold historical claim—like the peninsulares were the original Filipinos—is an amateurish and slapdash crack at historiography.

 

I have a little more to say about this matter on my other blog, The Term Filipino: A Question of Identity.

The Term Filipino: A Question of Identity

The term Filipino was first used in the 1590’s, and the first time it was used it referred to the Tagalogs, Visayans, Aetas, and other natives of the Philippines. Thus, it is safe to state that the natives of the Philippines themselves, being the first people to be called Filipinos, were the first Filipinos and the original Filipinos.

The first usage of the term can be found in the book Relación de las Islas Filipinas, which the Spanish Jesuit missionary Fr. Pedro Chirino wrote beginning in 1590 and which was published in Rome, Italy, in 1604.

The other books that also used the term to refer to the natives of the Philippines were Labor Evangelica (Madrid, 1663) by Fr. Francisco Colin; Historia de las islas e indios de Bisayas … 1668 (Samar, 1668) by Fr. Ignacio Francisco Alcina; and Descripción de las islas Philipinas (Manila, 1738) by Fr. Juan Francisco de San Antonio. The missionaries also called, aside from Filipino,  the natives naturales (natives), nativos (natives), and indios (Easterners). Those terms became the unifying identities of the natives.

However, since the Spaniards were bigots, most of them preferred the term indio to refer to the natives during their rule of the Philippines (1565-1898). They used it to demean the natives by giving it bad connotations like “monkeys,” “uneducated,” and “undeserving of civilization.”

A Question of Identity

The manner of using the term Filipino to refer to the natives of the Philippines is similar to the manner of giving a new-born baby his name.

When a baby is born, his parents give him a name; for example, Mark. Although the baby is not yet conscious that his name is Mark and that he is thus called, that name is already his identity. It would be senseless to assert that because the baby is not yet aware of his name, his name is not yet his identity and that his name will only become his identity once he becomes aware that it is indeed his name.

Only the brainless will say: “This baby is named Mark, but his name is not yet his identity because being a baby, he is not yet aware of his name.”

When the Spaniards called the natives of the Philippines Filipinos during the early decades of their rule, the term Filipinos became one of the identities of the natives, even if the natives were not yet aware that they were already called thus and that it was already one of their new collective names as one people.

The Baby Has Grown: “We are Filipinos!”

In the 1880’s, Jose Rizal and his fellow natives of the Philippines living and studying in Spain and other countries in Europe called themselves Filipinos. In a letter to his Austrian friend Ferdinand Blumentritt dated April 13, 1887, Rizal said:

“They are creole young men of Spanish descent, Chinese half-breeds, and Malayans; but we call ourselves only Filipinos” (The Rizal-Blumentritt Correspondence. Centennial Edition, Part 1, Manila: Jose Rizal National Centennial Commission, 1961, p. 72).

Being the first generation of enlightened Filipinos, Rizal and his fellow natives of the Philippines staying in Europe felt that they needed a common identity to refer to themselves; thus, they called themselves Filipinos. The term evidently meant “natives of the Philippines.” They were the first natives of the Philippines to call themselves thus.

It was only in the 1880’s that the natives had become conscious that the term Filipinos was their common identity and that they should call themselves thus.

The baby had grown and finally become aware of his identity.

An Outlandish Language

When the Spanish colonial officials called the archipelago las Islas Filipinas, that designation became the name of the archipelago. If someone will claim that “the Spaniards already called the archipelago las Islas Filipinas, but it was not yet the name of the archipelago,” then he is banging his head against a thick, concrete wall.

One would be speaking a nebulous language, if he stubbornly insists on erecting the following inutile claims:

“The natives were already called Filipinos, but they were not yet called Filipinos.”

“The natives were already called Filipinos in the early decades of Spanish rule, but they must only be called Filipinos beginning in the 1880’s—when they finally became conscious that their identity was Filipinos.”