CHAPTER FIVE THE HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE TAGALOG CHALLENGE TO ENGLISH One of the most inspiring stories in Philippine history is the story of the “seditious plays” of the first decade of the 20th century Following in the heels of the American military occupation was the imposition of a strictly enforced censorship against any utterance against the American government and any expression of independence As the press was rigidly monitored, brave Tagalog writers who wanted to express their desire for independence turned to the theater Using the Tagalog zarzuela form, a drama that included singing, the playwrights wrote allegorical stories, intentionally made with a thin plot so as to pass the American censors and so as to encourage adlibbing Vibrant sets, music, clandestine attempts to show the Philippine flag315 , thinly-veiled characters meant to represent the Filipino motherland or the oppressive American government, adlibbed, emotional speeches about the oppression by America of the Filipino, emotionally involved audiences: all these make the rise of “seditious plays” one of the most colorful moments in Philippine history Add to this the way in which riots broke out in many of the performances or the sensational way in which playwrights, actors, stage hands, theater managers and sometimes even the members of the audience would be hauled off to jail in the middle of the performance and you have an example of when the production of the drama becomes even more dramatic than the drama itself Hindi Aco Patay (I Am Not Dead) by Juan Matapang Cruz caused a riot during its performance of May 8, 1903 because American soldiers attempted to stop the performance after the flag of the Katipunan was raised Ten actors and the playwright were arrested later.316 Also 315 Though the Flag Law became an official law only in 1907, the display of the Philippine flag was considered an act of disloyalty to the United States The studies of the seditious plays recount how the display of a flag during a performance would spark either an arrest or a riot In one of her lectures during my university days, theater scholar Doreen Fernandez talked about how the performers would come up with inventive ways to display but the also quickly dismantle the flag It would be used as a woman’s kerchief which could easily be flashed and then withdrawn throughout the performance or it could be “assembled” by two women standing side by side with the designs of their long skirts containing the two halves of the flag 316 Tomas Capatan Hernandez, The Emergence of Modern Drama in the Philippines (1898-1912), Philippine Studies Working Paper, (Honolulu: Asian Studies Program, University of Hawaii, 1976), 113 115 in 1903, Juan Abad, author of Tanikalang Guinto (Golden Chain), was arrested during the performance of the play 317 The most famous of the seditious plays is Kahapon, Ngayon at Bukas, (Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow) which caused a riot during its initial performance on May 14, 1903 and caused its author (who also acted in the play), Aurelio Tolentino, to be sentenced to life in prison The description of the reaction of the audience of Kahapon, Ngayon at Bukas points to the deeply felt sentiments Filipinos had against the Americans and for independence: The audience on the night of May 14 was receptive and responsive They cheered the enumeration of revolutionary martyrs’ names (not in the script, but they could have easily been inserted during one of the many eulogies delivered in the play) They applauded whenever Tolentino and ‘the woman accompanying him’ spoke, and they kept silent or hissed every time the actors playing America and the American government delivered their pieces In the course of the performance, they frequently called for Tolentino, who stepped out of character to take a bow of acknowledgement ‘The audience displayed its greatest pleasure during that part of the play which showed the Filipino people up in arms against the Government.’318 These three plays and many others like it have achieved an iconic status and are very welldocumented in Philippine history319, Philippine literary history320, and even Philippine novels321 The plays themselves continue to be produced by many of the major Philippine theater companies.322 Along with the long-haired revolutionary leader, Macario Sakay, these seditious plays have become the great symbols of Filipino tenacity, courage and creativity during the first ten years of the oppressive American occupation This is a recent phenomenon, however, brought about by efforts of recent “nationalist” historians to shed light on the resistance to America Reynaldo Ileto, in discussing history up until the time he wrote Pasyon and Revolution says: “Even today, the period from 1902 to 1910 is very 317 Ibid, 117 Ibid, 131 Hernandez recounts the riot based on newspaper articles of the time 319 See Teodoro A Agoncillo and Milagros C Guerrero, History of the Filipino People, 290-291 320 See, for example Bienvenido Lumbera, Revaluation: Essays on Philippine Literature, Cinema and Popular Culture, (n.p.: Index Press, 1984), 36-43; 125-126 321 One such seditious play is the setting in which the main character of Nick Joaquin’s novel, The Woman Who Had Two Navels, meets her first husband 322 Kahapon, Ngayon at Bukas was produced by Tanghalang Ateneo in 1999 and Tanikalang Guinto was produced by Dulaang UP in 2002 318 116 little understood and, in some respects, clouded in secrecy.”323 The historical figure of Macario Sakay, in particular, has recently enjoyed not just a renaissance but a popularity even to the point of commodification His image is reproduced on t-shirts and the posed photo of Sakay and his generals taken shortly before their surrender has been spoofed on posters Without a doubt, the “nationalist” historians have done much to highlight Filipino resistance to American occupation In the 1960s and 1970s and in reaction to decades of American-sanctioned knowledge production, the humanties and the social sciences focused their attention on recovering knowledge from the margins Historians were now investigating figues like Sakay who had been part of a comprehensive movement of resistance against the Americans and who had been previously demonized Scholars and critics produced new knowledge that reinvested local literature and culture, that had been previously branded as inferior, with a new respect and inderstanding And yet many, many events of the early years of American occupation are still not known and not easily comprehended One such neglected topic of this period is the topic of this chapter The Tagalog essays on the Tagalog language published in the daily Muling Pagsilang from 19031908 were the first printed articulations of opposition to the English language policy Yet, these essays are hardly mentioned even in historical accounts of language The First Articulations Against the English Policy It is a bit of a mystery how Lope K Santos, known as the Ama ng Balarila (Father of Philippine Grammar) does not mention in his autobiography the work he did for the Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog (Convocation of the Tagalog Language), of which he was clearly the moving sprit Neither are the Kapulungan’s early (1903 and 1904) essays on Tagalog published in Muling Pagsilang mentioned The reasons for this are varied One possible reason is that the Samahan ng mga Mananagalog (Organization of Tagalog users), which evolved from the Kapulungan after 1904, was a bigger and more active and thus more easily remembered Also, much of Santos’s 323 Reynaldo Clemeña Ileto, Pasyon and Revolution: Popular Movements in the Philippines, 18401910 (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1979) 172 117 later work on Filipino, the national language (such as the first official grammar book to be used in all schools) were institutionalized on a national level and thus entered the realm of the material that historians are compelled to include in their national histories The writer of the autobiography might, understandably, focus on this official nationalism of which his is a very distinguished part Finally, Santos himself was a bit of a renaissance man who was a journalist, linguist, novelist and poet, labor leader and politician (he was a senator from 1910-1913 and Governor of Nueva Ecija from 11918-1920) The diversity and intensity of his life, a testimony to how, during his time, language and culture issues were indistinguishable from material and political issues, was probably itself the reason why the story of these essays written over just a few months gets left out Santos does recount his days as Muling Pagsilang editor The focus of his narrative, however, is, again understandably, on the reputation of the Muling Pagsilang and its Spanish counterpart, El Renacimiento, as great anti-American newspapers and on the very famous libel case that eventually brought about the papers’ demise The case, described by writer Loreto Paras-Sulit as “one of the most fiercely contested libel suits of the age,”324 caused an upheaval and polarized nationalists and supporters of America.325 Commissioner Dean Worcester brought the charges (Santos was initially included in the charge) as he (Worcester) felt an editorial piece, which appeared in El Renacimiento, “Aves de Rapina”326 (Birds of Prey), alluded to him and was an insult to his honor and dignity Both the criminal and the civil cases were lost by El Renacimiento/Muling Pagsilang and the newspapers were forced to close down and were sold at public auction in January of 1910 The libel suit, a symbol of America’s severe oppression and disregard for human rights, is an incident that is now studied by all students of Philippine history and “Aves de Rapina,” made their required reading 324 Loreto Paras-Sulit, “Birds of Prey: A Document of Human Rights,” in The El Renacimiento Libel Suit, ed Teodoro M Kalaw (Manila: n.p., 1950), 39 325 Pura Villanueva Kalaw, wife of Teodoro M Kalaw, editor of El Renacimiento at the time and one of two who were eventually tried and found guilty (the other being martin Ocampo, the periodicals founder and owner) described the event as having a “passion reminiscent of the political trial of Dreyfus, during which the French nation demonstrated the capacity for hate and generosity in its great heart” and through which “the Filipino nation suffered.” Quoted in Teodoro M Kalaw’s autobiography Aide-de-Camp to Freedom (translated from the Spanish by Maria Kalaw Katigbak), page 79 326 published in El Renacimiento in 1908 118 Though the libel incident overshadows much other knowledge about El Renacimento/Muling Pagsilang, it does serve as a good introduction to understanding the suppression placed by the Americans on the expression of national sentiment during the first decade of the twentieth century In the early days of occupation, when there was as yet no organized nationalist party, El Renacimiento/Muling Pagsilang and the Cebu-based El Nuevo Dia “acted as vehicles of nationalist views, tempered by the circumstances of the time, the Sedition Law and the censorship of the press.”327 The founders, editors and writers of both El Renacimiento/Muling Pagsilang and El Nuevo Dia were active during the revolution of just a few years before It is therefore not surprising that these newspapers “’embodied the ideals of the Revolution in all their purity.’”328 The authors of these papers were therefore fearless in their attack and criticism of American policy However, maybe as a concession to the censorship laws, the authors sometimes tempered their discussion of issues In its engaement of the language issue, Muling Pagsilang was both bold and moderate, almost always, however, pro-Tagalog The essays in Muling Pagsilang about language were of two kinds The first were the published output written by the members of the Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog (Convocation of the Tagalog Language) which was convened in June of 1903 and the second were a good number of opinion pieces, many of which were writen under pseudonyms The essays published under the Kapulungan were lengthy pieces that were serialized, the pages of which were not published in proper sequence because they were meant for cutting out and folding into little pamphlets The essays of the Kapulungan present a range of opinions and expertise; some express a keener interest in the relation of language to society while others are concerned with the technicalities of linguistics (creation of an alphabet, spelling, etc.) The opinion articles are shorter, less linguistically technical, and express stronger political opinions The signed pieces are written by relatively well-known Tagalog writers They include: Santos himself, playwrights Patricio Mariano and Severino Reyes, grammarians Sefronio G Calderon and Eusebio Daluz, and novelists Faustino Aguilar and Valeriano Hernandez Peña (who 327 Maximo M Kalaw, The Development of Philippine Politics, 1872-1920, (Manila: Oriental Commercial Co, Inc., 1926), 284 328 Ibid, 283, (quoting Jaime de Veyra) 119 wrote the first Tagalog novel, Nena at Neneng) The unsigned pieces were probably written by Lope K Santos, Faustino Aguilar, Valeriano Hernandez Peña, and Patricio Mariano, members of the Kapulungan who were also part of the editorial staff of Muling Pagsilang Given that these essays were written by well-known literary figures, that they were published in a relatively accessible forum329, and that they were the first articulations against the English policy, and therefore of great historical importance, it is a mystery that they have figured little in the our linguistic histories There are several possible causes for this grave oversight However, the most obvious one is the general attitude of disregard for articulations made in local languages, especially if the study is done in English This attitude is evident for example even in the assessment sometimes made of Muling Pagsilang For example, in The History of Journalism in the Philippine Islands, much is made of the historical importance of El Renacimiento but no mention is made of Muling Pagsilang This book has a short section that discusses “the vernacular press” and describes it as “not usually reckoned with in questions of greatest national magnitude” even while it acknowledges that “the circulation of most of them is greater than that of newspapers in either English or Spanish.”330 As this section on the vernacular press is part of a description of the newspapers that were current during the time the study was made, Muling Pagsilang (which had closed down with El Renacimiento more than twenty-five years after this study was published) is never once mentioned Though this particular study of Philippine journalism was done in 1933, it carries with it an attitude about writing in local languages that persists to today This same kind of linguistic discrimination—where articulations in English are given more importance than those in the vernacular—exists in literature as well Philippine literature in English stands high above 329 The newspaper in which these essays were published, Muling Pagsilang, and its Spanish counterpart, El Renacimiento, are widely acknowledged as the most vocal and most consistent critic of the American colonial government The two newspapers were twice involved in legal sedition charges brought by the American government The first one involved 1906 reports in Muling Pagsilang about abusive practices of the constabulary in Batangas and Cavite The second, more famous case was brought by Dean Worcester against El Renacimiento for its “Aves de Rapina” (Birds of Prey) editorial El Renacimiento and Muling Pagsilang were forced to close down in 1912 because of the loss of this case The “Aves de Rapina” is like Emile Zola’s “J’accuse!” in that they are both journalistic opinion pieces that played important roles in history The text of “Aves de Rapina” is often reproduced in history textbooks and essay anthologies 330 Jesus Z Valenzuela History of Journalism in the Philippine Islands, (Manila: Jesus Z Valenzuela, 1933), 160-161 120 literatures in the vernaculars in terms of the number of literary awards and in greater publication venues as well as in its position in the educational system 331 Thus, it is probably with some sort of blinders that linguistic historians tend to construct their histories; focusing more on the campaigns carried out in English Ommisions and Misnomers The first important linguistic history of the Philippines, Ernest J Frei’s The Historical Development of the Philippine National Language takes the general view that the Filipinos happily and widely accepted English Frei’s discussion of the Filipino reaction to the language policy focuses on the likes of Camilo Osias and Isidro Panlasigui who zealously defended English The interest in the vernacular languages are discussed from the perspective of American linguists such as Frank Blake and David Doherty and thus Lope K Santos and his “Academy of Philippine Lingustics,”332 of 1903 is mentioned only as a result of the discussion of Doherty’s fusionist view of language This attitude is repeated in Andrew Gonzalez’s Language and Nationalism, which devotes a mere paragraph to the subject of Santos and the Kapulungan The full text of that paragraph reads: Doherty persuaded Lope K Santos, already an established novelist, poet, and journalist at the time, during this same year to call editors and writers to a conference to make an attempt to ‘fuse these dialects into a uniform or common one.’ Thus, in 1904, Santos founded the Kapulungan ng Wika (Conference on Language), although, subsequently, Santos dropped the fusionist proposal in favor of Tagalog and became president of the Samahan ng Mananagalog (Association of Tagalog Users) in 1908 and in 1911 became the president of the Academia de Tagalistas (Academy of Tagalog Scholars) and subsequently vicepresident of the Kapulungang Balagtas (Association of Balagtas Followers), a decidedly pro-Tagalog association.333 331 The CCP Encyclopedia of Art defines Philippine literature in English as constituting “in the overall literary landscape, a larger stream than that written in Spanish, a much smaller stream than that written in the vernacular languages like Tagalog, Cebuano, Ilongo, Ilocano, Waray, Pampango, Pangasinan, Bicol, but certainly the most visible one because of its exposure in the educational system and its accessibility through publications.” 332 The organization formed by Lope K Santos in 1903 was the Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog, which can be translated as the Convocation or Meeting for the Tagalog Language, since “pulong” from “kapulungan” means meeting Frei’s mistranslation that removes the word “Tagalog” from the name is significant and will be discussed below 333 Andrew B Gonzalez, Language and Nationalism: The Philippine Experience Thus Far, (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1980), 36-37 121 The name of the organization founded in 1903 (and not 1904 as Gonzalez claims) is not the “Kapulungan ng Wika” but the “Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog.” This exclusion of the word “Tagalog” makes a world of a difference when reconstructing the origin of linguistic nationalism Whereas the misnomer makes it appear that the organization was interested in languages in general, its actual name shows it was committed to Tagalog at the very outset In the context of the colonial situation where the Americans instituted an overwhelming and unrelenting English campaign and American colonial officials were predicting the disappearance of local languages, the existence of such an organization in 1903, was vitally important as it points to an active stance of upholding and promoting Tagalog The misnomer also wrongly hints at the fusionist views of Santos and of the Kapulungan Gonzales also gets the date for the establishment of the Samahan ng mga Mananagalog wrong Gonzales claims it was founded in 1908, however, Faustino Aguilar, in 1904, mentions preparations for the establishment of the Samahan not in the context of abandoning fusionist views but as a way of widening the scope of what the Kapulungan had accomplished In 1906, Muling Pagsilang published a list of active members of the Samahan The list had fifty-three names All this is important because, as the suceeding chapter will argue, nationalist articulations, linguistic or otherwise, made before 1907 (the establishment of the Philippine Assembly; the lifting of the ban on political parties that call for independence) were disitict from those made after when bans on expressions of nationalist sentiments and aspirations for independence were lifted Gonzalez does not mention this body of essays (about thirty in all) published by Muling Pagsilang Their exclusion leads him to attribute the first proposal to make Tagalog the basis of the national language to Eusebio Daluz in 1915.334 The idea of Tagalog as the national language was of course an idea that had much currency during the Philippine revolution Even Gonzalez 334 Gonzalez, Language and Nationalism, 42 The attribution reads: “The proposal to make Tagalog the basis of the national language dates back to as early as 1915 and is found in the literature, for the first time, in Daluz’s Filipino-English Vocabulary.” The first openly signed (versus signed with a pseudonym) document explicitly calling for a Pilipino language based on Tagalog that I found was P.L Stangl’s “Ang Wikang Pilipino, Isang Wikang Isasalig sa Tagalog,” Muling Pagsilang, April 3, 1907, The idea of a “Wikang Pilipino” is mentioned even earlier in pseudonymed essays 122 notes this in his chapter on the Spanish period The exclusion, however of the Muling Pagsilang essays creates a gap of almost twenty years It is a period that, as the subsequent section will show, was actually rife with articulations about Tagalog and its central position in the Philippine nation The Origins of the Idea of Tagalog as the National Language The search for exactly who first proposed Tagalog as the basis of the national language during the American period is actually a complex and knotty enterprise In terms of the context of their movement, if not in terms of the actual first identifiable statement to that effect, the honor should rightfully go to the Kapulungan, if not to Lope K Santos himself While writing for the Kapulungan, Santos was very careful never to suggest that Tagalog alone should be the basis of the national language When he did mention the idea of a national language, it was always in the context language fusion This is seen in the following quote which is one of the first, if not the first proposal during the American period for a national language It is taken from his 1903 essay entitled “Isang Wikang Filipino” published in El Renacimiento (it was only in 1904 that the Tagalog version of El Renacimiento was given its own name, Muling Pagsilang): sapagkat yayamang iisa na rin lamang ang tawag sa atin, FILIPINO; iisa ang ating bayan, FILIPINAS, at malinaw na iisa rin ang pinakaina ng tanang wikang iyan, ang MALAYO, ayon sa mga pantas na Manunri (?), ay dapat na ring maging isa na lamang ang pairaling Wika, ang pinaglakpan baga ng lahat, WIKANG 335 FILIPINO [Lopez’s capitalization] …because we are given just one name FILIPINO; we have one nation FILIPINAS, and it is clear that the origin of all our languages is one, MALAY, according to the learned ones, there should just be one language that should be promoted, the joining together of all, the FILIPINO LANGUAGE Santos’s call for language fusion should, however, be seen in the context of the whole project of the Kapulungan, or, in this case, even within the context of his essay Language fusion is not the subject matter of this essay; it is the Tagalog language Apart from two brief references to fusion (this one quoted and one more at the close of the essay), the whole essay, all thirty pages of it, is about Tagalog and the need to modernize it 335 Lope K Santos, “Isang Wikang Filipino,” El Renacimiento, (serialized) September 7-16, 1903 This particular quote appeared in the September issue 123 Many of the subsequent essays published by the Kapulungan between 1903 and 1904 diplomatically avoid making definitive statements about the national language but certainly suggest it by the very topics they took on The essays clearly indicate the Kapulungan was interested in strengthening Tagalog for its possible future role as national language For example, Francisco Makabulos’s essay for the Kapulungan was entitled, “Ang Wikang Tagalog sa mga Lupang Kapampangan,” 336 (“The Tagalog Language in the Land of the Kapampangans.”) In this essay, he reaffirms the objectives of the Kapulungan of purifying the Tagalog language in order to meet the objective of the unity and strengthening of the mother nation It also describes how Tagalog is already accepted and widely used in the Kapampangan region as a medium of communication with people from other regions Eusebio Daluz’s essay is about the best way to teach Tagalog to other Filipinos.337 In this essay, Daluz recalls Jose Rizal and his call for us to study the Tagalog language This is important, Daluz tells us, because through the knowledge of our own language, we will achieve knowledge, freedom, and unity If the authors who wrote under the Kapulungan were hesitant about suggesting that Tagalog should be the basis of the national language, the authors who wrote for Muling Pagsilang (but not under the name of the Kapulungan) were not These authors, however, all wrote under symbolic pseudonyms.338 This suggests that, given the context of the time, the authors and maybe the editors of Muling Pagsilang felt that merely writing about strengthening and modernizing Tagalog was a relatively harmless activity but suggesting that it should be the basis of a national language was not Among several of these essays, Tagalog, in no uncertain terms, is offered as the national language One essay calls for Filipinos to: 336 See for example Francisco Makabulos, “Ang Wikang Tagalog sa mga Lupang Kapampangan,” El Renacimiento, December 17, 1903 337 Eusebio Daluz, “Alin ang Lalong Magaling na Paraan sa Pagtuturo ng Wikang Tagalog, Upang Matutuhang Madali at Pag-aralan di Lamang ng mga Tagalog Kundi ng mga Iba Pang Kapatid ng Lahi?,” Muling Pagsilang, March and 2, 1904 338 The pseudonyms themselves are beautifully symbolic Anak-Bayan means “child of the nation,” Taga-Danaw means “observer,” Isang Guro means “a teacher.” Apo ni Kapampangan means “grandchild of someone from the region of Pampanga” and indicates that even non-Tagalogs are open to the idea of Tagalog as the national language My favorite pseudonym, Mapaninta (from the root word sinta which means “beloved”) suggests the author’s deep love and commitment to Tagalog 124 The acknowledgement of the role of the revolution in establishing the idea of a single nation and the idea of Tagalog as the language that binds the nation is important (the reasons of which are listed in the succeeding paragraphs) It signifies a continuity between the goals and aspirations of the revolution and the objectives of the Muling Pagsilang authors This connection points to another connection between these early struggles for linguistic-self determination and the eventual “triumph,” altered and adulterated as it may have been, of the establishment of a national language It also establishes the strong awareness of those who would agitate against colonialism of the importance of agitating against cultural and linguistic imposition and the importance of the defense and protection of one’s own language and culture The Erasure of the Tagalog Campaign Andrew Gonzales’s misassignment of the first proposal to make Tagalog the basis of the national language to a later date has serious implications on how we understand the anti-colonial struggle Though, at first blush, it seems a harmless mistake to suggest the proposal was made ten or twelve years later than it actually was, it is in fact serious By 1915, the strong, anti-American resistance and the popularly supported guerilla movement of twelve years before had almost completely dissipated The ban on political parties advocating independence had long been lifted and in fact the Nationalistas (who openly campaigned for independence) had won an astounding victory over the Federalistas (who called for statehood) five years before This was just a year before the passing of the Jones law, which guaranteed independence Expressing nationalist fervor was no longer dangerous, in fact it was, by this time, quite banal What this twelve year misassigned lag accomplishes to (apart from the obvious erasures) is to cut out from history a bold and almost prophetic vision that is strongly connected to the past when Tagalog was the unquestionable language of the revolution and of the imminent nation.349 Though the essays in Muling Pagsilang hardly reference the revolution (as censorship 349 The only official statement of explicitly assigning Tagalog as the national language was made in the Biac-na-Bato constitution, a constitution drawn up in 1897 Article VII reads: “Tagalog shall be the official language of the Republic.” The full transcript of the constitution is found in Maximo M Kalaw, The Development of Philippine Politics, 1872-1920, (Manila: Oriental Commercial Co., 1926), 418-422 127 at the time was stringent), these essays, when taken in the context of the authors’ participation in the revolution and in the context of their other anti-colonial agitations at the time, are the irrefutable evidence of the longevity and continuity of the cultural and linguistic ideals of the revolution This exclusion dilutes knowledge about the extent and variety of campaigns of the early anti-American struggle It reaffirms the picture of the struggle being mostly an armed, mass-based, peasant, superstitious, untutored, and hinterland struggle Finally, it deliquesces the very strong and steadfast centrality of the Tagalog language to the Tagalog people What did language mean for the Tagalogs? The period between 1903 and 1908 was a dangerous time for those who would insist on asserting their own identity These essays are evidence that the Tagalogs would die for language as much as for land Both the cause and effect of this exclusion is a kind of facile focus on discussions of the language issue carried out in English Gonzalez, himself, devotes a mere three pages to the “Vernaculars and Vernacular Literature”350 against roughly twenty-four pages given to the campaign from 1915 to the 1935, most of which is focused on positions made by colonial officials who supported a local language campaign and the likes of Eulogio Rodriguez, Maximo Kalaw, and Jorge Bocobo who carried out their campaigns in English These campaigns and their difference from the earlier ones carried out in Tagalog will be discussed in the Chapter Seven The time within which these Muling Pagsilang essays were written had a bearing of their present exclusion from linguistic history Both the attitudes and the objectives of colonial scholarship set these essays out on the road to deletion.351 American colonial scholarship of the period was obviously interested in silencing the American acts of suppression and in underscoring their acceptance by the occupied people “Official history,” Renato Constantino tells us, “influenced by colonial scholarship, has presented the struggle against the Americans as a short one It has honored the collaborators and all but 350 Gonzalez, Language and Nationalism, 32-34 Ironically, one attitude of colonial scholarship, obsessive archival collection, also saved them The only existing copies of El Renacimiento and Muling Pagsilang are in the American Library of Congress The microfilm copies in the Philippine National Library are from the Library of Congress 351 128 ignored the resistance of the people.”352 The bequeathing of colonial attitudes through historical accounts is evident in Gonzalez’s treatment of the apparent early proposal to fuse the languages One other way in which these essays were marginalized in current history was through their being ignored by the colonial officials of that time As discussed in the previous chapter, the American education officials saw Spanish rather than the local languages as the serious threat to English The Ninth Annual Report of the Director of Education contains a section called “Spanish Versus English”353 while the annual report of the previous year contains a long discussion about the threat of Spanish to English354 and the non-threat of “native dialects” because their fate was to be one of annihilation as “the Philippine languages will disappear from use.”355 These essays were consigned to future obscurity by the very fact that they were ignored by the American officials themselves during the time they were written There were no debates about language simply because the American colonial officials refused to engage in the debate During the 1920s, unlike this time, there were open, published, and engaged debates involving Filipinos arguing for a national language or that local languages be used as the medium of instruction and Americans insisting on English The debates included the odd American official who supported local languages and the odd Philippine official who supported English By contrast, the articulations about language during the first decade of the century were opposed to each other but also isolated from each other The situation would be parallel to how official or “accepted” history ignore or belittle groups who subscribe to conspiracy theories, such as, for example, the group that insists that the lunar landing of 1969 was a hoax Official history would not deign to engage such discourse and thus such discourses are, in the more distant future, more likely to be marginalized or erased Such was the fate of the Muling Pagsilang essays During the first decade of the century, the dominant American attitude toward the local languages was one of a combination of derision and pity (for its “primitive state”) Justifying the choice of 352 Renato Constantino, The Philippines: A Past Revisited, 246 Philippines, Ninth Annual Report of the Director of Education of the Philippine Islands, (Manila: Bureau of Printing, 1909), 204 354 Philippines, Eighth Annual Report of the Director of Education of the Philippine Islands, (Manila: Bureau of Printing, 1908), 94 355 Ibid, 99 353 129 English as the choice of the medium of instruction because “there were no books in any one of them [the local languages],” the Bureau of Insular Affairs concluded that had Filipinos succeeded in learning to read their local languages they would have “found only a barren waste land before them and very readily fall[en] back into the mental darkness of the semisavage state.”356 It was thus impossible for American colonial officials to conceive of engaging local linguists who were articulating their ideas in the semisavage language their calls for making the semisavage language the medium of communication in this modern society they were trying darnest to set up Finally, one of the possible causes for the neglect of these essays is likely the effect of making a faulty connection between the anti-American and guerilla independence movements and anything related to El Renacimiento and Muling Pagsilang The radical reputation of Muling Pagsilang leads readers and scholars to think that the essays themselves were radical and rejected anything and everything that was imposed by the Americans As the discussion below will show, these essays actually expressed a range of positions: most were easily identifiable as nationalist (the category itself has to be nuanced), but some others were pro-Tagalog language but antiTagalog tradition, some were conditional and some were openly pro-English The easy association between these essays and independence movements might cause them to be seen as “nativist,” a category that is anathema to contemporary scholarship that puts a premium on hybridity If this speculative correlation is true, then it is a severe and erroneous conclusion Nativism, or the call to the return to old indigenous categories, meanings and practices is not a position expressed by any one of the essays Nativism and the Fusionist Detour These Muling Pagsilang essays and the idea that Tagalog was, from the outset, already functioning as a national language were marginalized (and continue to be so) through the iteration of the ideas that the authors of the Muling Pagsilang essays were either nativists or experimenters The link between El Rencimiento and a nativist tendency is suggested in Resil 356 Unites States, Bureau of Insular Affairs, Description of the Philippines, (Manila: Bureau of Printing, 1903), 227 130 Mojares’s campaign to rescue Trinidad Pardo de Tavera from the “nationalist constructions of the nation’s birth [where] he is usually cast in a villain’s role.”357 Pardo de Tavera is most known as the leader of the Federalista Party that campaigned for the Philippines to be granted U.S statehood Mojares’s project is centered on arguing that Pardo de Tavera was not a collaborator but instead was “against nativism”358 and was completely committed to modernization and to “’extricat[ing] ourselves from the limited circle in which reason and mind have been confined.’”359 The validity of this argument rests on the existence of the anachronistic foil of Pardo de Tavera, the nativist But who are these nativist thinkers? Mojares is very careful not to mention a single name but he does suggest who, in his view, they might be In contrast to Pardo de Tavera’s ideas that “were not generated in a vacuum,”360 Mojares mentions the Catholic Church which “criticized the secularization of education”361 and (unnamed) “Literary writers [who] opposed the promotion of English and turned toward “native tradition” as a medium of nationalism and defense against Americanization.”362 In the very next paragraph, Mojares even suggests the source of this nativism as being El Renacimiento: The question of how the nation should position itself vis-à-vis American rule was the subject of a running debate between the “pro-independence” El Renacimiento and Pardo’s La Democracia in which the americanistas were attacked as “renegades’ and “opportunists” and the nacionalistas were called “dreamers” and “foolish theorists.”363 Once the nativist strawman is set up, it becomes quite easy to argue that Pardo de Tavera was also a committed nationalist, the only difference being that he was “less ‘sentimental’ about the past [and] sought to hurry the nation into the future.”364 357 Resil Mojares, Brains of the Nation: Pedro Paterno, T.H Pardo de Tavera, Isabelo de los Reyes and the Production of Modern Knowledge, (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2006), 121 358 Ibid, 221 359 Ibid, 218, quoting Pardo de Tavera 360 Ibid, 220 361 Ibid 362 Ibid 363 Ibid, 221 One is inclined to conclude that Mojares is referring to Teodoro M Kalaw who was a central figure of El Renacimiento and was Pardo de Tavera’s adversary in “The Filipino Soul” debates (discussed in chapter six) However, as Mojares, in the following page, argues that “Kalaw was not a nativist,” it might be justifiable to conclude he had Lope K Santos and his ilk in mind when he imagined the nativist nemesis 364 Ibid, 223 131 Affixing a nativist label to the nationalism of the early anti-American movements is a great disservice to them and to scholarship in general The Muling Pagsilang essays on language make up a harmonious, though sometimes slightly incongruous, blend of perspectives The perspectives advocate a forward-looking modernization, a preservation of tradition and culture, an openness to change They manifest heart-felt sentiment alongside an astonishingly sophisticated understanding of how power works and a profound understanding, both rational and visceral, of the relation of language to history and culture What is most striking and admirable about these essays is how they brim with a courage to fight and struggle for the Tagalog language and culture and, though unsure yet at the moment of their writing of the relation of “Tagalog” to the Philippine nation, they are astounding too for how they brim with a confidence in and commitment to the concept of the Filipino nation An example of how knowledge production during the colonial era transmogrifying into contemporary “objective” data is seen in the so-called “fusionist” idea for a national language, the idea that the many local Philippine languages could be somehow fused together The enthusiasm for the fusionist idea is sometimes portrayed as a kind of detour in the road toward the national language The perception of a detour is significant because it erases the fact of the continuity of the revolution’s cultural and linguistic ideals and aspirations As the essays themselves sometimes explicitly express, the existence of the Katipunan strengthened the already existing fact that Tagalog was the language that unified the diverse Filipino people and linguistic groups into one nation.365 Locating the campaign to make Tagalog the basis for the national language at a much later date, as the myth of the fusionist detour manages to do, depoliticizes our linguistic history According to this myth, Lope K Santos first prescribed to a fusionist view of language, a position he supposedly arrived at through the influence of American linguist David Doherty It is an idea that has been passed on from American colonial scholarship all the way to contemporary scholarship According to this myth, the Kapulungan was created in order to work on actually 365 See Apo ng Kapampangan (pseudonym), “Ang Bayang Pilipino at ang Kanyang Sariling Wika,” Muling Pagsilang, April 18, 1905, 132 fusing the Philippine languages to come up with a national language Originating in Doherty himself, the myth passed on to Joseph Ralston Hayden, the vice-governor of the Philippines from 1933 to 1935, to Ernest J Frei, writing in 1959, and down to Andrew Gonzalez, writing in 1980,366 and is replicated again in later studies, repeated often enough for it to be taken now as fact (see footnote 13 above) This idea will appear to anyone who reads the output of the Kapulungan as bizarre—the primary objective of the Kapulungan, stated over and over, was the preservation and improvement of Tagalog The idea of language fusion plays an infinitesimal role in the Muling Pagsilang essays It is sometimes mentioned as a possible option for a way (not the way) at arriving at a national language but it is never thoroughly discussed This myth and the narrative constructed around it—that those who were early interested in a national language were experimenting with language fusion—is very much part of the colonial discourse regarding English being the only rational option for Filipinos to take The discourse claimed that there were too many Philippine languages, none of which resembled anything of a lingua franca and that the fusionist approach was a synthetic impossibility The discourse also claimed that there was so much antagonism between the language groups that Filipinos would readily accept English over another Philippine language as the common language.367 The discourse was so efficiently and smoothly constructed that it appears, even to today’s reader, as though the colonial officials of the turn of the century really had no option but to institute English Backward-looking Forwardness The narrative and the discourse take on new meaning when it is apparent that there was in fact, an organized group of people who consistently agitated, not for language fusion, which 366 In a footnote, Hayden (page 936) quotes Doherty who claims to have influenced Lope K Santos, in 1903, to gather the writers and editors and attempt to “fuse the these dialects into a uniform and common one.” Ernest Frei has a lengthy discussion of Doherty but briefly mentions Lope K Santos in connection to Doherty and in the same vein: “To this end [language fusion] he encouraged Lope K Santos, then editor of Muling Pagsilag.” (page 41-42) Gonzalez repeats this idea taking his information from Hayden Lydia Gonzales Garcia (1992), citing Doherty, repeats the same information regarding the Doherty-Santos connection and the fusionist perspective (page 75) 367 See for example, The Board of Educational Survey, A Survey of the Educational System of the Philippine Islands, (Manila: Bureau of Printing, 1925), 26-27 This is also known as the Monroe Survey 133 could take several years, but for the immediate use of Tagalog as the common language The Muling Pagsilang essays did this They consistently argued that historical events transpired such that Tagalog should be the national language and that it was also currently acceptable to all Filipinos as the national language This, however, was no nativist call to return to indigenous categories The objectives, repeated over and over in many of the essays, call not just for a pagdadalisay (purification) but for a pagbabangon (upliftment), pagpapayaman (enriching), pagpapalago (development) and pagtatanghal (exposure and popularization).368 At the outset, it should be said that the Muling Pagsilang essays not in any way represent a single, unified perspective Muling Pagsilang, though clearly critical of the American occupation of the Philippines, functioned like a modern newspaper that allowed for different voices to be heard As such, on the issue of language, it published essays with disparate positions including those that were emphatically pro-English369 and a number that were categorically antiEnglish.370 The essays published under the Kapulungan had an a-political air to them, hardly ever mentioning the colonial language policy However, the essays on language that were not published under the Kapulungan would openly criticize the colonial language policy and had in common, a deep interest in and concern for the promotion of the Tagalog language What seems to have motivated the authors who published under the Kapulungan was a trepidation over their perception that Tagalog was being erased Valeriano Hernandez, in his essay that calls for the establishment of the Kapulungan, describes Tagalog as being sick and at it’s death bed …sa loob ng maikling panahon ay papanatilihing wica sa Sangkapuluan ang ingles, ay di nga malayong ang sakit na ito ng wikang tagalog na kinagisnan, ay lalong lumubha at kung magkatao’y mamatay nang tuluyan, pag di naiagap ang mga ucol na gamot.371 368 “…bumalak ng pahayagang ito ang isang papulong na bilang simula ng pagtatayo ng dalisayan ng ating wika…” (this newspaper planned a meeting to start the structure to purify our language), Valeriano Hernandez, “Ang Wikang Tagalog,” El Renacimiento, August 26, 1903, “”nangangarap kapwa sa pagdadalisay at pagtatanghal ng sariling wika” (we both aspire for the purification and popularization of our language), Lope K Santos, “Isang Wikang Filipino,” El Renacimiento, September 5, 1903, and “Ang pagbabano in at pagdadalisay ng Wikang sarili ay di lamang katungkulan nating lahat…” (The upliftment and purification of one’s own language is not the only duty of all…), ibid, September 15, 1903, 369 K Patid (pseudonym), “Ang Wikang Ingles,” El Renacimiento, April 23, 1903, 370 Simoun (pseudonym), “Pagbabaka ng mga Wika’t Lahi,” Muling Pagsilang, May 19, 1905, 12 and Mapaninta (pseudonym), 371 Hernandez, “Ang Wikang Tagalog,” 134 In a short while English was established throughout the land and it is possible that the sickness of Tagalog will get worse and might lead to death if the sickness is not stopped through the proper medicines The sickness, caused by a non-vigilance during the Spanish period, is the weakening of Tagalog by the inclusion of many foreign words The medicine, according to Hernandez, is the Kapulungan itself that will purify and promote Tagalog Patricio Mariano expresses this agitation through the image of a drowning He says that it is through the work of the Kapulungan that the race and the Tagalog language will be saved from drowning: “maasahan natin na ang Lahi at Wikang Tagalog ay hindi malulunod kahit mapagitna sa mga alon’g tumatabon”372 (we can trust that the race and the Tagalog language will not drown even if it is in the middle of waves that overwhelm it) Andrea Vitan seems distressed over a communication gap that will be created between children educated in English and parents who speak only Tagalog: Ano ang unang itinatanong ng magulang sa anak, pagdating nito sa bahay na galing sa paaralan? Walang iba kun di ang natututuhan niya Kun sa Maestro o Maestrang di ipinatalos sa bata ang kahulugan sa Tagalog ng kanyang itinuro, pano ng maisasagot ng anak sa kanyang magulang? Marahil ay uulitiun na lamang ang salitang narinig sa maestro, at paano ang pagaalam ng magulang kung ang anak ay natuto o hindi?373 What is the first thing a parent asks a child when the child returns from school? Nothing else than what was learned If the teacher did not explain the meaning of the lesson in Tagalog to the child, how will the child answer the parent? The child will likely just repeat the words and how will the parent know if the child really learned? Given this threat and this desperate situation, her call is not for political action nor for the removal of English Instead, her call is for a turning toward the language itself, for the study and improvement of the language This is the call of the whole Kapulungan; it is not for a return to the old and indigenous but for a modernization of the traditional language in order to escort it into this new world Though there is much acknowledgement among the Kapulungan essays that popular education is a good thing (as there is much agreement among the Kapulungan members that that 372 Patricio Mariano, “Ang Wikang Tagalog sa mga Dulaan,” El Renacimiento, November 24, 1903, 373 Andrea Vitan, “Kailangan pa Kayang Pag-aralan ang Wikang Sarili? El Renacimiento, November 27, 1903, 135 education should take place in Tagalog), in their worldview language does not exist simply to introduce a population to a new modern, democratic society It is not modernization for modernity’s sake but for the survival of tradition and for the ideals of nationhood, and, some would even hint at, for freedom Francisco Makabulos uses the beautiful metaphor of the language as a beacon for national unity: “upang siyang maging hilagang tutunguhin ng pacay ng pagcacaisa sa icapapasulong sa paglusog ng Inang bayan.”374 (so that it [Tagalog] will be the north we will move toward for the objective of unity in the advancement of the motherland) Liborio Gomez argues for the inseparability of language and nation He says: “Samantalang may Wika ay may Bayan, pag naparam ang Wika, wala tayong bayan.”375 (While a language has a nation, if the language vanishes, so does the nation.) Lope K Santos argues that we of one race should have one language: “mahirap ang tayo-tayong mga anak ng iisang Lahi at ng iisang Bayan, kung magkalipatang pulo ay di na makapagusap kundi magdaan muna kapwa sa España o America”376 (it is difficult that we children of the same race and of the same nation, if we travel around the country cannot speak to each other except through the Spanish or American language) Eusebio Daluz goes as far as suggesting that the knowledge of one’s language brings learning and then freedom: “pamamagitan ng sariling wicang ito ay macamtan nating walang sagwil ang pagkabihasa sa madlang carunungan, na siyang cahulugann ng sanla ng calayaan”377 (through our own language we will gain knowledge which is needed for freedom) The way through which all this was going to be achieved was through the very tedious work of strengthening and modernizing Tagalog The lecture/essay that inaugurates the Kapulungan, written by Lope K Santos, is long and comprehensive and articulates the concrete concerns and objectives of the Kapulungan This essay, along with several other of the 374 Makabulos, “Ang Wikang Tagalog sa mga Lupang Kapampangan,” Liborio Gomez, “Ang Wika ay Siyang Pag-iisip ng Isang Bayan at Kaluluwa ng Isang Lahi,” El Renacimiento, December 16, 1903, 376 Lope K Santos, “Isang Wikang Filipino,” El Renacimiento, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 15, 16 September, 1903 This quote appears in the issue of September 15, 1903, 377 Eusebio Daluz, "Alin ang Lalong Magagaling na Paraan sa Pagtuturo ng Wikang Tagalog, Upang Matutuhan Madali at Pag-aralan di Lamang ng mga Tagalog Kundi ng mga iba pang Kapatid ng Lahi?” Muling Pagsilang, and March 1904 (serialized) This quote appeared in the March issue, page 375 136 Kapulungan essays, express a concern that all the extant grammars and dictionaries were written by foreigners …tunay na mahapding sabihin na hangang ngayon’y wala pa kaming nababasang limbag nang Gramatica o Diccionariong Tagalog na yari ng mga tunay na tagalog at angkap o alinsunod sa mga kasalukuyang pananagalog.378 …it is truly painful to admit that up until now, we have not read any published Tagalog grammars or dictionaries that are made by true Tagalogs and that follow the rules of contemporary Tagalog Up until that time, the many grammars and dictionaries that existed not just for Tagalog but for all the major Philippine languages had been made by Spanish friars in order to teach the friars the local language in order for them to carry out their work of proselitization 379 The Americans were also on their way toward mastering the local languages, undoubtedly for their own purposes as well During this time, Frank Blake was teaching Tagalog at Johns Hopkins 380 This is a fact that Santos was aware and proud of Seemingly unaware that an interest in the language of the occupied area was a compulsory part of the colonization process, Santos used this fact to argue that since Tagalog was being studied in venerable foreign institutions like Hopkins then Filipinos themselves should take an interest in studying their own language 381 For the first time, Filipinos themselves were actually going to take on the work of standardizing the language.382 This is a phenomenal task to take on and is a symptom of an awareness of the necessary ingredients for nation building On the one hand, Santos and the Kapulungan were conscious that Tagalog, with the omnipresent English policy, was under threat like it had never been during the Spanish period In this way, the move to modernize Tagalog was simply a reaction to American language policy On the other hand, they seemed to be primed 378 Santos, “Isang Wikang Filipino,” September 7, 1903, In the discussion of language and translation during the Spanish period, mention has to be made of Vicente Rafael’s Contracting Colonialism which examines the politics of translation and how Filipino translators, tasked with translating prayers and poems from Spanish to Tagalog, subverted meaning and converted prayers and other instruments of Spanish colonization into sites of struggle, 380 Blake himself reports in a 1902 issue of American Anthropologist that Tagalog was taught in Hopkins between 1901 and 1902 and was attended by eight students See pages 793-794 381 Santos, “Isang Wikang Filipino,” September, 1903, 382 It was work that was started by the likes of Jose Rizal and Trinidad Pardo de Tavera before the revolution See Jose Rizal, “On the New Orthography of the Tagalog Language,” La Solidaridad, April 15, 1890 See “A Contribution to the Study of the Old Filipino Alphabet,” in Readings in Philippine Linguistics, ed Andrew Gonzales, et al (Manila: Linguistic Society of the Philippines, 1973), 40-53 Originally published in 1885 See also “Orthografia del Tagalog,” Diario de Manila, August 5, 1888 379 137 by the experience of the revolution and the short-lived independent Philippine nation and were working with an awareness of that a standard and common language was necessary for an independent nation The work of the Kapulungan toward the creation of these grammars and dictionaries was to start with the standardization of matters like vocabulary and a pedagogy for teaching Tagalog For the standardization of Tagalog vocabulary, Santos offers four criteria: first, the removal of borrowed words for which Tagalog already has substitutes, second, the creation of parallel knowledge-related words that exist; third, to prioritize the borrowing of words, first from Malay and Sanskrit before borrowing from Latin-based languages; and finally, setting a procedure for using borrowed words that follow Tagalog rules The understanding of these early Tagalog scholars as being purist and nativist383 need to be revisited as, the essays clearly show, theirs was a well-thought out plan, not to simply purge, but to revive A nativist, one would expect, would call for a return to a primordial, pre-colonial linguistic formations Santos seems to anticipate this instinct among those who are seeking to assert their identity but asserts that a connection rather than an isolation from the world is necessary and therefore calls for the continued use of romanized letters The Kapulungan authors, because of their concern with the nitty-gritty of necessary work of linguistic standardization, of identifying specific words that were to be removed from standard use, became the easy targets for critics like Barrows, who would depict them as backwardlooking Their vision was in fact a very organic one that sought to create a Tagalog practice that was in line with current Tagalog use By contrast, the Muling Pagsilang essays that were not published under the name of the Kapulungan were not working with the primary objective of improving Tagalog and thus did not focus on the language itself Instead, the authors of these essays deal more openly with the social aspects of language and discuss such matters as the relationship of language to the progress of the 383 In the Eighth Annual Report of the Director of Education (1908), David Barrows refers to the policy of the “Filipino scholars interested in the development of the Tagalog language” as “shortsighted.” Barrows describes their activities as “trying to eject from the language all words of foreign origin and to substitute circumlocutions or words of new invention.” (page 98) 138 nation In this way they are similar to the American colonial discourse on English that is centered on the idea of progress Several of these essays are concerned with the creation of a civilized society with intelligent and modernized citizens “Ang sariling wica ay nacacatulong ng malaki sa pagpagpapatalino”384 (one’s own language is a great help in making one intelligent), claims one essay Another essay calls on mothers not to teach their children superstitions like the “’asuwang.’mga encanto,’ mga ‘gigante,’ ang mga agimat at kababalaghan ng mga ‘Hari’ at ‘Reyna’385 (vampires, spirits, giants, talismans, and the wondrous kings and queens) and would have mothers teach their children history and the story of heroes and martyrs of freedom instead The great civilizations of Europe that have many great geniuses and inventors are admired by one of the authors of these essays: “ang mga ganyang nasyon ay lubhang matalino at marami ang hinahangaan sa pagka mga inventor ng sarisaring dunong na pawing kababalaghan”386 (these nations are very intelligent and many of their inventors are admired for the various knowledges which are a wonder) Yet the concern here is in achieving a civilization on their own terms and using their own language: Kung sisiyasatin ang Kasaysayan ng Sangdaigdig ay makikitang maliwanag pa sa araw, na buhat pa sa mulang dako hanggang sa mga araw nating kasalukuyan, ang wika, ang sariling lenguwahe, ay siyang una sa tanang kasangkapan ng 387 IKADUDUNONG [author’s capitalization] If one were to analyze the History of the World, one would see, clear as day, that from the beginning of time, till now, language, one’s own language, is the first ingredient in learning It would be difficult to accuse the authors of these essays of dwelling on the past Their vision was very much grounded on bringing in Philippine society forward; but the vision was of bringing it forward as a whole nation, through the local language The term nativism simply refers to a belief in preserving and reviving indigenous culture People who actually prescribe to this belief can be as easily lauded as they can be discredited However, since the term is a disparaging one; a critic can easily use it on almost anyone without 384 S.G.C (Sefronio G Calderon), “Kamahalan ng Sariling Wika,” Muling Pagsilang, February 16, 1905, 385 386 Taga Danaw (pseudonym), “Pagtuturo ng mga Anak,” Muling Pagsilang, June 7, 1906, Isang Guro (pseudonym), “Ang Pagtuturo sa Isang Bayan,” Muling Pagsilang, November 8, 1905, 387 Ibid 139 necessarily being wrong The nativism, however, that scholars are wary of is a kind of dogmatic belief in a recapturing categories of a distant past in as pristine a form as possible Those who become involved in a campaign to save a culture against the actions of a dominating power that forces, pressures, or persuades the occupied culture to replace its values and structures are often accused of being idealistic, quixotic, and nativist The ideas expressed in the Muling Pagsilang essays were not necessarily against the presence of English in the Philippines but they certainly were against the American colonial method of moving forward by leaving one’s language behind But, in these essays one sees that the objective is not to move forward, but neither is it to move backward In order to understand what direction it was that these Tagalog authors had in mind when they prescribed Tagalog as medium of instruction, as national language, as official language, or even just as the continued language of their culture, one can recall Francisco Makabulos’s appeal to make Tagalog the north that we will move toward in the quest for nationhood.388 One can also refer to one of the Muling Pagsilang essays that calls for national unity through linguistic unity: Lahat lahat ng anak ng ating lahi at bayan ay may mahigpit na katungkulang mag-aral ng wikang sarili, sapagka’t upang tayong lahat ay magkakilakilala at magkaramayan, kinakailangang magkaroon ng isang wikang mapagsasaligan ng ating mga damdamin at panukala sa ikakagaling ng lahat Upang tayo’y magkaisa, kailangang ang nasa itaas ay bumaba; itoy maluwag kay sa ang nasa ibaba’y siyang pailandang sa dakong itaas.389 All the children of our race and nation have a firm duty to study our own language so that we may know one another and feel for one another, we need to have one language which can hold our feelings and aspirations which is for the greater good To achieve unity, those on top need to go down which is easier than having those below forced to adapt to those on top There is a seeming contradiction with one call (Makabulos’) to move northward and the other (Mapaninta’s) to move downwards Yet, there is no contradiction here The call for or critique about moving society in certain directions (forward, backward, upward, downward) are as broad and empty as the term nativism In whatever direction they were moving, for the Muling 388 389 See footnote 59 Mapaninta (pseudonym), "Ang Wikang Tagalog,"1 140 Pagsilang essays, the object was the nation itself, unified through language and learning; the nation moving toward freedom and self-determination 141 ... context of the authors’ participation in the revolution and in the context of their other anti -colonial agitations at the time, are the irrefutable evidence of the longevity and continuity of the. .. acknowledgement of the role of the revolution in establishing the idea of a single nation and the idea of Tagalog as the language that binds the nation is important (the reasons of which are listed in the. .. moment of their writing of the relation of ? ?Tagalog? ?? to the Philippine nation, they are astounding too for how they brim with a confidence in and commitment to the concept of the Filipino nation