filipinos in america in the 21st century: the shaping of...
TRANSCRIPT
+
Filipinos in America in the 21st Century:
The Shaping of the Filipino-American Identity
Carina M. Forsythe
Thesis
November, 2015
1
Table of Contents
Introduction ................................................................................................................................................. 3
Chapter 1 ..................................................................................................................................................... 8
Invisibility ................................................................................................................................................ 8
The first significant Filipino labor wave in America ....................................................................... 8
The first Filipino community in Los Angeles ................................................................................. 11
Little Manila ...................................................................................................................................... 15
Filipinos were destined to become invisible in America ................................................................ 20
Chapter 2 ................................................................................................................................................... 23
Identity ................................................................................................................................................... 23
Filipino identity in America ............................................................................................................. 24
A Filipino sub-culture is born in America ...................................................................................... 28
The Impact of different Filipino mindsets and identities in America .......................................... 33
Chapter 3 ................................................................................................................................................... 39
Filipino History ..................................................................................................................................... 39
Early history of colonization ............................................................................................................ 39
The Bridge Generation ....................................................................................................................... 41
The United Farmworkers Association................................................................................................ 44
Second generation American Filipinos .............................................................................................. 46
Chapter 4 ................................................................................................................................................... 49
National Identity .................................................................................................................................... 49
Filipino culture .................................................................................................................................. 50
Filipino culture and national identity ................................................................................................ 51
A weak national identity ................................................................................................................... 52
Interracial marriages ........................................................................................................................ 56
Chapter 5 ................................................................................................................................................... 59
Immigration and Citizenship ............................................................................................................... 59
World War II ..................................................................................................................................... 60
The First and Second Filipino Regiments ....................................................................................... 61
The Filipino Veterans community ................................................................................................... 61
Filipino immigration ......................................................................................................................... 65
Chapter 6 ................................................................................................................................................... 69
Filipinos in America in the 21st Century ............................................................................................. 69
2
Filipinos have always been contenders ............................................................................................ 71
3
Introduction
Emmanuel Dapidran Pacquiao, more commonly known as Manny Pacquiao, is
undoubtedly one of the most celebrated professional boxers in the world. On May 2, 2015,
Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather engaged in what was commonly referred to as “the fight
of the century” between two great contemporary boxers. It was a fight with a purse that paid an
estimated $300 million, making it the highest paid boxing event in American history. The fight
made Pacquiao the second highest paid athlete in the world. (Riccobono, 2015). Although
Pacquiao lost the fight to Mayweather, he remains a hero in the Philippines and to the Filipinos
in America.
The San Francisco Chronicle, which distributes its newspaper from San Francisco to
Santa Barbara County and was once the largest circulated newspaper on the west coast, wrote
“The Pacquiao-Mayweather fight was more of a cultural happening, an ethnic and historical
milestone . . . Filipino families are expected to crowd into homes throughout the Bay Area to
watch the fight, including grandmothers, children and many people who normally care little
about sports or boxing”. It also quoted Filipino Americans who said, “It’s really about pride and
visibility. It distinguishes us. It boosts our self-esteem and connects us to our roots, whereas
historically we’ve been pushed to the side”. (Fimrite, 2015). According to CNN, 3 million
American households were estimated to watch the fight from home. (Isidore, 2015).
Indisputably, Manny Pacquiao helped spotlight the Filipinos in America when they came
out to cheer in his corner. I find it to be somewhat analogous to the 1939 movie classic The
Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy arrived in the Land of Oz and the timid Munchkins came out of
hiding to celebrate the demise of the Wicked Witch of the West. Filipinos in California did
much the same thing when they came out to celebrate a Filipino hero. According to the 2010
4
Census Report, Filipinos comprise the largest Asian concentration in Southern California, yet
their presence is virtually invisible. Why is this? Where are they when an event such as the
Pacquiao-Mayweather boxing match is not in town?
My first point begins with a discussion on invisibility because it is one of two significant
points that I will discuss in addressing the question why there is not a distinct Filipino
community in Los Angeles. (Chapter I). My second point is a discussion on identity (Chapter II).
The topic of invisibility and identity is a popular discourse among many Filipino Americans
today. The Pacquiao-Mayweather event evidenced visibly huge Filipino support and fanfare,
which I will draw from in discussing sociological dynamics, such as symbolic identity to explain
the quasi-Filipino community in America.
Although Manny Pacquiao lost the fight to Floyd Mayweather, Filipinos in America
enthusiastically came out for that long-awaited and highly publicized boxing match on May 5 to
unite for at least that one night as a community to support a Filipino contender. This might
suggest that perhaps Filipinos come out of the woodwork as a community in spirit rather than as
a defined community occupying a particular space.
As background for understanding these questions, it is important to consider the history
of both Spanish and American colonization in the Philippines, and the effects of colonization on
the Filipino people. This background will help set the stage for a better understanding of the
general mindset and behavior of the early Filipino settlers who came to America in the 1920s. I
will explore these issues by following the life of my father, Tomas Montoya, who came to
America and settled in Los Angeles in 1925. His life in the Philippines and emigration to the
U.S. epitomizes the Filipino-American experience from the hardships of poverty in the
5
Philippines that drove him to America, to the obstacles of discrimination that met him in
America, to the way that becoming an American changed his identity. (Chapter III).
Stanley Renshon, a professor of political science, discusses the expectations that
Americans have toward immigrants, stating:
The question of American national identity and the strength of our attachments to the
American national community is, given our diversity, perhaps the most important
domestic national question facing this country. Some dismiss these concerns as being
based on outdated theories. Others urge Americans to accept other possible platforms for
solidarity like new diasporas, transnational civil society, and other identity groups and the
thinning out of national ties and argue that it is time to accept an America . . . whose
bonds are secondary to other forms of association.
Although Renshon’s focus is more on contemporary immigration, it is indeed a reflection of the
expectations of immigrants both in a new country today or one hundred years ago.
An awareness of the obstacles of discrimination and the trials and tribulations that many
new immigrants face in assimilating into a new country is taken more seriously today. However,
it was largely ignored in the early years. America did not help in “facilitating the emotional
attachments of immigrants and citizens alike to the American national community.” (Renshon,
2007). Rather, it discouraged ethnic identities and promoted Americanization. This caused the
new Filipino arrivals in the 1920s to become invisible for at least two reasons: the transient
nature of the work that America recruited them to do and their political status.
Bernardo (2014) argues, “The United States, in order to deny its imperial nature, projects
itself as an anti-racist, anti-imperial nation, making Filipinos one of America’s historical and
contemporary imperial subjects, categorically invisible since they did not neatly fit in
6
conventional immigrant narratives that emphasize assimilation into a multicultural, democratic
polity”. Bernardo goes on to pose the crux of the question of this thesis by addressing “To
whom were Filipinos invisible? Did Filipinos always carry this characterization? If the lack of a
distinct Filipino enclave makes a community invisible, then would Filipinos gain the visibility
they desired if they concentrated geographically in distinct ethnic enclaves?” (Chapter IV).
I believe that the way in which Americans think about American national identity can
explain why there is not a distinct Filipino community in America. The early Filipino
immigrants unintentionally set the stage for future Filipino immigrants and the American-born
Filipino generations that followed. The early and difficult era of the Filipino American
experience not only seeped into the minds of Filipinos who later emigrated to the U.S., but it
shaped the mindset of American-born Filipinos, such as myself. Jana Braziel, Assistant
Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Cincinnati, points out that
the Immigration Act of 1965 established a new criteria for immigrants. Her time line reflects
significant revisions of the Act, one of which removed natural origins as the basis of
immigration. This opened the doors for many Filipinos to immigrate to America, and the
ensuing immigration wave brought a different class of Filipinos to America, such as educated
and professional emigrants.
The mindset of those coming to America to settle was different than the early settlers of
the 1920s, which resulted in an economic/status divide among Filipinos in America. The
common denominator among the growing population of Filipinos in America was ancestry, but
the factors of education, profession, language, religion, financial status, and varying degrees of
being Americanized created a separation. (Chapter V). Here is where mindset and identity can
help explain the estrangement. However, despite social and economic differences among
7
Filipinos in America, there still exists a yearning for many Filipino immigrants and American-
born Filipinos to attach to something, such as a distinct Filipino community to find or enhance
their identity. (Chapter VI). As an American Filipino far removed from Filipino culture and
tradition, I joined with other American Filipinos in the spirit of Filipino national identity in
supporting a spotlighted individual representing the Philippines. Nothing evidenced this more
than on May 5, 2015 when the rags to riches icon, Manny Pacquiao, stepped into an American
boxing ring donning the distinct colors of the Philippines. There is no denying that every
Filipino acknowledged a lot or a little bit of their heritage that night.
8
Chapter 1
Invisibility
Suntukan is a Filipino word that means bare-hand fighting, which was used as a method
of street fighting similar to today’s boxing, and was a form of martial arts used before Spanish
colonization. During Spanish colonization Suntukan was prohibited, but despite its prohibition it
was still practiced underground for almost 400 years. During U.S. colonization, the dynamics of
Suntukan evolved into what we know today as boxing. Many well-known boxers have come
from the Philippines through the years, such as Cerefino Garcia, 1923; Francisco Guilledo,
known as Pancho Villa, 1923; Diosdado Posadas, known as Speedy Dado, 1926; Fernando Opao,
known as Young Tommy, 1930; and, of course, Manny Pacquiao, to only name a few. Western
boxing imposed strict guidelines in fighting, replacing the cultural dynamics involved in
Suntukan from bare-hands to gloved-hands, and providing a specified and defined list of rules as
set forth by the American Boxing Association. However, the objective remains the same: to
triumph over an opponent. The same can be said of dynamics of assimilation in America for the
early Filipino settlers who faced a new culture that imposed strict guidelines, rules and laws as
they struggled to find a place for themselves in America.
The first significant Filipino labor wave in America
To be a contender, one must have a good chance of winning among competitors. Tomas
Montoya was born on December 12, 1905 in Cavite, a province located on the southern shores of
Manila Bay in the Philippines. Cavite is the smallest province in the region, but is known as the
Historical Capital of the Philippines because it was the nucleus of the Philippine Revolution over
the renouncement of Spanish colonial control in 1898.i It was primarily an agricultural area,
9
producing staple items such as rice, coconuts, vegetables, corn and coffee, as well as a location
for businesses engaging in some livestock, fishery and mining activities.
People living in the province were typically poor and living conditions, particularly in the
early 1900s, were largely primitive. There was no electricity, indoor plumbing or household
appliances. Water was drawn from a well, candles and kerosene lamps provided indoor light at
night, and wood gathered daily from around the province provided the fuel to cook in an outdoor
pit. The people of Cavite largely spoke Chabacano, which is pidgin Spanish, as a way to
communicate with the Spanish soldiers and other Filipinos from various regions who labored at
the Cavite naval base and spoke different dialects.ii Ashcroft, Griffiths and Tiffin, three notable
professors of post-colonial studies, assert that “Pidgin was inevitably used in the context of
master-servant relationships during the period of European colonization, and the social and
economic hierarchies produced by colonialism have been retained in post-colonial society
through the medium of language.” (Ashcroft, Griffiths & Tiffin, 1989).
Tomas was like most poor young men his age in Cavite. The second oldest of six
children, he was burdened with the responsibility of helping to support the family at a time and
place when jobs were few and the country’s chains of colonization had left its scars on the
natives for generations to follow, namely, poverty. Families were typically large, comprising
five or more children, and although Cavite was a relatively small province where most families
knew each other, families tended to be clannish.
Even today, large Filipino families in America comprising immediate family members,
cousins, in-laws, nephews and nieces, etc., often exceed the number of guests most people invite
into their homes at a given time. Accordingly, there is no need to invite outsiders to a party. I
bring this up because I have experienced this phenomenon growing up in America. At first
10
glance it may appear that Filipinos living in the same neighborhood can be likened to a
community; however, if each is a separate family the dynamics of being separate can be the same
as if the neighborhood comprised different races. This might help explain one facet of why there
is not a distinct Filipino community in Los Angeles, because many Filipino American families
do not have a need to connect with other Filipino families to be able to thrive in America today.
For example, I have lived next door to Filipino Americans for the past 13 years. Not
once have they acknowledged me as their Filipino neighbor in any way, except when I
introduced myself on the day they moved into the house. When I told them that I do not speak
Filipino, they seemed to dismiss me, having nothing more to say. Yet, every evening and all day
on the weekends, numerous cars crowd the neighborhood’s street with dozens of Filipino-
speaking families visiting my neighbors. I believe that most of the visitors are relatives based on
the physical interactions that I have observed, such as hugging and kissing upon their arrival and
departure. In this example, my neighbors appear to be clannish or outright un-neighborly for
their own personal reasons.
When the Hawaiian Sugar Planters Association (“HPSA”) began sending recruiters to the
Philippines in 1906 to sell the illusion of escaping poverty by working in America, Tomas and
many other poor young Filipino men between the ages of sixteen and twenty-two, some with less
than an eighth grade education, eagerly jumped at the opportunity for a free ticket to America,
albeit mostly as indentured laborers. The recruiters scoped and targeted some of the poorest
provinces in the islands including, but not limited to, Cavite, Vigan, Illocus Sur and Cebu.
Recruits were sent to work on Hawaii’s sugar cane plantations and on California’s fast-growing
agricultural farms. Others came to America for a specific reason and on different terms, such as
to obtain an education or to simply live the American dream. These included pensionadosiii and
11
Filipino men who served in the U.S. Navy and obtained U.S. citizenship upon completion of
their enlistment, which was relegated to the service rate of ship steward.
When Tomas arrived in America with a few dollars in his pocket and an abundance of
hopes and dreams, little did he and the others know, indentured or not, that they were to be used
in America like pawns on a chessboard, essential and numerous, but also the weakest in
community strength as compared to other immigrants, such as the Chinese and Japanese.
America became a new arena for Filipinos, where contenders were placed on a dim lit stage in
shabbiest and smelliest rings, into which any contender would be insulted and horrified to enter.
The first Filipino community in Los Angeles
Tomas’s life and journey to America was typical of the lives of most Filipinos who came
to America in the early 1900s. His journey represented the first major wave of Filipino laborers
that hitched their wagon to the star of America’s agricultural giants who enticed their palates
with the promise of high paying jobs and educational opportunities. However, the reality of
living in America for most people of color in the early years, particularly Filipinos, was
disappointing. Restrictions on the basic freedoms that were available to white Americans
dictated how and where Filipinos fit into the puzzle. Anti-miscegenation laws in Californiaiv
dictated who Filipinos could marry, discrimination dictated where they could work, and
prejudice restricted their residential choices to an impoverished section of downtown Los
Angeles, which housed the Chinese, Japanese and other non-white communities. Although at
first glance it would appear that each group had their own distinct communities, such as
Chinatown, Japantown and Little Manila,v there were significant differences.
12
Los Angeles’s Little Manila was formed in the 1920s and encompassed approximately
the length of a few typical neighborhood city blocks. Its claimed area comprised a couple of
Filipino-owned restaurants, barber shops, a Philippine Chamber of Commerce of Southern
California, and a few Filipino business corporations. (Catapusan, 1934). Little Manila was
mostly a gathering area for Filipinos, especially those between seasonal work and those seeking
city work. It served as the nucleus where Filipino compatriots could find ethnic foods and freely
stroll up and down the streets in the designated area without being harassed. It also served as the
place where white Americans segregated Filipinos because they were deemed to be a racial
problem and unassimilable. (Kramer, 2006). This kept Filipinos invisible from the white
population by keeping them out of white neighborhoods, restaurants and other white-owned
businesses.
The Little Manila area epitomizes the American “attitude” toward communities of color.
While incorporating communities of color into the American economy, it also hid them through
segregation and exclusion from white-society, which forced them to become invisible. And
although most of the young Filipino men were not related to each other and were from different
provinces in the Philippines and spoke different dialects, they banded together, giving the
impression that they were clannish in America. (Espana-Maram, 2006). Yet, Filipinos
continued to be solicited, encouraged, recruited and brought to America to enhance U.S.
economic growth by increasing its migrant population, while being kept in a segregated
landscape. (Takaki, 1993).
In contrast, both Chinatown and Japantown were thriving communities in residency,
schools, religious institutions, restaurants, commercial businesses and recreation. Their success
was largely due to their growing population’s need for housing, schools, places of worship,
13
restaurants, commercial businesses and recreation. The Chinese and Japanese communities
comprised growing families, whereas the Filipino community comprised mostly single young
men. Although Filipino and Chinese migration to America was similar in many ways, it was
different in other significant ways. Filipinos were forced to mostly live a transient lifestyle,
while the Chinese were forced to find a means to survive, thereby establishing enclaves, such as
Chinatowns. However, the acquiescence to a transient lifestyle by one group and resistance to it
by another group is telling of the different mindsets of the Filipinos than the Chinese, resulting in
two similar groups with similar goals and objectives going separate ways in America. By
comparing the mindset or the reasons for coming to America, one can see the significant
differences between the Filipinos, Chinese and Japanese, and the need or lack of a need for a
distinct and visible community.
The Chinese began migrating to America in the 1870s. Some came to escape the British
Opium Wars in China, the Taiping Rebellion, the conflict between the Punti and the Hakkas,
harsh economic conditions, and the allure of gold and employment to be found in America.
(Takaki, 1993). In contrast, the first significant wave of Filipino laborers came in the early
1920s in response to America’s need for cheap labor, particularly in agriculture. Both the
Chinese and Filipinos in the early years came to America mostly as single young men, some
leaving their wives and children behind with a promise to return. Some Chinese sojourners paid
their own fare to America, while others contracted with recruiters to become indentured laborers
for paid passage. (Takaki, 1993). Many Chinese joined the Forty-Niners during the gold rush in
California, and later found work on the railroad and in factories. When construction of the
Central Pacific Railroad line was completed, many found work on California’s agricultural
farms. However, with white America’s growing anti-Chinese climate in the late 1800s, the
14
Chinese began to establish businesses located in Chinatowns. Chinatowns offered a somewhat
safe haven and a wealth of services and aid to Chinese arrivals, including Chinese women that
began to immigrate to America. Tongs and fongs were formed that provided protection and
recreation for the Chinese community, which continued through the years to prosper in business
and growing families. (See, 1995).
The Japanese came to America to escape political conflict, but their early migration was
largely comprised of single women, many leaving their husbands and children behind. In
contrast to the Filipinos, America dictated a quota of Japanese women. However, the Hawaiian
government that initially required a quota of contract laborers from Japan to be all women, later
began contracting Japanese men because they felt Japanese men would be better laborers if they
had their families with them. This resulted in HPSA’s promotion of family as a means to keep
workers on its plantations. (Takaki, 1993). In further contrast, many Filipinos who were
recruited by the HPSA to work in the Hawaiian sugar cane plantations and on California’s
agricultural farms for a contracted minimum of three years only planned to temporarily work in
the U.S. (Espana-Maram, 2006). Their objective was to earn money to send back home to the
Philippines, obtain an education, and return home to the Philippines. Those seeking work on the
west coast, particularly in California, scattered throughout the state’s cities and agricultural
communities. Often desperate, frightened, alone and penniless, many found solace and
familiarity in Little Manila. (Bulosan, 1943).
In comparing all three groups, many Filipinos from the first wave of Filipino laborers to
arrive in the U.S. remained bachelors for approximately twenty years, which not only resulted in
a lost generation, but suggests that these men did not have the same needs that necessitated the
formation of and visibility of Chinese and Japanese communities. Further, while the Chinese
15
and Japanese thrived in their respective communities, Filipinos who worked the agricultural
circuit lived wherever the seasons took them, and those working in low paying domestic and
service-related jobs in the city typically shared affordable housing with other domestic workers
or were live-in help, resulting in not having a need for an attachment to a particular place or
community. However, if invisibility is a cause of not having a distinct community today, what
happened to Little Manila?
Little Manila
Los Angeles in the 1920s was like any major port city in the U.S. It was and continues to
be a melting pot of immigrants. Los Angeles currently has approximately two hundred officially
designated communities, namely, Chinatown, Little Tokyo, Little Armenia, Thai Town and
Koreatown, to name only a few. Most of these distinct and diverse ethnic communities boast
cultural identity, solidarity and heritage as a group by residency, restaurants, businesses,
churches, schools, stores, markets, art, music, and entertainment, which are commonly located
within their respective communities. The only significant evidence of Filipino presence in Los
Angeles, however, was memorialized by a motion in 2002 that officially designated a small area
west of downtown Los Angeles as Historic Filipinotown. It memorializes an area where many
Filipinos first settled in the city, but unlike other distinct and thriving ethnic communities,
Historic Filipinotown is symbolic and in name only. (Montoya, 2009). Today, the majority of
residents in the designated Historic Filipinotown area are Latinos, but from the 1920s to
approximately the 1980s there was a significant Filipino presence in and around the officially
designated area. (Bernardo, 2014).
16
Espana-Maram (2016) argues:
Because of the dominant society’s racism and discriminatory practices and because of the
Filipinos’ lack of training in skilled and semiskilled trades, these immigrants were
concentrated in low-status, labor-intensive jobs at or near the bottom rungs of the
socioeconomic ladder. The majority of Filipinos became migratory laborers in the
agribusiness and extractive industries in the Pacific Coast states. The transitory nature of
their work and their desire for shared experiences compelled Filipinos to forge portable
communities to maintain connections among the members of this highly mobile
population. Filipinos used these informal networks to obtain information about jobs and
housing as well as to keep in touch with their compatriots along the migration circuit.
Little Manila was a portable community and basically catered to a transient group, but in
addition to the transitory nature of agricultural work for most Filipinos that came to America
between the 1920s and 1940s, many found domestic and service-related work in Los Angeles, as
did Tomas.
Tomas found work at an upscale restaurant in Hollywood as a waiter and later a
bartender, which was to become his career until his death in 1965. Although Little Manila’s
community primarily comprised Filipino transients, it was a distinct and defined space.
However, because Little Manila was located in one of the most impoverished and run-down
sections of the city, Los Angeles city officials focused on Little Manila and slated the area for
redevelopment in the mid-1940s. Redevelopment of the Little Manila section resulted in the
demolition of businesses, hotels, apartments, boxing gyms and boxing arena, but more
significantly, the one quasi-community gathering place that had reached its height in Filipino
presence in the city was destroyed.
17
The redevelopment of Little Manila basically erased any trace of Filipino presence in the
area, forcing Filipinos to relocate west of downtown Los Angeles to another run-down section of
the city known as Bunker Hill. (Montoya, 2009). Filipinos made an attempt to create another
space for themselves in Bunker Hill by re-establishing businesses in the area and living in
affordable housing. However, city officials again targeted the heavily Filipino occupied area and
slated the Bunker Hill section to be redeveloped by the demolition of its businesses, hotels,
apartments and boardinghouses, again destroying Filipino presence in the area. Relocation
further west brought Filipinos to what is known as the Temple-Beaudry corridor, another low
income section of Los Angeles.
By the end of World War II, the anti-miscegenation law in California was lifted and
immigration laws were revised to allow Filipino wives and fiancés of Filipino servicemen who
served in the U.S. Navy to immigrate to the U.S. in a provision known as the War Brides Act of
1945. (Wilt). This marked the beginning of a growing Filipino community in Los Angeles and
the need for an attachment to a place. Growing Filipino families began to settle in the Temple-
Beaudry corridor, but city officials again targeted the heavily populated Filipino area for
redevelopment, calling it the Temple Urban Renewal Project, resulting in demolition of houses,
apartments, businesses, and hotels. Filipinos were forced to relocate further west into a section
called the Temple-Beverly corridor. (Montoya, 2009).
The 1950s marked a milestone for Filipinos in America because they were now able to
purchase land, and many growing Filipino families in Los Angeles purchased their first homes in
the Temple-Beverly corridor. The area became a thriving nucleus where Filipinos established an
attachment to a place for approximately 30 years, and a place that was later designated in 2002
18
by the City of Los Angeles as Los Angeles’s Historic Filipinotown. Did the Temple-Beverly
corridor give Filipinos visibility?
A distinct Filipino space would definitely give Filipinos visibility as a community, but to
whom were Filipinos visible? The Temple-Beverly corridor is where Tomas settled and raised
his family, and is the place where I lived at a time when Filipinos were still restricted to a
primarily low-income designated section of the city. My knowledge of and experience in having
grown up in the area that is now designated as Los Angeles’s Historic Filipinotown can offer a
personal insight and explanation of what the area was really like then, why and when the area
changed, and what it is today, which can help answer the question of Filipino invisibility then
and now.
Our neighborhood was a melting pot of immigrants because it was an area where housing
was affordable. By the time I was born, Tomas was Americanized. My mother, on the other
hand, was a new immigrant and was learning to become Americanized under Tomas’ tutelage.
Only English was spoken at home, and Tomas introduced American cuisine to my mother, which
became the main fare in our home.
My best friend and neighbor was a Japanese girl. Other neighbors included Filipino,
Chinese, Mexican, German, and African Americans. Most of the children in my neighborhood
did not learn to speak their respective heritage language, except for the Chinese. My Chinese
friends spoke Chinese at home and learned to write Chinese characters, but the closest I and
many of the other children of the neighborhood knew about our respective heritage was through
food, which in my case was seldom eaten at home. I can still remember the smell in the air,
especially on Sundays, when families were cooking fried chicken, fish, pinto beans and menudo,
19
which permeated the neighborhood. At an early age I was able to detect a difference between
our Filipino family and newly immigrated Filipinos who later moved into the neighborhood.
The newly immigrated Filipinos appeared to be reclusive, except among their many
family members who I often watched come and go. Their children never came out to play with
the other children in the neighborhood; instead they played inside or in their backyards with
siblings and cousins. Other American-born Filipinos like myself thought the new immigrants to
be odd and as the years passed, even though we were neighbors for years, they were seemingly
invisible in the neighborhood. In school, the newly immigrated Filipino children seemed to stick
together, possibly because most of them were related and possibly because they spoke Filipino to
each other. In any case, there existed a divide among American-born Filipinos and Filipino-born
Americans. As the years passed, I came to realize that the only thing we had in common was
ancestry, resulting in them becoming as invisible to me, as I was to them. This phenomena still
exists today.
The county of Los Angeles comprises 4,084 square miles. Approximately 10.4 million
people currently live within the county, which comprises more than 140 cultures and
approximately 224 languages. (lacounty.gov). The Chinese community erected two large
dragons symbolizing wisdom, power and good luck at the entrance into Chinatown. The
Japanese placed pagodas, fountains, and built a Japanese Temple in the core section of
Japantown, officially designated by the City of Los Angeles as “Little Tokyo”. Thai Town
marks its area with the construction of buildings to resemble the landscape of Thailand and
displays intensely gold painted statutes of Phra Sayam Thewathirat, a supreme deity who is
regarded as a revered guardian of the Thai nation. Koreatown’s buildings are also designed to
resemble Korean architecture, and a major subway station in Los Angeles located in Koreatown
20
has been named after Alfred Hoyun Song, the first Korean and Asian-American politician to be
elected as state senator to the California State Assembly. In commemoration of the long history
of Filipinos in Los Angeles, there are a few 8-foot green and white signs, closely resembling
common freeway signs, placed along the boundaries of a relatively small area designated as
Historic Filipinotown.
Many people have asked and continue to ask me “what makes Historic Filipinotown
historic?” and “where exactly is Filipinotown?” because there are no landmarks or distinguishing
characteristics in the designated area to give it an identity, such as having a cluster of restaurants,
businesses or the like. Other than the signs posted, there would be no memorial of Filipinos in
an area that was once the most heavily populated section of the city where Filipino immigrants
resided in Southern California from the 1920s to approximately the 1980s.
As an American Filipino, I would regard a distinct Filipino community as an interesting
place to visit, rather than a cultural heritage center to which I long to belong. Does this suggest
that I do not claim my Filipino heritage? The answer is both yes and no. I am of Filipino
ancestry because not only do I look Filipino, but my parents told me that I am. However, Tomas
made sure that I was raised as an American by effectively erasing any and all traces of immigrant
mentality that could affect his new American family. I believe this is a form of invisibility.
Filipinos were destined to become invisible in America
Writer Ralph Ellison described a person as invisible if others refuse to see him. His
description, in his book, Invisible Man, was in reference to himself and his status as an African
American. Ellison’s plight of being invisible was typical of many immigrants of color in the
early years, particularly Filipinos, who were groomed in history to work for America. Some
might argue that since English is spoken in the Philippines, as a result of U.S. colonization, that
21
immigrants are more suited to wage labor and not dependent on an ethnic economy, such as the
Chinese in Chinatowns, which is the foundation for many ethnic enclaves. And others may
argue that U.S. colonization of the Philippines enabled Filipinos to become more assimilated to
American culture by the time they migrated to America, despite America’s anti-Asian
movements, regarding Filipino migration to America as the “Third Asiatic Invasion.”vi
America’s strategy of co-opting the public to endorse its colonization of the Philippines
was through the recruitment of Filipinos to work in America as cheap labor. (Abinales &
Amoroso, 2005). However, the root of U.S. colonization of the Philippines can be seen in the
U.S.’s expansion into the Pacific, which was portrayed as being for democratic and liberatory
purposes. Benevolent assimilation was constructed as a means to justify colonization by
teaching Filipinos national self-rule. (Francisco & Jenkins, 1999). Then-President William
McKinley stated: “We could not leave them to themselves . . . they were unfit for self-
government . . . there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all, and to educate the
Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them.” (History matters). In essence, the
concept of benevolent assimilation was used as a way to justify colonization. (Baldoz, 2011).
This was the equivalent of a sucker punch to the migrating Filipino, despite the appearance of a
boxer’s handshake. Filipino poet and novelist Carlos Bulosan described coming to America on
U.S. passports, but not as citizens or aliens, an existence of being neither fish nor fowl.
Struggling in America for over two decades, Tomas refused to throw-in-the towel. His
persistence in becoming Americanized was a double-edge sword. On the one hand, he fully
assimilated into American culture and became Americanized in his walk and talk, so to speak.
On the other hand, he created an Americanized family with American-born children, erasing his
Filipino accent, custom and traditions from his life, and insisting that he be called “Tommy”.
22
By the 1960s, Tommy appeared to be the clone of Clark Gable in his mannerisms and
dress, as described by my mother and others that knew him well. Tommy blended in well with
white America because he was tall in stature compared to most Filipinos, had a light complexion,
spoke perfect English, and had made many white American friends from his years of working as
a bartender in some of Hollywood’s swanky restaurants and clubs. His Filipino persona had
disappeared, and the camaraderie once shared with other young compatriots that came to
America in the early 1920s was just an echo of Tommy’s past, leaving him with few Filipino
friends.
Tommy’s next objective was to move somewhere in the suburbs, far away from the
mixed ethnic community where I was born. Unfortunately, our move to the suburbs came long
after his death. Interestingly, Tommy raised his family much like many of the other Filipino
Tommys, creating families that were intentionally separated from Filipino culture and tradition.
Learning about the history of my father, I see that being invisible was a means of
survival. Tommy was like a chameleon because he was able to blend into the American
landscape – undetected and invisible. Carlos Bulosan described his experience in coming to
America by saying “All roads go to California and all travelers wind up in Los Angeles . . . It is
hard to be a Filipino in California . . . I came to know afterward that in many ways it was a crime
to be a Filipino in California.” (Bulosan, 1943). Bulosan’s description of his Filipino American
experience mirrored Tommy’s experience. Public streets were not free for Filipinos to walk,
police officers indiscriminately harassed Filipinos, and white-run establishments prohibited entry
of Filipinos as customers or guests. For a Filipino to survive in America in the early years, it
would appear that one would have to become invisible so as not to be targeted for harassment.
This would suggest that becoming Americanized can change one’s identity.
23
Chapter 2
Identity
Seventy-three years after the birth of Tommy, the living conditions of the poor in the
Philippines, particularly in the provinces, had not improved. In the 1980s, a young boy, like
most young boys of Tango, a remote and forested area of the Sarangani province on Mindanao
Island, was burdened with the responsibility of helping to support the family at a time and place
when jobs were few and people lived in abject poverty.
People of Tango lived off the land by engaging in small gardening, lugging buckets of
water from nearby streams into the home, and searching for edible roots and leaves from
Sarangani’s jungle when there was no money to buy rice and meat. The people in Tango during
the 1980s reminded me of the Yanomamo Indians of southern Venezuela, one of the largest
unacculturated tribes that still exist today in South America. The differences, however, between
the people in Tango and the Yanomamo are a world apart.
The Yanomamo are described as “the fierce people . . . that is how they conceive
themselves to be, and that is how they would like others to think of them.” (Chagnon, 1977).
The people of Tango were poor, and many had a better chance of survival by living off the land
than living in nearby towns where food, housing and other necessities required money. Living in
Tango was not a choice, but rather it was a place to survive. Houses in Tango were typically a
one-room thatched structure called a payag or nipa hut, built on stilts and constructed of light
wood, bamboo rods, and a roof made from local plant leaves.
When the young boy reached the age of ten, he began to understand the reality of poverty
and feared for his family’s survival in Sarangani’s harsh jungle. He realized that without
adequate food, medical care, and other services available in the 20th Century, his family did not
24
stand a chance of survival. It was this realization that prompted the young man to dream of a
better life for himself and his family.
Young, strong, and full of hope, he began using his muscular legs, which he developed
from years of endless daily treks up and down mountains and hills hauling water and provisions
to his home, kicking and punching a large banana tree that shaded the family’s nipa hut. The
turning point in his life came on the day that he saw his first movie about Bruce Lee, the hero of
many martial artists. He said, “All my life, since my youth I sold odds and ends on the street
corners. I’ve always wanted to do something better, to learn something new every day. Boxing
is no different. In fact, it was a very tall ladder I wanted to climb, not just in weight classes but
in learning how to beat the best of the very best. In order to do this, I felt I had to keep growing .
. . not just physically, but mentally and emotionally as well.” The young man soon became
empowered with the strength of survival, and an obsession with fighting. His mindset changed
from being hopelessly poor to someday becoming a great contender and escaping poverty. His
name is Manny Pacquiao. (Poole, 2010).
Filipino identity in America
The turning point in Tommy’s life came when he arrived in America. Most young men
who came to America between the 1920s and 1940s desired to better themselves by working and
saving money, as well as send money back to the Philippines to help support their families, and
to obtain an education. Their enthusiasm was fueled by the poverty they left behind in the
Philippines and the promise of the American dream. Although most of the young men who came
to America as U.S. nationals came for employment and educational opportunities, the reality of
life in America for Filipinos relegated them to primarily stoop labor on the west coast’s
agricultural farms, and domestic work in the cities. Interestingly, although the early settlers were
25
disappointed and disillusioned with the American dream, it was the disappointment that kept
them in America. The restrictive immigration laws preventing Filipino women from
immigrating to America prevented many young Filipino men from marrying, anti-miscegenation
laws prevented them from marrying Caucasian women, and low wages prevented them from
being able to save any significant sum of money. Despite the circumstances, it was pride that
kept most of them in America because it would be humiliating to return to the Philippines
uneducated and in no better financial shape than when they left. It was better to simply
disappear and become invisible.
As the years passed and the men became Americanized, many lost the desire to return to
the Philippines, aging without families and remaining bachelors throughout their lives. (Cruz,
2000). Manuel Castells, Professor of Sociology and Planning at the University of California,
Berkeley, states:
Identities are sources of meaning for the actors themselves, and by themselves,
constructed through a process of individuation . . . identities can also be originated from
dominant institutions, they become identities only when and if social actors internalize
them, and construct their meaning around this internalization . . . an identity which is
self-sustaining across time and space.
Castells further points out that the construction of identities stems from various realities, such as
biology, geography, and history, to name a few. (Castells, 2010). Accordingly, Filipinos’ mixed
ancestry of Indonesian, Chinese, Japanese, Spanish and Caucasian had an effect on physical
appearances, dialects, customs and traditions in various regions of the Philippines.
The difference between Manny Pacquiao and Tommy is their self-identity. Pacquiao
wanted to escape poverty by doing what he was good at, which was boxing. Whether his boxing
26
skills garnered attention in Venezuela or Jerusalem, it did not matter. Becoming a celebrity in
America by boxing in American rings and defeating American boxers was really a means to an
end for Pacquiao. He accomplished his goals by earning enough money to pull himself and his
family out of poverty, but his identity as a Filipino never wavered. If anything, he capitalized on
his Filipinonessvii, which the Filipinos in the Philippines applauded, and gave American Filipinos
a sense of lost ethnic pride.
Castells also asserts:
[Identity is] people’s source of meaning and experience . . . construction of meaning on
the basis of a cultural attribute, or a related set of cultural attributes, that is given priority
over other sources of meaning. For a given individual, or for a collective actor, there
may be a plurality of identities. Yet, such a plurality is a source of stress and
contradiction in both self-representation and social action . . . roles are defined by norms
structured by the institutions and organizations of society. Their relative weight in
influencing people’s behavior depends upon negotiations and arrangements between
individuals and these institutions and organizations.
Pacquiao’s international success in boxing also gave him added success in the
Philippines, which became a true rags to riches story. The more fame and money Pacquiao
acquired, the more he gave back to the Philippines by spotlighting a third world country from
which one of the world’s greatest boxers emerged, and founding educational institutions that
would give impoverished children in the Philippines, particularly in Sarangani, an opportunity
for an education.
27
Pacquiao’s celebrity status and help in bettering impoverished Filipinos, particularly in
poor provinces, not only earned him an honorary degree in Human Kinetics from Cebu’s
Southwestern University in the Philippines, but he was also elected to serve as a congressman in
the House of Representatives, representing his home province of Sarangani. His popularity has
made him a Filipino hero in the Philippines, and American Filipinos join in celebrating a hero
who represents something bigger than themselves, even though they may not have anything even
remotely in common with Pacquiao, except for ancestry. In fact, outside of a highly publicized
fight when American Filipinos donned Pacquiao t-shirts and displayed other Pacquiao-related
paraphernalia, American Filipinos make fun of Pacquiao’s thick Filipino accent. I, too, am
guilty of poking fun at him at times. Tommy, on the other hand, strived to become
Americanized, which permanently distanced him from the Philippines and Filipino-Americans.
28
A Filipino sub-culture is born in America
In the 1920s, America’s dominant society was racist, and people of color, particularly
Filipinos, were subjected to racism and discrimination. The majority of Filipino laborers that
came to America in the 1920s were unskilled workers, relegated to low-status, low-pay, and
labor-intensive work found at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder. A great majority of
Filipinos from the 1920s to early 1940s became migratory laborers and cannery workers on the
west coast, including Alaska. As Espana-Maram (2006) argues:
The transitory nature of their work and their desire for shared experiences compelled
Filipinos to forge portable communities to maintain connections among the members of
this highly mobile population. Filipinos used these informal networks to obtain
information about jobs and housing as well as to keep in touch with their compatriots
along the migration circuit.
Little Manila was a portable community and catered to a transient group. It also was a place
where many of these young men underwent a transformation of identity through the process of
becoming Americanized, manifested in a subculture known as the manongs, much like the
African-American and Mexican zoot suitsviii of the 1930s and 1940s.
Tommy was a manong, as were most of the young men of the 1920s-1940s. The
manongs distinguished themselves in their style of dress, daily routines and recreational
activities. Tommy associated with other young men who were from different parts of the
Philippines and spoke different dialects, but shared the same trials and tribulations in America,
which created a bond between them. Young, virile, separated from family, subjected to
miscegenation laws and banned from patronizing white establishments, including churches, they
were forced to find a way to exist in a country that oppressed them. Disillusioned with the
29
American dream and ashamed to return home to the Philippines no better off than when they left,
they created a new identity in America.
Best known for his bolo punch, which was a powerful right uppercut blow, Ceferino
Garcia was the favorite contender and hero in the eyes of Filipino young men, particularly on the
west coast where the majority of Filipinos lived and worked. Boxing was a popular activity,
either engaged in or attended by Filipinos. It superseded other popular recreational activities,
such as gambling dens in Chinatown and taxi dance halls, where a Filipino could dance cheek-to-
cheek with a Caucasian woman for ten cents a minute. Because boxing was a mainstream
organized sport, Filipinos were not banned from attending prizefighting events, especially if the
event was located in downtown Los Angeles, which they often were. Filipinos would travel
hundreds of miles up and down California’s coast to attend boxing matches, especially when a
Filipino favorite pugilist was fighting.
Tommy had relayed many of his boxing stories to my mother, which she later told to me
and which are very similar, if not identical, to other boxing stories I have been told by people of
my generation who grew up hearing stories from their fathers and uncles, who were also
manongs. The sport of boxing not only represented an exciting activity for spectators in
watching gloved hand-to-hand combat between two contenders, and the possibility of a monetary
win from a bet, but it was a means of self-expression for these young men. It did not matter that
many of these young men, including Tommy, lost a week’s wages on a bet, because they also
often lost a week’s wages in one night at a taxi dance hall. According to Espana-Maram (2006),
boxing and taxi dance halls became a means of expressing masculinity in a society that
attempted to suppress it.
30
Manongs can best be described as men who frequented seedy establishments around the
city, drove flashy cars, wore expensive tailored McIntosh suits--pin stripped suits were the most
popular--hats, gold chains, gold watches and bright gold diamond rings. Tommy’s closet was
full of McIntosh suits, hats, shoes, jewelry, pipes, smoking jackets, and many other accessories
that mirrored a wardrobe of movie stars, such as Clark Gable, who most Filipino manongs
modeled themselves after. These young men resisted the look of a poor laborer by transforming
their image into a suave, masculine identity. This new identity enabled them to escape
invisibility as just another migrant laborer through their distinct dress, but it resulted in the
manongs becoming more vulnerable to the negative and discriminating reception of them in
white America.
The new Filipino male image countered white society’s earlier stereotype of the Filipino
as being asexual, dirty laborers in overalls, docile workers by day donned in uniforms provided
by domestic and service-type industries to being trouble makers by night who frequented billiard
rooms, taxi dance halls, gambling dens and seduced white women. The new image stereotyped
Filipino men as being hypersexual and a menace to white society by keeping company with
white women, as well as a menace to white labor, particularly during the Depression years when
Filipinos were willing to work for lower wages than Caucasians. (Tiongson, Gutierrez &
Gutierrez, 2006).
Philip Vera Cruz, a Filipino American who was a key figure in the formation of the
United Farmworkers Association, recalls the effect anti-miscegenation laws had on Filipino men,
and how sex became a problem because of their vulnerability in being easily hustled by white
women in taxi dance halls. The story was always the same, “a hustler would tell a guy she loved
him to get his trust . . . she would say, ‘honey, you can’t read very well’ or ‘you don’t speak
31
good English’, so why don’t you put your car in my name . . . she disappears with the car.”
(Scharlin & Villanueva, 2000). The transformation of these Filipino men allowed them to
become contenders, even though they continued to be bamboozled by white women and despised
by dominant white society; they worked by day and danced with white women at night. It was a
triumph of a sort.
Knowing the history of my father and personally meeting a large number of manongs
through the years, I believe that the root of their transformation was similar to Roberta Menchu’s
transformation, a poor and powerless Guatemalan woman who understood and realized the need
to transform herself by learning Spanish in order to assimilate and become a contender in a
different and discriminating culture. (Wright, 1984). The difference between Menchu and the
manongs was that Menchu’s transformation by learning to speak Spanish was a means to an end
in fighting for her people. The manongs transformed themselves by becoming American; a new
identity that alienated and disassociated themselves from new Filipino immigrants, as well as
from their homeland.
George Lipsitz, professor of Black Studies and Sociology at the University of California,
Santa Barbara, describes cultural indeterminacy as “picking and choosing from many traditions
to fashion performances and narratives suitable for arbitrating an extraordinarily complex
identity.” The manongs had distinct characteristics in their style of fashion, recreation and
fantasy. Another pursuit for acknowledgment and recognition was a shared desire among the
manongs to become movie stars, especially those living in Los Angeles, where Hollywood lives
and movies are made. Tommy desired to become bigger than life. At night he worked in a
Hollywood restaurant, but during the day he was often a movie extra, as were many other
Filipinos desiring to break into the movies. After all, they dressed like movie stars. Most casting
32
calls that Filipinos auditioned for were native-types or service-types, such as servants or butlers,
but mostly they were cast as uncredited extras.
In the 1930s, Director Frank Capra hired thirty-five Filipinos to portray bandits in the
Columbia Studios film Lost Horizon. (Espana-Maram, 2006). There were a handful of Filipino
actors that made it to the big screen by the 1940s, but they were never given a leading role. One
such Filipino actor, Leon Lontoc, was cast in more than fifty roles and was portrayed as either a
Chinese boatman, butler, steward, native or savage, but was never given a leading role.
(Montoya, 2008).
During the Great Depression years (1929-1939), the average daily wage of Filipinos was
$1.00. The pay Tommy earned as a movie extra was much higher than what he earned in a
week’s wages at the restaurant. The extra money and being part of a Hollywood movie, however
small and insignificant his role, added to his new identity, the manong identity. The manong
identity was expressed by being flashy dressers, boxing enthusiasts, good taxi dance hall dancers,
and connected to Hollywood. Tommy was all of that. By the time he met my mother in the mid-
1940s, she thought at first glance that he was a wealthy movie star or a wealthy Filipino-
American. Soon after they married she realized that he “didn’t have a pot to piss in.” Such was
the case with many of the manongs from that era, who lost their money by keeping up with the
identity and image of a manong. The manongs were legendary in their own right, and had a
reputation that preceded them, which was not a good thing at the time.
Between the years 1906 and 1934, the pensionados, students whose education in America
was subsidized by the government, were also subjected to the obstacles of discrimination in
America, despite their education and fluency in English before coming to America. Although
they were forced to find housing in low income areas where manongs also resided, there existed
33
a separation between the students and manongs. The students did not approve of the manong
lifestyle because not only did it taint the Filipino-American image, but they regarded the manong
lifestyle as being idle and wasteful, and more importantly immoral. (Espana-Maram, 2006).
My mother knew about the manong reputation long before she came to America in the
mid-1940s. She was warned not to associate with them, much like children today whose parents
fear that they will encounter or become influenced by the wrong children at school. The same
negative sentiments towards manongs prevailed in later Filipino immigration, such as in the
enactment of the 1965 Amendment to the Immigration Nationality Act, which abolished the 1924
national origins quota that was designed to preserve the ethnic balance of the U.S. population
favoring Nordics. The enactment reversed the former immigration exclusionary regulations by
allowing other foreign nations, including the Philippines, to thousands of immigrant entries per
year. The revision opened the flood gates for another wave of Filipino immigration, which
included thousands of educated and professional Filipino immigrants. (Cordova, 1983).
The Impact of different Filipino mindsets and identities in America
Merriam-Webster defines individuation as: “(1) the development of the individual from
the universal; and (2) the determination of the individual by the process by which individuals in
society become differentiated from one another.” The Philippine Island’s national origins lie in
Spanish and U.S. imperialism, and the effects of their colonization on the Filipinos has left them
with the feeling of being unsure of their roots. (Mulder, 2013). This prompts the contemporary
question, what does it mean to be Filipino? Spanish and U.S. colonization of the Philippines
both divided the rich from the poor. The rich became educated and held jobs of prominence,
while the poor remained poor, such as those living in the provinces. The two classes were
separate.
34
The history of the Philippines’ controversial arbitrary and corrupt nature of politics and
its effect on ordinary poor people prevented identification with the collective whole, resulting in
people not able to develop into a nation of genuinely committed citizens because of the distinct
divide between the rich and poor. (Mulder, 2013). Tommy was an ordinary poor individual,
much like other poor people living on the islands’ cities and provinces. The education, income,
and status differences created a distinct line between the haves and have-nots, something
seemingly engrained in the Filipino psyche, even after Americanization. I personally witnessed
growing up, and still witness, this engrained mentality and mindset among Filipino-Americans
from opposite sides of the fence.
Pacquiao was an ordinary poor person before his first big winix that put him on the
marquee. He did not come to America in response to American labor needs or to seek a better
life. He simply became aware of his talents and sought to use them as a means to escape poverty
in the Philippines. In contrast, Tommy came to America in response to America’s need for
cheap labor, choosing to remain in America to live a better life rather than return to the abject
poverty in Cavite. On this ground, one can see the different mindsets. Had Pacquiao become
acquainted with the manongs in the 1920s, he likely would have been accepted as part of that
subculture because he came from the same beginnings. However, Pacquiao would also be
accepted by, if not invited to be part of, the more educated and affluent Filipinos in America by
virtue of his celebrity and financial status.
Speaking for myself, my identification with Pacquiao is personal, but it came to be as a
result of his celebrity status which brought him into one of the circles in which I am a part. What
if Pacquiao was simply a no-name without celebrity status; would I still identify with him? My
honest answer is “no” because we have nothing in common, such as language, culture, education
35
or profession. I do not believe that it is conscious snobbery, but rather a form of snobbery as a
result of a difference in identity. Although I realize that I am a cumulative creation of my
parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and so on, and have inherited many traits such as
stature, skin color, brains (that part unfortunate), prejudices, likings, and culture--which by the
time I was born was undeniably Americanized--Pacquiao could easily be an Ethiopian in my
eyes. It is his larger-than-life status that makes knowing him thrilling, a mere coincidence that
he is Filipino. I feel the same way about another boxing great, Muhammad Ali, whom I have
also personally met. It is this type of connection, if any, that I have with Filipino Americans,
which mirrors the connection, if any, that they have with American Filipinos. Based on this type
of superficial relationship, what would be the impetus to form a thriving Filipino community
today?
Another significant difference between Filipinos and American Filipinos is religion. The
Philippines is perhaps the only Christian nation in Asia with 86 percent being Roman Catholic, 6
percent of various nationalized Christian cults, and 2 percent belonging to over 100 Protestant
denominations. (Miller). My parents were Catholic, and my brother and I were raised as
Catholics. However, by the time I was born Tommy was not a practicing Catholic. My mother
told me that before 1947 there were no churches in Los Angeles that welcomed Filipinos. In a
concerted effort to have a place of worship, Filipino families in the Temple-Beverly corridor
came together and created fundraising events to raise money for the purchase of a building to
hold church services. In 1947, the Catholic Filipino community was able to purchase an old fire
station that they converted into the first Filipino-owned Catholic Church in America. (Montoya,
2009). Years later I was baptized and married in this church.
36
Fundraising events included beauty pageants comprising candidates who were the
daughters of Filipinos from various cities and provinces in the Philippines. The candidate who
sold the most tickets won the title of Miss Philippines. Other fundraising events included
barbecues and potlucks where Filipinos came together and exchanged ethnic foods from various
regions of the Philippines, as well as displays of traditional Filipino dance performances, crafts,
and the like. Tommy had no interest in these events and did not desire to associate with this new
generation of Filipino immigrants, and he discouraged my mother from associating with these
groups.
Several Filipino organizations began to spring up in Los Angeles, mostly as individual
clubs comprising members from specific regions of the Philippines. It was only during
fundraising events, such as the beauty queen pageants, when the various organizations came
together, otherwise they were virtually invisible to each other. One such group, called The
Filipino Federation of America (“FFA”), was established in 1925. The FFA was a quasi-
religious organization, but more commonly known among the Filipino community as a non-
Christian cult. It was founded by Hilario C. Moncado (1898-1956), who devoted his life to the
betterment of native Filipinos in America.
Moncado mostly targeted the all-male Filipino population across California to join the
Federation. He offered free housing, food, employment in agriculture (field laborers), specific
recreational activities, mainly golf, and spirituality in exchange for strict obedience to the rules
and guidelines of the organization, as well as turning over all monies earned from employment to
the Federation.
Out of financial desperation, some manongs joined the Federation, relinquishing their
flashy lifestyle. A few of the strict rules were vegetarianism, teetotalism, and extreme physical
37
fitness. Those that disobeyed were severely punished by their disappearance, never to be seen or
heard from again. Because Filipinos have historically been invisible in American history, and
because the Federation was mostly a secret organization, not much has been documented or
publicly written about it. However, among its hundreds of members throughout California, the
fear of disappearing held the same threat as the fear of God that most Christians subscribe to.
I gained admittance into the Federation world in Los Angeles by befriending the
caretakers of the headquarters’ mansion/office in Los Angeles in order to obtain props for a
manong exhibit I created for a traveling Smithsonian art exhibit in 2009. It was there that I came
to know about the secret life of the Federation and its founder, Moncado, who was not a
vegetarian or a teetotaler and lived a lavish lifestyle at the expense of his followers. As an
outsider, I can see that feeding hundreds of vegetarians was more cost effective than feeding
hundreds of meat eaters, and the constant flow of money to the Federation enabled Moncado to
purchase lavish homes in America and abroad. The Federation shunned all other Filipinos and
Filipino organizations, and the Catholic and non-Catholic Christian Filipino communities
shunned the Federation. In all this separateness among Filipinos in Los Angeles, how would it
be possible to establish a Filipino community?
Tommy did not associate with the Federation, Catholic, Christian or other Filipino
organizations because he regarded them as too ethnic, and he shielded his children from it too.
Interestingly, my mother, too, severed ties with the Filipino-American community, often
commenting that she didn’t find anything in common with them, much less have a desire to live
among them in a distinct community. I believe that for my mother it was a combination of
becoming more Americanized than newly immigrated Filipinos, and being less educated than
38
immigrating professionals that began to comprise a fast-growing Filipino population in Los
Angeles. This set the stage for continued separateness among Filipinos in Los Angeles.
Organizations chose to remain separate, religious organizations were separate due to their
beliefs, Americanized Filipinos distanced themselves from newly immigrated Filipinos,
education and professional careers caused a status divide, and all groups looked down upon
manongs. Does this offer a plausible answer as to why there was never a distinct thriving
Filipino community in Los Angeles?
The most interesting and curious facet of the Filipino-American experience is that
becoming American through citizenship and Americanization, Filipinos seemingly disappear into
the mainstream. Speaking fluent English and many bearing Spanish surnames and Anglo-
surnames through marriage, it is difficult today to single out a Filipino or a person of Filipino
ancestry, unless they shout it out as they did when they came out to cheer for Pacquiao on the
night of May 5. Their shouts acknowledged a lot or a little bit of their ancestry and heritage that
night.
39
Chapter 3
Filipino History
Early history of colonization
Spain’s colonization of the Philippines for almost 400 years (1521-1898) changed the
Filipino native culture by imposing new social, economic, political, religious, and caste values.
Even before Spanish colonization the natives of the archipelago comprised a mixture of several
different cultures and races of people, including Negritos, Malaysians, Indonesians, Chinese,
Japanese, and Indians. On that ground, perhaps Spain’s long occupation in the Philippines gave
the natives an identity. After all, the Spanish named the archipelago the “Philippines”, after
King Philip II of Spain, and called those of mixed Spanish blood, Filipinos. However, after
Spain’s colonization the natives continued to call themselves Filipinos. This would seem to
indicate that they played an important role in shaping their own self-identity as Filipino, and
didn’t simply adopt a name and identity that was forced on them by others.
Although the Spanish flourished in the Philippines, natives largely remained poor,
particularly those living in relatively remote provincesx where growing technology and
industrialization did not reach these areas until well into the 21st Century. Todaro and Smith
(2012) state that “European colonization often created or reinforced differing degrees of
inequality that was often correlated with ethnicity . . . postcolonial elites in many developing
countries largely took over the exploitative role formerly played by the colonial powers.” When
the Philippines was ceded by Spain to the United States in 1898 under the Treaty of Parisxi, U.S.
colonization of the Philippines further changed the cultural effects of Spanish colonization on the
Filipinos.
40
The U.S. occupation in the Philippines lasted forty-eight years (1898-1946), adding an
additional 48 years of colonization. The U.S. had full control over the resources of the
Philippines, and sent Filipino studentsxii to obtain an education in the U.S. in the fields of
business, medicine and politics. Upon completion of their studies, graduates would return to the
Philippines and would be placed in government positions that could help manage the new
westernized economic and political changes in the Philippines. (Cordova, 1983). The U.S.
occupation in the Philippines also introduced and promoted Western ways by imposing different
social, economic and political values which, for example, can be seen in the Philippine national
flag that displays the dominant colors of red, white and blue. Does this indicate that Filipinos
desire to self-identify as American by becoming American?
Filipino elites through the years of colonization lived comfortably while the poor
remained poor, which is still the economic reality in the Philippines today. Todaro and Smith
(2012) assert that “It becomes quite clear that colonialism played a major role in shaping
institutions that set the rules of the economic game, which can limit or facilitate opportunities for
economic development”. Further, “Colonial history matters not only or even primarily because
of stolen resources but also because the colonial powers determined whether the legal and other
institutions in their colonies would encourage investments by the broad population or would
instead facilitate exploitation of human and other resources for the benefit of the colonizing elite
and create or reinforce extreme inequality.” (Todaro and Smith (2012). Cheng & Bonicich
(1984) argue that capitalist development in industrialized nations is one cause of imperialist
invasions in non-Western regions in search of cheap labor and resources.
U.S. colonization of the Philippines resulted in migration of Filipinos as colonial subjects
who were segregated, marginalized and powerless in America, all of which rendered them
41
invisible. President William McKinley’s justification for colonizing the Philippines in 1898 was
the benevolent assimilation of Filipinos into democracy and modernity. (Ngai, 2004). Bernardo
(2014) adds that “White hostility towards the corporeality of Filipino presence in the United
States during the 1920s and 1930s made Filipino assimilation into American society an
impossibility”. The new arena that the Filipino colonial subjects found themselves in was akin to
sparring in boxing – work hard, get hit, use self-control in protecting oneself, or else get kicked
out of the game.
When the U.S. gave Filipino Americans immigrant status, as opposed to national status, it
not only attempted to erase its once colonial hold on Filipinos, but it attempted to change the
mindset of Filipino Americans. Because the U.S. later granted Filipinos U.S. citizenship, home
ownership and assimilation into American society, many Filipinos were able to get their piece of
the American dream. U.S. colonization had groomed Filipinos in western ways, through the
establishment of a public school system in the Philippines, institution of the English language,
education, employment opportunities in America, television, radio, American products, music
and the arts. When Tommy came to America in the early 1920s, he was fluent in English, as was
my mother who immigrated to America in 1945. Although there was a large age gap of 20 years
between my parents, they both shared the same desire to become American and they shunned
Filipinoness, even Filipinos from what is referred to as the Bridge Generation.
The Bridge Generation
The term Bridge Generation was coined by Peter Jamero, an American Filipino writer
and retired assistant professor at the University of Washington. The term refers to children born
in America from at least one Filipino parent before 1946. As discussed earlier in this paper,
many of the early Filipino settlers between the early 1900s and the 1940s came to America in
42
response to America’s need for labor. Many of the laborers, who were mostly males, found
work on the agricultural farms on the west coast. Children born from the union of agricultural
workers lived in campos, which were farm-labor camps. Here is where Filipino communities
existed, albeit in portable communities.
Filipino agricultural workers stuck together, but not necessarily as a solid Filipino group.
Agricultural laborers followed the crop seasons in California and the Pacific Northwest. They
also worked in Alaskan canneries during the summer months, and in the cities during the winter
months as busboys, cooks, bell hops and others service related positions. Campos were formed
based on where workers were from in the Philippines. For example, Ilocanos and Visayans
comprised the dominant groups because the HPSA originally targeted those regions for labor.
Ilocanos were from the Ilocos region and Visayans were from islands that stretch along the
Visayan sea coast. Although both groups were Filipino, they spoke different dialects, cooked
different foods, and their cultures were different than the Ilocanos. As a result, they kept
separate camps from each other. In contrast to Filipinos living and working in large cities,
campos were often isolated in rural communities and the American born children of the workers
were typically raised to learn the Filipino language, tradition and customs. However, the Bridge
Generation represents an era that is somewhat unique to the Filipino-American experience.
Children of the Bridge Generation formed close ties with each other, many lasting for a
lifetime. The Bridge Generation fully acknowledged their Filipino ancestry and heritage and
coined the word “Flips”, meaning they were American Filipinos. (Jamero, 2006). They grew up
playing together, becoming members of Filipino youth clubs, and participating in Filipino sports
activities. It was for all intents and purposes a Filipino community, whether it was at the campos
or in a small rural agricultural town. But children of the Bridge Generation had difficulty with
43
those who were Filipino-born who did not like the Bridge Generation’s American ways and their
decision to speak only English, or their inability to speak a particular Filipino dialect. This also
stands in contrast to city-born American Filipinos, such as myself. I resent being called a Flip
and have never had the desire to attend any all-Filipino clubs or organizations in my youth. Here
is where another separateness existed among American Filipinos.
The common denominator between the children of the Bridge Generation and later
generations, such as mine, is the differing parental mindsets that created a distinct culture gap
between Filipino parents and their American-born children. For me, being born and raised in
Los Angeles, known for its melting pot population, it was easy for me to become socialized with
a diverse mix of other ethnicities. I quickly became Americanized in comparison to children
growing up in agricultural communities who were virtually isolated. I was as different to them
as they were to me, and we are no closer today as a community of American Filipinos than we
were yesterday. As American Filipinos, especially second and later generations, our values and
different outlook on world views and cultural perspectives creates a divide where neither is right
or wrong, but it is those differences that keep us separate.
Most children of the Bridge Generation experienced the hardships of the Great
Depression, as well as the harsh obstacles of discrimination, especially when Filipinos were
harassed by being accused of taking jobs away from Americans. They grew up being called
apes, monkeys and dogs by white Americans. They resented their parents’ colonial mentality of
acting and feeling inferior to whites. In a sense, the Bridge Generation rebelled against white
society by parading their brownness and refusing to be treated any less than an American. They
fought back by obtaining an education and securing professions. Their aspiration was to become
44
Americanized in order to be accepted. Fortunately, their success took them away from the harsh
rural communities, but unfortunately, it also took them away from a Filipino community.
This stands in contrast to my generation of the 1960s. I knew nothing about the Great
Depression and never heard about Filipinos being called apes, monkeys and dogs until I read the
books of Peter Jamero and other Bridge Generation authors. Further, only some children of my
generation aspired for a higher education and profession. Both the Filipino American and
American Filipino values can be likened to every man for himself. This is clearly evidenced in
one of the most historical Filipino attempts in America to form a solid group – a labor union.
The United Farmworkers Association
Philip Vera Cruz came to America around the same time as Tommy. His reasons for
leaving the Philippines for America was the same as most of the other young men – to obtain an
education and earn a better living to help support their family in the Philippines. (Scharlin &
Villanueva, 2000). However, because of the reality of being an unskilled and poor Filipino in
America in the early 1920s, Philip soon realized that his dream of an education was not going to
be easy to attain, so he sought work on California’s agricultural farms. He remained an
agricultural laborer for more than 40 years.
Before 1936, Filipinos were nationals and were not eligible for U.S. citizenship. They
were also powerless in not having a voice in political activities, such as organizing as a political
body to form a union. In the late 1950s, Philip became a member of the Agricultural Workers
Organizing Committee (AWOC), which was not a union, but rather a branch of the American
Federation of Labor – Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO). AWOC was headed by
a Caucasian, but its members were mostly Filipino laborers. It was a place where farmworkers
could voice complaints and discuss ways to earn higher wages and better living conditions.
45
Hundreds of Filipinos would attend the meetings. A Filipino man named Larry Itliong became
the first AWOC organizer, along with a Mexican woman named Dolores Huerta. It was on
September 8, 1965 that members of the AWOC decided to strike, resulting in the first major
agricultural strike that launched the United Farmworkers Association (UFA).
Both Philip Vera Cruz and Larry Itliong were central to the formation of the UFA, but the
lack of unity among Filipinos caused their fall and the subsequent rise of Cesar Chavez. By the
mid-1960s, Philip was a candidate for vice president of the UFA, but the aging Filipino men who
once fought for a voice were turning away from the man who they once supported as their
advocate. Most of the men had toiled in the fields since the 1920s and were afraid to rock the
boat, so to speak, and risk losing what little they acquired through the years. Most remained
bachelors and were virtually alone in America with no family, except their compatriots who were
also alone and aging. This resulted in Philip losing the election and resigning from the UFA.
(Scharlin & Villanueva, 2000).
The aging Filipino laborers retired at a place called 40 acres, a building owned by the
UFA for its members located on Garces Highway near the Delano City Dump. Philip bought a
small house with his savings away from the men he toiled in the fields with for over 40 years,
creating a separateness between him and the men. And what did Tommy and others living in the
city do for the UFA cause? I know that Tommy did nothing, except get up and change the
television station when the news reported the Delano grape strike. A televised boxing match was
much more interesting to watch. Since Tommy did not support the Filipinos involved in the
UFA cause and strikes, my brother and I didn’t know about it until we were older.
46
Second generation American Filipinos
In an essay titled Immigration Portrayed as an Experience of Transplantation, John
Bodnar argues that at some point “all individuals meet the larger structural realities of their
existence and construct a relationship upon a system of ideas, values, and behavior which
collectively gives meaning to their world and provides a foundation upon which they can act and
survive.” (Gjerde, 1998). Tommy soon became aware of the harsh reality of being a Filipino in
America, particularly in a large city such as Los Angeles. Philip Vera Cruz also soon became
aware of the harsh reality of being a Filipino in America, particularly in a dominant rural white
community. Both Tommy and Philip yearned to be accepted by white America in two different
ways. Tommy transformed his physical appearance to blend in with the Hollywood crowd by
wearing expensive suits, jewelry and perfecting his English and erasing his Filipino accent. He
also raised his children without any mention of their Filipino heritage. Philip sought acceptance
by fighting for a voice that would empower the powerless laborers. Tommy’s success was found
in his American children. Philip’s success was found in the eventual success of the UFA, which
gave field laborers better wages and living conditions.
Much like other minority immigrants in California, such as the Chinese, Japanese and
Mexicans, long-time residents of Los Angeles and rural communities throughout California’s
farmlands resented new immigrants who were better able to assimilate in American society
without the struggles earlier immigrants faced. The new immigrants were able to buy property
and establish lucrative businesses. Business owners were able to post signs on their buildings in
a different language, such as Chinese, Spanish and Japanese. Opportunities that were not offered
to the early immigrants, such as education and higher paying jobs, were available to later
generations. Those opportunities virtually took Filipinos out of the fields because the earlier
47
farm laborers were growing old and retiring, and the new generation was more skilled, educated
and able to secure higher paying jobs outside of agricultural farms and domestic service jobs.
Another example of immigrant parents raising their children as Americans is found in an
essay by Vick L. Ruiz titled, Changes between Daughters and Parents in the Mexican American
Family. Ruiz states that “many middle-class Mexicans desired to dissociate themselves from
working-class neighbors” and “middle-class Mexicanos found themselves subject to ethnic
prejudice that did not discriminate by class”, resulting in parents encouraging their children to
pass themselves off as being Spanish, not Mexican. Mexicans, like Filipinos, were stereotyped
as being dirty, ignorant, lazy, thieves and drunkards. Attempts to transform themselves into
white Americans by living incognito was a means of survival in a discriminating society.
Tommy lived his life in America incognito, but his children did not.
On this ground, the separateness between Filipinos makes it impossible to form a distinct
and thriving community in America. The differences in class, status, mindset and identity are all
factors that prevent a people from coming together and coexisting in a defined space with a
national identity. It is no different than the mindset and identity of an average American-born
Caucasian whose heritage is, say, French-German. If you ask them “where are you from?” they
are likely to respond, “I’m an American”, but my parents or grandparents were from France and
Germany. If you also asked them if they practice any French or German traditions, they will
likely respond, “no.” Accordingly, if you use this example to explain a Filipino’s estrangement
towards fellow Filipinos it makes sense. Time, place, environment, culture, peers, language,
education, profession, fashion, religion, inter-racial marriage, etc., the list goes on—these are the
things that define a person. However, there does exist a predominately French and German
community in Los Angeles, whether or not the average American born Caucasian with French
48
and German ancestry chooses to associates with it. Although it might help explain why there is
not a Filipino community in Los Angeles today, it does not explain why there was not a distinct
community in the early years. Yet, Filipino national identity comes out when someone like
Pacquiao represents the Philippines.
49
Chapter 4
National Identity
George Foreman, one of America’s former boxing icons and a two-time world
heavyweight and Olympic gold medalist, is often quoted as saying, “Boxing is the sport to which
all other sports aspire”. His statement indicates to me that sports can transcend mere athletics,
especially demanding physical sports, such as boxing. Boxing, however, is perhaps the most
challenging of sports because it depicts ultimate manly traits – contender, protector, strength,
virility. In boxing, two males come face-to-face in a challenge that tests one of the basic human
physiological reactions to a perceived threat, namely, survival.
McKay & McKay (2010) describe boxing, saying “There is but two men, facing off with
nowhere to go, with only their fists and their determination to decide their fate”. This one-to-one
combat situation can be used as a metaphor in describing other similar and challenging
situations, such as the Filipino experience: Filipino versus Spanish, Filipino versus American,
Filipino versus Filipino, and immigrant versus nativist.
McKay & McKay further describe boxing as having “a connection to cultural ideals and
masculinity that has given boxing a volatile history . . . people have recoiled at boxing’s
perceived brutality, seeing the sport as evidence of a barbarism at odds with a perception of
themselves as too enlightened for such pursuits”.
The Filipino-American experience, much like boxing, had its challenges with a larger-
than-life opponent, namely, white America. Similarly, the scars of the sport left on a boxer can’t
be missed or denied. Cauliflower ear is a term used when the external part of the ear is subjected
to trauma. If the ear is repeatedly injured by heavy blows, cartilage in the ear separates from the
perichondrium, resulting in the formation of fibrous tissue in the overlying skin. A more severe
50
condition that could result from frequent trauma to the head affecting the brain is dementia
pugilistica, a neurodegenerative disease much like dementia. Boxing great, Mohammad Ali,
suffers from Parkinson’s syndrome, which is a common disease with symptoms of dementia and
associated with head trauma. Metaphorically, the sport of boxing has been much like the
Filipino-American experience for the early settlers, including the scars from decades of
sustaining blows from obstacles and discrimination. The resulting amnesia is bittersweet. Bitter
for the many who endured the rounds, but sweet for the new generation who are far removed
from the ring, and either have forgotten the history or don’t know or don’t care. Nina Simone, a
Black American singer, songwriter and civil rights activist of the 1950s, sums up the Filipino
identity in her 1965 song, Feeling Good. The lyrics, It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new
life for me, speaks of a transformation and change in identity.
Filipino culture
The Philippines comprises approximately 7,100 islands at low tide, but only
approximately 2,000 islands are inhabited. Given this mental picture of an archipelago
comprising thousands of islands, it would be difficult to imagine a distinct image of its people
and culture. For example, the province of Ifugao, located on the main island of Luzon in the
Cordillera Administrative Region, is home to the Igorots or Cordillerans, the collective name of
many Austronesian groups. The Ifaguao Indians live in and around the province of Ifugao and
still live a largely primitive lifestyle, and are known for their extensive tribal tattooing. Although
the Philippines comprises a high percentage of Catholics and other Christians, the beliefs of the
Ifaguao evolved in becoming a complex Ifaguao cosmology, which has been shaped over time
by many factors, including Christianity. The other thousands of islands engage in their own
respective beliefs and practices, including different dialects, foods, and social habits. On this
51
ground, if culture is the sum of the characteristics of a particular group of people, then it would
follow that the Philippine Islands have many different cultures and cannot be seen as
homogenous.
Tommy’s province had a distinct Spanish and U.S. influence, mostly as a result of its
ideal physical location where both the Spanish and U.S. had a strong presence through the years
of occupation. Most people of Cavite spoke fluent Spanish, English, Tagalog and Chabacano, as
did Tommy. In contrast to the province of Ifugao, the language spoken by the Ifaguao Indians is
Malayo-Polynesian, which comprises four separate dialects. Notwithstanding the different
regions of the Philippines where Cavite and Ifugao are located, the people of these two provinces
were a people with their own unique identity, occupying a space in an archipelago called the
Republic of the Philippines. Is the national identity of the Ifaguao Indians Filipino because of
the political umbrella under which they live? Or is their identity the sum total of their
uniqueness?
Culture is not a fixed ideology. Rather, it is fluid and religious beliefs, values, and other
elements that make up a culture are subject to change with time. With that said, it is difficult to
define any culture in only one way. (Zimmerman, 2015).
Filipino culture and national identity
A nation’s culture is multi-faceted and takes shape by the history of its people. It is
where people share beliefs, values, language, art, music, etc., resulting in their identification with
each other. These shared interactions collectively give a person his or her identity that can
mirror how people or a nation sees itself. However, given the many different cultures of the
Philippines, it is difficult to combine Filipino culture and identity because of their many
differences.
52
National identity can be found among people who share a distinct character, and the
distinction is different from other countries. National identity can also be a sense of pride in
one’s country because of its history, economy, traditions, political institutions, achievements, and
sports teams. The latter is evidenced when Filipinos from around the world, even people with
just a small fraction of Filipino ancestry, joined in the spirit of national identity by cheering for a
Filipino hero. However, as discussed earlier, the people of the Philippines do not share a distinct
character, and the lack of a distinct character is what makes them different from most other
countries. The history of being colonized by the Spanish and the U.S. for several hundred years
has been both cursed and celebrated. The Philippines celebrates being free from imperialists, but
remains a Third World country with widespread abject poverty and a long history of corrupt
politics that has kept poor people poor.
Tommy escaped poverty in the Philippines by coming to America with the hopes and
dreams of attaining an education and a good paying job, and this still remains the dream today of
many Filipinos in the Philippines to come to America for the same reasons.
A weak national identity
Spanish and U.S. colonization of the Philippines for several hundred years left natives
with a weak identity, and the differences between the natives from island to island prevented
Filipinos from being homogenous in culture. This makes the Filipino identity difficult to
describe. However, Filipinos share a provincial identity in their respective regions, which can be
misinterpreted as a national identity, such as when Manny Pacquiao enters a boxing arena
donning the colors of the Philippines. Unlike Americans who cheer for the U.S! under the
American flag, and Mexican’s who cheer under the Mexican flag “viva Mexico!”, Pacquiao
cheers for “Visaya!” under the Philippine flag. Visaya is the region of the Philippines that he
53
comes from. To an unknowing audience, it would appear that Pacquiao displays Filipino
national identity. Given its history of colonization and the cultural differences in various
regions, the Philippines’ identity lies somewhere between its multiplicity of different cultures
and identities.
U.S. colonization of the Philippines included the establishment of western systems of
government, education and health, which were instituted in the spirit of preparing Filipinos for
national self-rule. The introduction of western culture in the Philippines was twofold: it allowed
American political, corporate and military interests to easily penetrate the islands, and it gave
Filipinos the hope and promise of a western education and employment opportunities.
(Bernardo, 2014).
The pensionado program was the first door that opened for Filipinos to partake in
obtaining a western education, and return to the Philippines to further western ideals. However,
it is worthy of mention that the pensionados in America were sent to St. Louis, Missouri as an
exhibition attraction at its 1904 World’s Fair. The college students were displayed and depicted
as primitive and savage people of the Philippines. The students wore loin cloths and held spears
to enhance the display. After the show, the pensionados returned to their respective universities
across the country to resume their studies. The show not only portrayed Filipinos in America as
savages, a portrayal that would follow them in America for several decades, but it is also very
telling of the values of the pensionados, who voluntarily (or involuntarily?) consented to place
themselves in such a debasing and negative light.
If the Filipino exhibition at the St. Louis State Fair served as an introduction of Filipinos
to Americans, it allowed the U.S. to justify its occupation of the Philippines by benevolent
assimilation. In the same spirit, it opened a second door for Filipinos to work in America to fill
54
the U.S.’s need for cheap labor. For a poor Filipino living in the Philippines, an opportunity to
better himself in another country that welcomed him would change the mindset and allegiance of
most people whose own country kept them poor. It was at this juncture in Filipino history that
the story of Tommy began.
A new identity in America
The literature of a people can offer insights into their values, perspectives, mindset and
identity. Post-colonial writing, which is typically affected by the imperialist colonizers, arises
from the experience of being a colonized people. Much of written Filipino history, particularly
the Filipino-American experience, is relatively recent and is written in English. Ashcroft,
Griffiths, and Tiffin (1989) state, “The study of English and growth of Empire proceeded from a
single ideological climate and the development of one is intrinsically bound up with the
development of the other . . . where it leads to the naturalizing of constructed values.” The
Filipino-American experience as depicted in these writings shows a people who were national
off-shoots of their colonizers. This self-perception resulted in their being relegated to marginal
and subordinate positions in America.
By the time Tommy left the Philippines for America, English was a main Lingua-Franca
in the Philippines, which later became known as Taglish. Although many young men that came
to America in the 1920s were from different regions of the Philippines and spoke different
dialects, they were able to communicate and established friendships. The common ability to
speak English, albeit rudimentary and broken, enabled them to communicate with each other and
band together. Timing, circumstances, geographic location and white American’s negative
feelings towards Filipinos in that era resulted in a need for these young men to attach themselves
to something, such as creating a new identity.
55
As discussed earlier, the manong subculture was a means of creating a new identity.
Within the manong subculture existed a hierarchy of masculinity based on the type of work
Filipinos did and the occupational dangers it posed. (Espana-Maram, 2006). The most
dangerous job was working in the Alaskan canneries. The work and living conditions in Alaska
were harsh, and not all Filipinos were suited for the job. Working in the Alaskan canneries
commanded a sense of respect and envy among the subculture because survival in Alaska was
viewed as a true test of masculinity.
For the others who sought work as agricultural farm workers or domestic and service-
related laborers in the city, specific leisure and recreational activities also provided a show of
masculinity. Attendance at boxing matches was typically the most popular activity, especially
when Filipino fighters were scheduled. Attendance at boxing matches or talking about it in
billiard rooms, restaurants and in the agricultural fields and camps exemplified the obsession and
passion of the sport. Boxing in the Philippines existed in all regions, so it was one thing in
common that was cultural in the Philippines. The hype of a match, predominately male
audience, male-bonding and betting, made for a collective experience in being part of a
masculine sport.
Tommy enjoyed playing golf. Although private golf clubs were not open to people of
color, not to mention the high membership costs to be a member, public golf courses served
minorities. Tommy enjoyed golf because it was considered a white man’s sport, and it was an
opportunity for him to wear fashionable golf attire and blend in with white America. As many
Filipino men modeled themselves after Clark Gable by wearing McIntosh suits, Tommy also
modeled himself after golf greats of the times, such as Julius Boros, Byron Nelson, Peter
Thompson, and Doug Ford, to name only a few. Espana-Maram (2006) argues, “The persistence
56
displayed by Filipinos in negotiating an identity in the context of complex race, class, and gender
relations reveals the crucial role that popular culture practices played in the formation of viable
identities and coping strategies among an immigrant working class.”
Interracial marriages
Before anti-miscegenation laws in California were repealed in 1948, specific minorities,
including Filipinos, were not allowed to marry white women. This was in direct contrast to what
Filipinos were taught and observed in the Philippines. The early public school system in the
Philippines, established shortly after the U.S. succeeded Spain in its rulership of the Philippines,
was modeled after the U.S. school system. Schools were staffed by many American teachers
who taught western culture, values and patriotism. Students were taught that in America all men
are treated equal. Further, the heavy U.S. presence in the Philippines resulted in many white
men dating Filipino women. This planted the desire in many young Filipinos men to go to
America and to date and marry white women.
In America, Tommy dated white women until he met my mother in the mid-1940s. It
wasn’t until adulthood that I came across Tommy’s photo album dating back to the 1920s.
Every photograph in the album was of Tommy and white women. In fact, a few of the
photographs were pictures of Tommy, a white woman, and a baby girl that looked of mixed race.
When I asked my mother about the women and baby in the photographs, she replied that Tommy
was a typical manong and had been with lots of white women through the years. She also said
that the baby girl in the photograph was a child he had with the white woman, which means that I
have a half-sister somewhere! Further, when Tommy married my mother, he gave the white
woman a new Oldsmobile sedan and some money to make her go away. My Godfather, named
Guadisoso, but known as Joe in America, also had an illegal relationship with a white woman
57
until he met a Filipino woman and married her. This was very common among Filipino men,
and it was accepted by the Filipino women who they later married.
Illegal unions between Filipinos and white women, and interracial marriages between
Filipinos and Mexicans, Blacks and Japanese were prevalent through the anti-miscegenation
years. But there existed an exception to the rule: pensionados often married white women
without much attention or opposition from white Americans. Since pensionados were few, and
because they were college educated and would return to the Philippines (taking their white wives
with them), it was regarded as being acceptable. However, the common Filipino laborers greatly
outnumbered the pensionados, and it was the working class that was mainly marginalized. Their
plight had to do with timing, race, place, specific geographic location, and desires. It did not
leave a Filipino with much latitude in which to assimilate into American culture. The majority
of the manongs were bachelors. By the 1940s there were fewer than 3,000 Filipino families in
the U.S., and many of these were racially mixed families. In the towns and cities across the U.S.,
and especially along the Pacific coast, where there were large concentrations of Filipinos, there
was always a shortage of Filipina women. The bachelor manongs, however, found fulfillment
elsewhere. (Fabros). In an attempt to find fulfillment, happiness, companionship and a sense of
equality, Filipino men dressed up and engaged in many types of activities that were acceptable
for white males, but illegal and looked down when Filipinos emulated them.
The change of values and the interracial marriages of many of the Filipino men
contributed to and reinforced a desire for a change in identity. Many of Tommy’s friends were
married to white women, and I recall playing with their mixed-race children. If the children had
a Mexican mother, the family identified more with Mexicans than Filipinos, and if the children
had a Black mother, the family identified more with the Black community. Filipino families,
58
such as Tommy’s, identified more with white Americans. There was no Filipino national
identity expressed among these families, including ours. Not one figurine or piece of bric-a-
brac, such as a painting of The Last Supper, a staple in most Filipino homes in the Philippines, or
a wooden carabaoxiii figurine, was to be found anywhere in our home. This would help explain
why although we lived in an immigrant neighborhood with other Filipinos, it was not by choice,
but rather out of necessity, and Tommy planned to move away from it at the first available
opportunity. This is perhaps one of the most plausible reasons why there was not a distinct
Filipino enclave in Los Angeles, and why there was not a need for one.
Because of the multi-faceted culture in the Philippines, there is not a solid national
identity. Its strong western indoctrination has led many Filipinos to leave their birth land and
begin a new life in America, and elsewhere around the world. Immigration and citizenship in
America set a new stage for a new life, and new identity.
59
Chapter 5
Immigration and Citizenship
Immigrant history in America is almost identical with the history of the trials and
tribulations faced by most immigrants, particularly immigrants of color, such as Filipinos. I do
not believe that discrimination and prejudice against newcomers was solely the result of an
individual being an immigrant, but rather it was the color of an immigrant’s skin that determined
his place. In their book titled Created Equal, Jones, J., Wood, P., Borstelmann, T, May, E. &
Ruiz, R (2003) state, “European Americans persisted in focusing on physical appearances, and
they stereotyped all Chinese, Mexicans, and African Americans as promiscuous, crafty,
‘degraded,’ and intellectually inferior to whites”.
Even after the end of slavery in America, blacks were not provided with the opportunities
afforded to whites. Filipinos experienced the same treatment. Even in sports such as boxing,
blacks were not fully welcomed as contenders. Only a few blacks made it into the mainstream
arena, including ex-slave Tom Molineaux and Bill Richmond in the 1700s. (History Wired). In
the 1800s, John L. Sullivan, a white American, refused to box with blacks, making it even more
difficult for blacks to enter the sport. However, in the mid-1930s, Joe Louis’ exceptional talent
and skill won him the title of black heavyweight champion, which opened the doors for other
blacks with exceptional talent and skill.
Boxing has always been a popular sport in American history, and it has evolved into one
of the most accessible avenues for minority contenders to become recognized for their skills and
talents. This was a milestone for blacks in America, as well as for Filipino boxers who also
entered the ring with exceptional talents and skills. It also became the main recreational activity
60
for most Filipino men of the 1920s-1940s, who either were contenders or attended the events as
spectators.
World War II
America’s tolerance towards minorities in general, and Filipinos in particular, took a
significant turn for the better during the war. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and
invaded the Philippines, America went to war in the Pacific. President Franklin D. Roosevelt
asked the people of the Philippines and the Filipinos in America to become an American ally,
because American forces were deficient in body numbers. General Douglas MacArthur issued
General Orders No. 46, which summoned the Philippine Army to active duty into the service of
the United States Army Forces of the Far East (USAFFE). (Friend, 1965).
Many Filipinos in America, including Tommy, wanted to join in the allied effort by
enlisting in the U.S. military service. However, Filipinos were denied acceptance into the U.S.
military because of their legal status as nationals. However, because of the U.S.’s need of bodies
for war, Congress allowed Filipinos to be eligible for recruitment by modifying the Selective
Service Act with Public Law 360. President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Selective Service Act
on January 2, 1942. It was the first significant act of government that sought inclusion of
Filipinos after the Tydings-McDuffie Act of 1934, which was created to drive out Filipinos in
America by sending them back to the Philippines on a paid one-way ticket. (Bernardo, 2014).
Bernardo (2014) further argues:
While Filipinos did want to liberate the Philippines from the Japanese through joining the
U.S. Armed forces, and some did believe in the promise of American inclusion, many
anticipated an entry into U.S. citizenship and all of the promised social and economic
gains that came with loyalty to American authority. Filipinos discovered that the
61
privilege of citizenship only came when demonstrations of loyalty as “allies” became
recognized during an era when U.S. policy shifted to reflect an “inclusive” America.
The First and Second Filipino Regiments
The First Filipino Infantry Regiment was formed on March 4, 1942, and the Second
Filipino Infantry Regiment was created later in the same year. The difference between the First
and Second regiments was that the First Regiment was deployed to Australia, then to New
Guinea in 1944 where it engaged in combat against Japanese troops, fighting side-by-side with
American soldiers before deploying to the Philippines. The Second Regiment never engaged in
combat, many never left the U.S. Tommy served in the Second Regiment.
The effects of the Filipino wartime alliance were both positive and negative. Filipino
service members returning to the U.S. began to feel a positive change in the attitudes of white
Americans towards them. Local news coverage praised Filipinos for their valor and support in
the war effort, and many Filipinos who left Los Angeles to fight in the war returned married.
The War Brides Act of 1945 allowed the wives of service members to immigrate to the U.S.
This is when the story of Tommy and his Filipino bride began, but when the honeymoon of
Tommy and his wife ended, so did the honeymoons of the Filipino veterans.
The Filipino Veterans community
At the unveiling of the Filipino Veterans Memorial located in Los Angeles in Historic
Filipinotown on November 11, 2006, the first of its kind in the United States, the art designer of
the memorial, Cheri Gaulke, introduced the memorial by saying:
Over 120,000 Filipino soldiers fought in World War II as the United States Army Forces
in the Far East. Filipinos endured some of the fiercest battles of the war and many died
62
on the infamous Bataan Death March. At the end of the war, Congress stripped the
Filipino veterans of the benefits they had been promised. They have been struggling to
regain their full veteran status for the last 60 years.
The unveiling was a milestone for Filipino veterans in Los Angeles. It represented the second
official recognition of Filipinos in Los Angeles in almost 90 years. The first official recognition
was the designation of Los Angeles’s Historic Filipinotown in 2002. Did the group of Filipino
veterans represent a Filipino community? The answer is no. Much like provincial identity in the
Philippines, the Filipino veterans viewed themselves simply as Filipino veterans who were
cheated from obtaining full G.I. Bill benefits. Their overall involvement in other provincial
events and activities was minimal, if at all, perhaps because of their ages, but their occasional
presence at events was undeniably for the purpose of spotlighting their cause. They always
attended events in military regalia.
The many young American-Filipino college students who attended the unveiling
ceremony appeared to display a Filipino national identity when they came together on that day,
but it was just for a day. The memorial has not seen a similar crowd since its unveiling, and soon
after the unveiling the memorial grounds were vandalized by local gangs. There were no
provisions for supervision of the memorial, and there was no voluntary assistance offered to
oversee the maintenance of the memorial. In fact, many American Filipinos that I work with
who live within a five mile radius of the memorial do not know of its existence, and have no
interest in it.
Today, the veterans affiliate with one group located in Los Angeles’s Historic
Filipinotown. Hosted in an old American Craftsman housexivthe group is a non-profit
organization called Filipino American Services Group Incorporated (FASGI), established in
63
1981 to serve the needs of Filipino-American veterans. However, most of the veterans have
since passed away, so the organization currently focuses on low-income and senior Filipinos in
need of assistance. In 2013, I observed a family sleeping on benches near a church in downtown
Los Angeles. When I approached the family to give them money, I was surprised to learn that it
was a Filipino family. A woman and her husband, along with her parents, were recently evicted
from their home because she and her husband lost their jobs and could not pay the rent. I gave
them the telephone number of FASGI, to which they said FASGI had turned them away. I then
called FASGI to inquire about what the family had told me, and they responded by denying that
they had turned them away. After providing FASGI with the exact location where the family
was camped, they promised to send a van out to pick them up. I waited hours for them to arrive,
but they didn’t come. When I attempted to call them again hours later, I reached their voicemail.
The Filipino veteran community in Los Angeles is perhaps the best example to use in a
discourse about the Filipino-American experience, Filipino community, and the lack of a
national Filipino identity in America. The majority of the veterans were manongs. When they
returned to Los Angeles after the war, the bachelors resumed the manong identity, and the
married men took on the responsibility of providing for a family. This created a divide between
manongs and former manongs, such as in the case of Tommy severing ties with all things
Filipino.
The veterans who continued the decades-long fight for the benefits owed to them were
wedged somewhere between their Filipino veteran identity and their Filipino-American identity,
without any shade of Filipino national identity. After all, their argument in the fight for benefits
was their loyalty and dedication as soldiers who risked their lives for America. It is interesting
that the focus was not on helping to free their native land of the Philippines from Japanese
64
imperialism, but rather their main focus was on their status as quasi-American soldiers fighting
for America. And although the Filipino Veterans Memorial is located in the heart of the official
designated area of Los Angeles’s Historic Filipinotown, most of the veterans lived in the suburbs
of Los Angeles in predominately white neighborhoods.
Given the many examples of separateness between Filipinos, both in the Philippines and
in America, and taking into account the U.S. colonization of the Philippines, it is no wonder that
Filipinos suffer from a national amnesia. The Americanization of Filipinos began long before
Filipinos began emigrating to the U.S. for work, educational opportunities, citizenship, or simply
for vacation. The institution of an Americanized school system was a brilliant strategy of
conquest, because “It taught young Filipinos to accept the United States as a benefactor,
removing vestiges of resistance and ‘mis-educating’ the Filipinos to be good colonial subjects.
Training Filipinos to view Americans and American goods as superior created consumption of
patterns conducive to the entry of American products.” (Ignacio, De La Cruz, Emmananuel &
Toribio, 2004).
The indoctrination of western culture in the Philippines was taught early to its children.
It is similar to parents who plant the seeds of success in the minds of their children, by promoting
and encouraging education in preparation of securing professions in adulthood. In that light,
Filipinos were groomed to become Americans, or at least to serve America. Tommy was
groomed at an early age to believe that America was the land of all lands, and he dreamed, like
many others did in Cavite, that someday, somehow and some way, he was going to America.
When his dream was realized, a new chapter of life began.
65
Filipino immigration
The immigration of Filipinos to the U.S. began in the early 1900s when America needed
agricultural workers, primarily in Hawaii and California. This labor wave primarily consisted of
young males. Those that worked the sugar cane plantations in Hawaii were called sakadas,
which was a name later given to describe them as being unskilled laborers primarily from
Visayas and Ilocos regions of the Philippines.
The Filipinos in Hawaii have a long history in Hawaii, much like the history of Filipinos
in Los Angeles, because they both came to America during the first significant labor wave. The
Filipinos in Hawaii developed a distinct quasi-Hawaiian identity, and identified themselves as
being Hawaiian Filipinos. To the unknowing eye, a Hawaiian Filipino, particularly a female,
could be easily mistaken for a Hawaiian or Polynesian. The traditional Filipino dress worn for a
formal event is called barong Tagalog for both the men and women. The male’s barong Tagalog
resembles a tunic or shirt with long sleeves. The female barong Tagalog can also be a tunic or a
dress. The dress is also called a butterfly dress, because of its butterfly-like sleeves. Both are
made from thin fabric and richly embroidered. Hawaiian Filipinos do not typically wear barong
Tagalogs. Women will wear colorful Hawaiian print long dresses, accessorized with a flower
lei. Men will wear a colorful Hawaiian shirt.
If the barong Tagalog is any measure of the multi-faceted Filipino identity, it would be
easy to see why. The barong Tagalog and other Filipino national costumes are colorful and
ornate. Its history of colonization and occupation by different cultures is seen in the fabric of its
attire. To a knowing eye, colors, design, ornaments, style and symbols are representative of
influences from Japan, China, India, Indonesia, Spain, and the U.S., to name a few. With so
many influences, not to mention different provincial cultures, it would be difficult to understand
66
how Filipinos could be in any way homogenous, much less desire to group together and live in a
distinct area as a people, such as in America. Similarly, civil conflicts in nations around the
world subjected to colonial powers resulted in various subgroups identifying with their own
cultural heritage and not a larger unit, such as a tribe.
The Hawaiian-Filipino identity separates them from mainland Filipinos, not just in
distance, but in culture and identity. However, cultural clashes separate Filipino-Hawaiians in
Hawaii. Following World War II, Filipinos began putting their families together. The 1965
liberalization of the U.S. immigration laws accelerated the process and greatly increased the
number of new Filipino immigrants. But the constant refertilization of provincial rivalries, the
clash between new, often better educated recent immigrants and the locally born descendants of
plantation Filipinos, and the intrusion of the politics of the Philippines into Hawaii have left
Hawaiian-Filipinos, a struggling community seeking to find itself. (Boylan).
The dynamics of separateness between Hawaiian-Filipinos, American-Filipinos and
Filipino-Americans epitomizes a different fixed identity among Filipinos, even though all share
the conflicts of provincial rivalries, clashes between the new and old, and status differences.
Although similar dynamics can be found in virtually all ethnic communities, the difference is
that the Filipinos, Hawaiian-Filipino or not, do not form ethnic enclaves and have a weak
national identity, if any at all.
The U.S. Census of 1930 reported an estimated 45,000 Filipinos living in the United
States, most in California, but some also lived and worked in the states of Washington and
Alaska. (Bernardo, 2014). The 1930s had a significant negative impact on migration to the U.S.,
mostly due to the Great Depression. It was during this time that anti-Filipino sentiment was
high, mainly as a result of white workers blaming Filipinos for taking jobs away from white
67
Americans. The Tydings-McDuffie Act was passed in attempt to send Filipinos in America back
to the Philippines. Under the Act, the U.S. would provide a paid one-way ticket to the
Philippines, under the condition that upon acceptance of the ticket, the individual could never
return to the U.S. Tommy was one of many that refused the ticket.
After World War II, immigration quotas began to expand and allowed more than 100
Filipinos annually into the U.S., as a result of the enactment of the War Brides Act. At the same
time, America’s need for health-care workers allowed more Filipinos to immigrate. These new
immigrants filled positions as nurses, hospital aides, medical technicians and other related
healthcare positions, as well as a few who studied medicine and became doctors. This class of
immigrants, who were mostly educated, was different from the returning war veterans class, who
were largely manongs before the war, and then again after the war. This caused a class divide
among Filipinos in Los Angeles.
Another significant immigration wave came in 1965 as a result of the removal of the
national-origin restrictions. This wave brought in Filipino teachers and scholars, known as the
beginning of the brain drain, because the country’s skilled workers, professionals and scholars
were migrating out and seeking higher wages and a better standard of living elsewhere. This
class consisted of many intellectual-types, which again resulted in a separation between them and
other fellow compatriots.
Since 1990, Filipinos constitute one of the largest Asian groups in the United States and
is “consistently among the top five countries of origin, and was the fourth largest in 2013,
accounting for 4.5 percent of the 41.3 million total immigrant population in the United States,
with the majority residing in Los Angeles.” (McNamara & Batalova, 2015). Additionally,
McNamara & Batalova devised an immigration timeline from census reports showing that
68
Filipinos in America grew from 105,000 in 1960 to 1,844,000 in 2013. It further showed a
steady growth of the Filipino population by 501,000 in 1980, 913,000 in 1990, 1,369,000 in
2000, and 3.4 million by 2010, which includes multi-racial individuals who are part Filipino.
Today, many Filipino immigrants in the U.S. hold lawful permanent residence and are
given a green card. Filipino-American citizens can petition for and sponsor family members to
come to the U.S. and live. Without the obstacles of discrimination that threatened and
marginalized the early immigrant, these new arrivals freely display their Filipinoness, even
though they have been indoctrinated in western ways because of the western influence that
continues to exist in the Philippines. These new immigrants typically have thick Filipino accents
and are clannish. Needless to say, yet another separation among Filipinos continues.
As Rodney Kingxv declared on national television after he recovered from a severe
beating at the hands of the Los Angeles Police Department, “Can’t we all just get along?” Many
American Filipinos, such as myself, have a similar, but quieter plea. I would like nothing better
than to see Filipinos in America embrace each other for at least sharing the same ancestral
connection, but time, place and circumstances have always charted Filipino ways that conflict
with my desires.
69
Chapter 6
Filipinos in America in the 21st Century
Although the fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather on May 2, 2015 was
dubbed “the fight of the century”, what really made it such a big deal for Filipinos? If I had no
interest in the sport of boxing, would I have joined with other Filipinos to watch the widely
televised fight? Maybe. If I was not a Filipino and had no interest in the sport of boxing, would
I have watched the fight? Probably not. If CNN’s estimation that 3 million American
households would watch the fight from home was accurate, how many Filipino households
comprised the 3 million American households? I don’t know, but according to the U.S. Census
Report 2010, 3.4 million Filipinos live in the U.S.
The steady growth of the Filipino population in the U.S. began with the labor waves of
the early 1900s. By 1916, an estimated 20,000 Filipinos worked in Hawaii’s sugar plantations.
Further, the U.S. Census of 1930 reported an estimated 45,000 Filipinos living in the United
States, most in California, but also lived and worked in the states of Washington and Alaska.
(Bernardo, 2014). After World War II, immigration quotas doubled from 50 to 100 per year.
(Beechert, 1985).
If social media, such as Facebook, can be a measure of the fight’s popularity among the
hundreds of Filipino groups across the country of which I am a friend, thousands of posts leading
up to the fight overwhelmed my news feed page. Relatively speaking, hundreds of Filipinos
posting thousands of comments on Facebook is a mere drop in the bucket compared to 3 million,
so the actual number of Filipinos who watched the fight is anyone’s guess. However, I feel
confident in taking an educated guess that most of the Filipinos who posted comments on
Facebook watched the fight in person or on television. And I feel equally confident in saying
70
that the Filipinos who rooted for Pacquiao that night came together in the spirit of national
identity, as I did. Could this be a measure of a strong national identity among Filipinos? Not
necessarily.
In the larger picture the response to the Pacquiao-Mayweather fight, evidenced a weak
sense of national identity because although Filipinos came together in the spirit of national
identity, they were really rooting as fans, not as Filipinos. I am a Pacquiao fan, so I was rooting
for him as a fighter. The fact that he was Filipino made it more personal. If Mayweather was
not so hated by most, many Filipinos, including me, may have very well rooted for him.
Identity, especially in the context of national identity, is not solely measured by someone who
merely says “I was born in the Philippines”, or “my parents and grandparents were from the
Philippines”, or “my cousin’s husband’s father is Filipino”. It involves more than a mere
association or connection to a place or people to create an identity.
So what made the fight such a big deal among Filipinos? I don’t know, except for the
obvious--it was a fight between two larger-than-life world champion welterweights, and it had
the highest purse in boxing history. In general, it was a big event, but in particular, it was a
gargantuan event for Filipinos. People of Filipino ancestry, including full, half, quarter, seventh
cousins twice removed, etc., rooted for Pacquiao. Did they root for Pacquiao as a world
champion boxer or did they root for him because he represented something else to them? I think
it is a little of both that made it gargantuan, because a part of that support was representative of
that something, which sociologist Herbert Gans calls symbolic identity.
According to Gans, “Since ethnic identity needs are neither intense nor frequent in this
generation, however, ethnics do not need either ethnic cultures or organizations; instead, they
resort to the use of ethnic symbols”. Gans goes on to say, “Today’s ethnics, have become more
71
visible as a result of upward mobility; and they are adopting the new form of ethnic behavior and
affiliation”. In a nutshell, third and fourth generations find new ways of keeping in touch with
their ethnicity. The Pacquiao fight supporters is a good example of symbolic ethnicity.
Filipinos have always been contenders
Each person knows a little or a lot about their ancestry, including the average American-
born Caucasian mentioned earlier. The same can be said about American-Filipinos, like myself.
If I did not have an interest in Filipino history and the Filipino-American experience in Los
Angeles, not only would I not be writing this thesis, but I would be like the millions of other
American Filipinos who unknowingly blend unnoticed in the American landscape. This isn’t
because I disavow my ancestry, but rather because I was born and raised American and my
national identity is American. Similarly, my mother told me that her great-great grandfather was
Chinese, so I am also of Chinese ancestry. Had I known this sooner, I might have taken an
interest in the Chinese side of my family and this paper would have been about Chinese
Americans. If I was born in America, but raised in the Philippines and continued to live in the
Philippines, chances are that my national identity would be Filipino, and I would subscribe to the
culture and identity of the particular region or province that I associate with.
Another example is my twenty year enlistment in the U.S. Navy. While I served in the
Navy, I identified with all things Navy. I was proud to be a WAVExvi, and am still proud to have
served. Now that I am a civilian and out of uniform, there is nothing that identifies me as a
former Navy member. I don’t put Navy stickers on my car, and I don’t display Navy
paraphernalia around the house because it wouldn’t match my taste in décor. Further, I do not
feel the need to live in a predominately Navy housing community because I’m a civilian.
72
However, am I partial to the Navy? Yes. Would I root for a Navy sports team over, say, the
U.S. Army team? Yes.
One year I was touring Bavaria and a parade seemed to appear out of nowhere. A loud
rumble was heard and suddenly several motorcycles turned the corner and were part of the
parade. I was surprised to see that they were U.S. Marine Corp. motorcyclists. I cheered for
them as they passed because although they were not Navy, they were American and they were
military. I was able to identify with them. Filipinos identify with each other, and it is that
identification that sometimes invokes a quasi-national identity.
The Filipino American experience is unique in many respects. It’s a story about a people
who have a long history of colonization that resulted in their assuming the values of their
colonizers over the years, and then changing with the next. On this premise, identity and
sociocultural meanings are a culmination and combination of a myriad of personal experiences
that people evolve into becoming; it’s a matter of survival, much like how a contender survives
in the ring.
In support of this argument, I reiterate that in order for the U.S. to justify allowing more
Asians to come to America and work, despite the prevalent anti-Chinese and Japanese climate at
the time, Filipinos were intentionally made invisible and they had to contend for their survival.
This may explain the limited information available between the years 1920-1945 in mainstream
resources, such as newspapers, magazines, books, media, and left out in American history
studies. Historian Jon Gjerde’s book titled Major Problems in American Immigration and Ethnic
History, a collection of essays from prominent historians and university professors, tells the
stories of the immigrant experience in America. Gjerde’s opening chapter begins with him
stating:
73
Although the United States, was, for the most part a nation of immigrants, there was no
single immigrant experience. Rather, a variety of historical circumstances lay the
groundwork for a diversity of immigrant profiles . . . there was no single model of
national integration, but an assortment of understanding of how the United States should
be configured that modulated over time according to historical event and processes.
I agree with the above statements because there are several models of national integration, such
as the well documented experiences of the Chinese, Japanese, Mexican, Irish, and Blacks, to
name a few. The only non-documented people—those whose history has not been well
documented--in the early years were Filipinos.xvii
World War II prompted the U.S. to solicit Filipinos in America to fight side-by-side with
Americans. For their service, they were promised G.I. Bill benefits, but after the war, the U.S.
did not keep its promise. It was an historical circumstance that caused yet another
disappointment in their experience. The retraction was simply a broken promise the U.S. made
to the Filipinos. In addition, they had difficulty assimilating as do many new immigrants.
Gjerde refers to the general obstacles of assimilation that all new immigrants experience.
He argues that it is normal and expected for anyone immigrating to a new country that they will
face difficulties. On this premise, Oscar Handlin, an American historian and professor of history
at Harvard University, wrote an essay reflecting an early European American experience. A
portion of his essay states:
Once fixed, completely settled, he is now a wanderer. Remorseless circumstances, events
beyond his control, have brought him to this last familiar spot. Passing it by, he becomes
a stranger . . . the emigrants at that moment considered the nature of the forces that had
uprooted them, all the new conditions had conspired to depress the peasants into a
74
hopeless mass, to take away their distinguishing differences and to deprive them, to an
ever-greater extent, of the capacity for making willful decisions.
John Bodnar, a professor of history at Indiana University wrote about the Italian American
experience. A portion of his essay states:
Immigrants lived in scattered urban-ethnic enclaves which were heavily working class.
But these settlements were neither structurally nor ideologically monolithic. Newcomers
were tied to no single reality. The workplace, the church, the host society, the
neighborhood, the political boss, and even the homeland all competed for their mind and
bodies.
The point that I am making is that all immigrants experienced a type of culture shock when they
came to America, which initially resulted in an experience that contrasted with their values,
culture and traditions, which still exists in many ethnic groups today. But the differences
between most other ethnic groups and Filipinos in assimilating into western culture are many.
For example, as frequently mentioned throughout this paper, Filipinos were taught western ways
before coming to America, so they regarded America as their second home; a home that their
teacherxviii introduced them to and taught them to accept. In contrast to other immigrants,
particularly white immigrants with families, who were better able to rise up in status through the
years, Filipinos remained stagnant, but not by choice.
Bookstores are heavily stocked with books about California’s history. Its central coast
area, Santa Maria Valley, is known as the garden plot of California because of its fertile land and
a place where most of the country’s strawberries and lettuce are still grown today. The valley
has a long history of immigrants that toiled in its fields dating back to 1850, when California
became a state. Immigrant groups that came to the valley included Danish, Portuguese, Italian,
75
Japanese, Chinese, Mexican and Filipino. By 1911, the Danish established a defined thriving
community, naming it Solvang. Solvang still exists today, and is a popular tourist attraction that
showcases everything Danish. A Japanese man by the name of Setsuo Aratani developed the
first means of transporting ice-packed produce to the eastern markets, and the Portuguese and
Italians went into the dairy and cattle business. Their influence and success is memorialized in
statues, plaques and street names around the valley today. (Montoya, 2011). The success of
these immigrants was largely due to the ethnic communities they formed, and the support they
received from their respective communities. Filipinos have worked the central coast agriculture
fields for decades, but not one notable legacy can be found anywhere in the valley.
In conclusion, this paper asks the question, why do Filipinos lack a defined community?
My answer to the question focuses on an analysis of the many facets of the Filipino identity. The
Filipino American experience not only evidences the uniqueness of their status in America, but it
shows their identity and orientation in America. Their experience was likened to that of the red-
headed step-child. However, now the step-child is grown and has left, disappearing into the
landscape to create a new life in an old place. His children are ignorant of the Filipino American
experience because American children are free to pursue their dreams. For a Filipino father to
tell his children of the experience would be a nightmare, at least that’s how Tommy felt. He was
a contender, as were the other manongs, who went the rounds and survived. That was another
great fight of the century, and I will again join with others as a Filipino community in spirit
when another great Filipino athlete or other Filipino notable comes to town, namely spotlighting
Filipino identity.
There are many famous Filipinos in America who have large numbers of Filipino
supporters. For example, Efren Reyes is a nationally known professional billiard player. Lea
76
Salonga was the voice of two Disney Princesses and a lead singer in the Broadway play, Miss
Saigon. Allan Pineda is more commonly known as Apl.de.ap of the popular rap group Black
Eyed Peas, and Bruno Mars is a world known hip hop artist. In addition, many Catholic
Churches in Los Angeles hold separate services in English, Spanish, and Filipino. The churches
that hold services in Tagalog are predominately Filipino churches, including their associated
schools. These churches are attended mainly by first generation immigrants, such as my mother,
and new immigrants. However, most American Filipinos, such as myself, do not attended
services at these churches because of the language barrier, and I personally prefer all-American
churches whose congregation is mostly white.
Another Filipino organization is Search to Involve Pilipino Americans (S.I.P.A.), a non-
profit organization dedicated to health, economics and social service programs that enhance
quality of life. Many Latinos seek the services of S.I.P.A., and many young Filipino college
students volunteer their time in community programs to benefit the quality of life for low income
individuals and families. S.I.P.A. also engages in fundraisers for Filipino endeavors, such as the
promotion of Los Angeles’s Historic Filipinotown, and serves as the Los Angeles hub for
disaster relief donations for the Philippines, after a destructive hurricane or typhoon devastates
the islands. At the annual Historic Filipinotown festival, young Filipinos can eat a variety of
Filipino foods, watch and participate in traditional dances, as well as poke fun at older Filipinos
who speak in a thick Filipino accent. It is these types of endeavors, organizations and
institutions that Filipinos attach to that gives them a sense of ancestral identity. Gans explains
symbolic ethnicity by saying, “the symbols third generation ethnics use to express their identity
are more visible than the ethnic cultures and organizations of the first and second generation
ethnics . . . a new state of acculturation and assimilation.” Put simply, it is a way to “stay in
77
touch”, yet maintain an American identity. Furthermore, attachment to an ethnic community is
voluntary, is often temporary, and has different meanings to Filipinos who vary in age, social
status, and historical experience.
In the same way that statues and plaques scattered throughout the Santa Maria Valley
memorialize the legacy of the early non-Filipino immigrants, I am happy to be the one to present
this thesis in honor of Tommy’s legacy in America.
78
References
Abinales, P. & Amoroso, D. (2005). State and Society in the Philippines. New York, NY:
Rowan and Littlefield.
Ashcroft, B., Griffiths, G., & Tiffin, H. (1989). The Empire Writes Back (2nd ed.) (p.75). New
York, NY: Routledge.
Baldoz, R. (2011). The Third Asiatic Invasion: Empire and Migration in Filipino America, 1898-
1946. New York, NY: New York University Press.
Beechert, E. (1985). Working in Hawaii: A Labor History. Honolulu, Hawaii: University of
Hawaii Press.
Bernardo, J. (2014). From “Little Brown Brothers” to “Forgotten Asian Americans”: Race,
Space, and Empire in Filipino Los Angeles. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University
of Washington, Seattle.
Boylan, D. (n.d.). Crosscurrents: Filipinos in Hawaii’s Politics. Retrieved June 3, 2015, from
http://www.efilarchives.org/pdf/social%20process%20vol%2033/boylan_politics.pdf
Braziel, J. (2000). History of Migration and Immigration Laws in the United States. ACLA Net.
Retrieved May 6, 2015, from http://www.umass.edu/complit/aclanet/USMigrat.html
Bulosan C. (1943). America is in the Heart. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.
Castells, M. (2010). The Power of Identity (2nd e.). Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
Catapusan, B. (1934). The Filipino Occupational and Recreational Activities in Los Angeles.
Unpublished Master of Arts thesis, University of Southern California, Los Angeles.
Chagnon, N. (1977). Yanomamo: The Fierce People (2nd ed.). University Park, PA: Holt,
Rinehart and Winston.
Cheng, L. & Bonacich, E. (1984). Labor Immigration under Capitalism: Asian Workers in the
United States before World War II. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Cordova, F. (1983). Filipinos: Forgotten Asian Americans. Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt.
De Leon, C. (2013). Filipinas/Pilipinas: A national identity crisis. The Philippine Star. Retrieved
July5, 2015, from
http://www.philstar.com/supreme/2013/07/06/962031/filipinas/pilipinas-national-
identity-crisis.
Ellison, R. (1995). Invisible Man (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Random House, Inc.
79
Espana-Maram, L. (2006). Creating Masculinity in Los Angeles’s Little Manila: Working-Class
Filipinos and Popular Culture, 1920s-1950s. New York: Columbia University Press.
Fabros, Jr., A. (n.d.) When Hilario Met Sally: The Fight Against Anti-Miscegenation Laws.
Positively Filipino. Retrieved September 1, 2015, from
http://www.positivelyfilipino.com/magazine/when-hilario-met-sally-the-fight-against-
anti-miscegenation-laws
Fimrite, P. (2015, May). For Filipinos, Pacquiao-Mayweather is More Than Just a Fight.
Retrieved May 8, 2015, from
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/For-Filipinos-Pacquiao-Mayweather-is-more-than-
6237198.php
Francisco, L. & Jenkins, S. (1987). The Philippine Reader: A History of Colonialism,
Neocolonialism, Dictatorship, and Resistance. Boston, MA: South End Press.
Friend, T. (1965). Between Two Empires: The Ordeal of the Philippines, 1929-1946. New
Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Gans, H. (1979. Symbolic Ethnicity: the future of ethnic groups and cultures in America. Ethnic
and Racial Studies. Retrieved October 26, 2015, from
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01419870.1979.9993248.
Gaulke, C. (2007). Valor: Filipino World War II Veterans Memorial. New York, NY: Midmarch
Arts Press.
Gjerde, J. (1998). Major Problems in American Immigration and Ethnic History. Boston, MA:
Houghton Mifflin Company.
History Wired. (n.d.). Sports: Black Americans. Retrieved on August 12, 2015, from
http://historywired.si.edu/detail.cfm?ID=77.
Ignacio, A., De La Cruz, E., Emmanuel, J. & Toribio, H. (2004). The Forbidden Book (p.155).
San Francisco, CA:T’Boli Publishing and Distribution.
Isidore, C. (2015, May). Mayweather vs. Pacquiao: How your $99.99 Equals Biggest Payday in
Sports. Retrieved May 10, 2015, from
http://money.cnn.com/2015/05/01/media/mayweather-pacquiao-fight/index.html
Jamero, P. (2006). Growing Up Brown. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.
Kramer, P. (2006). The Blood of Government: Race, Empire, the United States, and the
Philippines. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
80
Lacounty.gov. Retrieved on July 25, 2015, from http://www.lacounty.gov/
Lipsitz, G. (2011). How Racism Takes Place. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
McNamara, K. & Bartolova, J. (July 21, 2015). Filipino Immigrants in the United States. The
Online Journal of the Migration Policy Institute. Retrieved October 26, 2015, from
http://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/filipino-immigrants-united-states
McKay, B. & McKay, K. (2010). Boxing: A Manly History of the Sweet Science of Bruising.
Theartofmanliness.com. Retrieved June 2, 2015, from
http://www.artofmanliness.com/2009/05/30/boxing-a-manly-history-of-the-sweet-
science-of-bruising
McNamara, K. Batalova, J. (2015). Filipino Immigrants in the United States. Migration
Information Source. Retrieved on September 3, 2015, from
http://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/filipino-immigrants-united-states
Merriam-Webster Online. Identity. Retrieved August 30, 2015, from http://www.merriam-
webster.com/
Miller, J. (n.d.). Religion in the Philippines. Asiasociety.org. Retrieved June 2, 2015, from
http://asiasociety.org/religion-philippines
Montoya, C. (2013). A Rose and a Butterfly: An Autobiography of an Immigrant’s Daughter.
Baltimore: MA. PublishAmerica.
Montoya, C. (2008). Filipinos in Hollywood. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing.
Montoya, C. (2009). Los Angeles’s Historic Filipinotown. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing.
Mulder, N. (2013). Filipino Identity: The Haunting Question. Retrieved June 1, 2015, from
www.currentsoutheastasianaffairs.org
Ngai, M. (2004). Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Poole, G. (2010). Pacman. Philadelphia, PA: De Capo Press.
Renshon S. (January, 2007). Becoming American: The Hidden Core of the Immigration. Debate
Center for Immigration Studies. Retrieved May 15, 2015, from
http://www.cis.org/BecomingAmerican-ImmigrationDebate
Riccobono. A. (2015, May). How Much Money Did the Boxers Make On Saturday?
International Business Times. Retrieved May 6, 2015, from
http://www.ibtimes.com/floyd-mayweather-vs-manny-pacquiao-2015-how-much-money-
did-boxers-make-saturday-1907236
81
Rusling, J. (1903). Interview with President William McKinley. Retrieved May 30, 2015, from
http://history matters.gmu.edu/d/5575
Scharlin, C. & Villanueva, L. (2000). Philip Vera Cruz: A Personal History of Filipino
Immigrants and the Farmworkers Movement (3rd ed.). Seattle, WA: University of
Washington Press.
See, L. (1995). On Old Gold Mountain. New York: Random House.
Takaki, R. (1993). A Different Mirror. New York, NY: Back Bay Books.
Tiongson, A., Gutierrez, R. (2006). Positively No Filipinos Allowed. Philadelphia, PA: Temple
University.
Todaro, M. & Smith, S. (2012). Economic Development (11th ed.). Boston, MA: Addison-
Wesley.
Thearenaama.com. (n.d.). The Arena: Mixed Martial Arts. Retrieved August 3, 2015, from
http://www.thearenamma.com/boxing-dying-sport/
The Future of American Democracy. (n.d.). Foundation Project III: The American Identity.
Retrieved on August 10, 2015, from
http://thefutureofamericandemocracyfoundation.org/Project3.html
Wilt, B. (n.d.). America in WWII: War Brides. Retrieved August 1, 2015, from
http://www.americainwwii.com/articles/war-brides/
Wright, A. (1984). I Rigoberta Menchu: An Indian woman in Guatemala. Brooklyn, NY: Verso.
Zimmerman, K. (2015). What is Culture? Livescience.com. Retrieved July 5, 2015, from
http://www.livescience.com/21478-what-is-culture-definition-of-culture.html
i When Spain ceded its control of the Philippines in 1899 to the U.S. in the signing of the Treaty of Paris, it soon
caused a Filipino revolution that resulted in the Philippine-American War that lasted for three years (1899-1902).
ii There are approximately 170 different dialects spoken in the Philippines. During Spanish colonization, Spanish
became the official language. During U.S. occupation, English was taught in schools. In 1946, Tagalog became the
official language. Today, most Filipino-Americans speak Taglish, which is a juxtaposition of Tagalog and English.
(Rafael, 2000).
iii Filipino students whose education had been subsidized by the Philippine territorial government. (Cordova, 1983).
82
iv An anti-miscegenation statute was enacted in 1880 making it illegal for any white person to marry a Negro,
Mullato, or Mongolian. Although Filipinos are Malays and were not listed as an undesirable race on the prohibited
statute, the statute was amended in 1933 to include Malays on the list. (Roldan v. Los Angeles County, 129 Cal.
App. 267, 18 P.2d 706.)
v The first Filipino settlers in Los Angeles congregated in a small section of an impoverished downtown area,
particularly on First and Main Streets, where inexpensive hotels, pool halls and taxi dance halls were located. The
area was called Little Manila and became the nucleus where young Filipino men congregated to socialize and
patronize businesses, whereas neighboring Chinatown and Japantown flourished in residency and business as
distinct family communities. Little Manilas were also formed in other West Coast port cities, including San Diego,
San Francisco, and Seattle, Washington.
vi U.S. Representative Richard Welch was the first to call Filipino immigration the “Third Asiatic invasion of the
Pacific Coast”.
vii Filipinoness is a term used among Filipinos to describe Filipino characteristics. viii Zoot suits were originally associated with a sub-culture of African-American musicians. Their style of fashion
was loud colored baggy suits, hats and shoes. During World War II, a Mexican sub-culture formed in Los Angeles
donning the original zoot suits to distinguish themselves, but their suit colors were black, brown and dark blue pin-
striped.
ix Manny Pacquiao’s first win that won him international recognition was on November 15, 2003 when he fought
Marco Antonio Barrera in San Antonio, Texas. He defeated Barrerra by way of a technical knockout in the eleventh
round, which was the second knockout loss in Barrera’s boxing career.
x Provinces are rural communities comprising 18 regions largely distinguished from each other by cultural,
ethnological, and geographical characteristics. There are approximately 82 provinces in the Philippines. xi The Treaty of Paris ended the Spanish-American War. The treaty was signed in Paris on December 10, 1898 by
both American and Spanish delegates, ceding the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico to the United States.
xii The Pensionado Act of 1903 was enacted to allow select Filipinos to study in America. The students were called
Pensionados, studying abroad at the expense of the U.S. The Act was founded on the idea that Filipino students
would become educated in U.S. government systems to be practiced in the Philippines upon their graduation and
return to the Philippines.
xiii A Carabao is a water buffalo used in the Philippines for plowing and hauling.
xiv An architectural design that was popular in Los Angeles in the 1920s.
xv Rodney King, an African American, was severely beaten by officers of the Los Angeles Police Department
following a high-speed car chase. He sued the city and won $3.8 million for the racial tint of the officers’ behavior
and actions, and the injuries King sustained.
xvi WAVE was originally a name given to women who served in the U.S. Navy Reserves during World War II.
Today, there is no distinction made between women serving in the Navy Reserves or on active duty.
xvii I use the word non-documented in the context that Filipinos, unlike other immigrants, were not documented in
books or articles. Throughout the paper I made reference to them being invisible, partly because of the non-
documentation. Therefore, it is not to be confused with being illegal, in sense of being an illegal alien.
xviii I use the term teacher to mean American influence during the U.S. occupation years in the Philippines.