The triumph of tagalog and the dominance of the discourse on english language politics in the philippines during the american colonial period 6

142
CHAPTER SIX
MULING PAGSILANG, 1903-1906

El Renacimeinto (and its Tagalog counterpart Muling Pagsilang) will always be
enshrined in popular, textbook Philippine history because of the famous “Aves de Rapiña” (Birds
of Prey) libel case that made easily identifiable protagonists and antagonists in the story of anti-
colonial struggle during the American period. In 1908, El Renacimiento published an editorial,
written by its city editor, Fidel A. Reyes. Dean Worscester, one of the members of the Philippine
Commission at the time, brought a suit against the newspaper as he felt the editorial alluded to
him and he felt insulted by it. In a much-publicized trial that lasted several years, Worcester
(through the justice system that was controlled by Americans) won the case and managed to have
the newspapers closed. In the century since it happened, the libel case has been recounted in
various books and the inclusion of its story an imperative for every Philippine history textbook.
The essay itself has been republished many times and the characters involved have become
stereotypes of American colonialism in the Philippines: Worcester, the evil colonial official bent
on snuffing out any expressions of freedom and El Renacimiento and its writers and publishers,
the brave nationalists who stood up to America.
In as much as there is truth to them, these stereotypes, however, do not tell a story that
reflects the actual complexity of how the concepts of “nationalism” and “colonialism” came into
play during this period.
El Renacimiento/Muling Pagsilang have been characterized as brave voices that were the
“vehicles of nationalist views” during a period of suppressed nationalism
390
and as “popular
because of its vigorous campaign against dishonesty and corruption in the government” through
its “strongly worded comments on the abuse of …unscrupulous government officials.”
391

390
Maximo M. Kalaw, The Development of Philippine Politics, 1872-1920, (Manila: Oriental
Commercial Company, 1926), 284.
391
Teodoro A. Agoncillo and Milagros C. Guerrero, History of the Filipino People, 292.

143
There is, however, an alternative view of El Renacimiento/Muling Pagsilang. Michael
Cullinane, for example, describes them this way: “During the Guerrero
392
years (1903-1907), El
Renacimiento became the leading ‘radical’ newspaper. . . the most ‘radical’ staff member was
probably Lope K. Santos, the editor of Muling Pagsilang.”
393
Cullinane’s skepticism of the
description of “radical” for the newspaper and its writers and editors comes from his analysis of
the period during which the newspapers functioned as a period when interests and focus in Manila
politics shifted from militant labor movements and the sedition dramas “toward the campaigns of
El Renacimiento, and a somewhat more moderate and distinctly more ilustrado style of political
propaganda.”
394
Thus, Cullinane tells us “little of what the paper reported or editorialized on was
radical or even particularly extreme” and that they served as “a responsible voice for its primary
constituency, the ilustrado opportunists.”
395

This description of El Renacimiento and Muling Pagsilang reflects the dramatic changes
in Philippine politics. From 1898 onward Philippine politics was increasingly moving away the
idea of revolution and armed struggle as a way toward an independent nation toward more
“democratic” models for struggle, through legislative efforts, through political negotiation,

through the pen rather than the sword. The height of Philippine participation in the Philippine-
American war and the height of the popularity of the seditious plays lasted just a few years, until
around 1905. With American hints that independence would eventually be granted, that America
would tutor the Philippines in self-government and slowly hand the reigns of the country back to
the Philippines (the proof of which was the institution of the Philippine Assembly in 1907),
radical, anti-colonial protest slowly gave way to peaceful, even cordial negotiations for
independence. This is no more dramatically illustrated than in the surrender (and betrayal) of
Katipunan leader, Macario Sakay in 1906. Convinced by former labor leader Dominador Gomez

392
Fernando Ma. Guerrero. Editor of El Renacimiento from 1903-1907, Guerrero won a seat at the
first Philippine assembly and his position as editor was taken by Teodoro M. Kalaw, who, along with El
Renacimento/Muling Pagsilang prublisher, Martin Ocampo were the defendants of the libel suit.
393
Michael Cullinane, Ilustrado Politicis, 125.
394
Ibid, 124.
395
Ibid, 126.

144
that the Philippine Assembly was the way toward independence, Sakay and his staff surrendered
and were quickly arrested, tried, and executed,
396

This shift would, of course, create a schism between the different meanings given to
“freedom,” “independence,” and “nationhood.” The ideas that were gaining currency during the
first years of the American occupation and that were mostly borrowed from the West and initially
adopted by elite nationalists, contrasted from the ideas that were generated through the Katipunan
and the revolution and were held mostly by the peasant and laboring classes.

397
The modern idea
of the nation as a location with definite and clearly-defined territorial boundaries, politically
independent, citizens with unified aspirations and who pledged allegiance to the government and
constitution, would conflict with other more organic ideas of the Philippine nation. The work
then of the nationalist elite during this time would have been to toggle between these two worlds.
To comprehend the meaning of politics and the politics of meaning during this time, one
necessarily has to consider the interplay and negotiation of meaning between these two
“factions.” This is done, for example, by Reynaldo Ileto in his study of a Tagalog awit (metrical
romance) “written” (more precisely narrated) during the Philippine-American War.
398
The
authorship of the awit is unknown but Ileto deduces from the author’s familiarity both with folk
beliefs and his knowledge of Spanish and of anti-clerical literature that he would have been a
“rural ilustrado,” someone who occupied a middle position who was “engaged in the activity of
translation, comprehending late nineteenth-century concepts of history and nation through the
meaning-matrix of Tagalog, and rendering them into verses comprehensible to his audience.”
399

This description might easily apply to Muling Pagsilang. Though El Renacimiento, written in
Spanish and run by Western-educated elite like Guerrero, and would have had a “principal
constituency” of illustrados, as Cullinane argues, this could not have been true of Muling

396
For an explanation of Gomez’s use of particular vocabulary of the Katipunan to convince Sakay
of the legitimacy of the Philippine Assembly to fulfill the distinct Katipunan ideal of freedom (kalayaan)
see Reynaldo C. Ileto, Pasyon and Revolution, 192-197.
397
See Chapters Four and Five of Pasyon and Revolution for a discussion of the folk emphasis on
the loob or inner self in the transformation of the nation and on kalayaan not just as political autonomy but

as a kind of revolution of the self.
398
Reynaldo C. Ileto, “A Tagalog Awit of the ‘Holy War’ Against the United States, 1899-1902,”
forthcoming publication.
399
Ibid.

145
Pagsilang which was published in Tagalog which was then, most decidedly, the language of
ordinary folk. Its editor, Lope K. Santos, had a working class background (his father was a
printer) and had gotten his education at the Normal College through a scholarship. He became
known as a journalist because, according to him, there were few journalists at the time writing in
Tagalog. He had gained a reputation because of his style, which had the “lilt of revolution” in
them
400
and because of this was asked to head Muling Pagsilang.
Muling Pagsilang then would have been in this middle position, translating for the
popular masses the new ideas that were coming to the fore through ilustrado or western-style
politics. Lope K. Santos himself describes this situation in his autobiography. The first few
years of the American occupation, he tell us, was a time when very few people knew either
Spanish or English and it is during this period when people like Santos (who knew Spanish and
had learned some English) became important for their ability to translate speeches, letters,
directives, etc. into Tagalog. Santos is just too aware of the translator’s role in bringing a whole
new culture and way of thinking to the common Filipino people:
Lumabas nga noon ang mga mananagalog at mamamahayag sa wikang Tagalog
at doon nila nagamit sa pagpapakilala sa bayan ang kabutihan ng bagong
rehimen, ng kasamaan ng nagdaang panahoon ng mga bagong panukala at mga
alituntunin na iniisip itatag sa Pilipinas , upang makilala ang iyong tinatawag na
Demokrasya, at yakapin, gayundin naman ang pamahalaang Republikano.
401

At that time, the Tagalog speakers and the journalist in the Tagalog language
came out and were used to introduce to the nation the goodness of the new
regime, the evil of the previous rulers, the new plan and objectives that they had
for the Philippines, in order to introduce what is called Democracy, and for the
Philippines to embrace a Republican government.

The work of translation, however, cannot be seen simply as verbatim transposition of these ideas
into Tagalog. Ileto tells us: “In order for ‘history’ and ‘nation’ to make sense [to the Tagalog
audience], popular ideas of community, of self and others, of the past and the future, and of the
interaction of human and divine agency, needed to be articulated and translated into ‘modern’ yet

400
From Lope. K Santos’s autobiography. Santos poetically describes this as “panulat ko noon na
may himig ng mapaghimagsik” and explains this as coming from his recent experience as a revolutionary
who fought in the Philippine-American war. Talambuhay ni Lope K. Santos, (Manila: Capitol Publishing
House, 1972), 25-26.
401
Ibid, 42.

146
‘localized’ discourses.”
402
Yet, “translation” here is not a matter of “dumbing down” the concepts.
Such Tagalog translations would be witness to, as Ileto tells us, “the resistance and limits of the
imposition of notions of modernity in their raw, alien forms.”
403
The modern notions would be
remade into something quite unique and quite different from its originating idea.

An additional idea has to be asserted here about the process of translation in Muling
Pagsilang and particularly for the language campaign. In as much as new concepts of
nationhood, progress, and modernity were disseminated to the Tagalog readership through Muling
Pagsilang, so were the sentiments of the common readership about language and Tagalog and the
unrelenting campaign of the Muling Pagsilang writers for Tagalog disseminated to the nationalist
elite who would soon have control of the government.
"Translation" goes both ways. Muling Pagsilang did operate on a rubric that was
adopting the new politics, ilustrado in character, that was shying away from radical politics and
from the meanings generated from below. However, in the language issue at least, Muling
Pagsilang "translated" ideas also upward. Ideas of the connection of the revolution to Tagalog
and the nation and sentiments of ordinary folk about the absolute essentialness of Tagalog were
brought forward into the legitimate political realm and made a permanent part of what would
eventually be Philippine national identity. The importance of this cannot be underscored enough.
If colonial politics were simply a matter of the imposition of the colonial will upon the colonized,
then English, and only English would have been the language of the Philippines. If Philippine
politics were simply a matter of the nationalist elite imposing its will upon the whole Philippine
population then Spanish (or maybe even English) would have been the languages of the
Philippines. However, through these Tagalog language campaigns and through the tremendous
popularity of the Tagalog language itself not only in the Tagalog region but throughout the
Philippines, (as witnessed by the popularity of Tagalog writers
404
, popular films, magazines and
other forms of literature in Tagalog) Tagalog shifted from being a language under threat of
extinction to the basis of the national language not merely in name but in effect.

402
Ileto, “A Tagalog Awit of the ‘Holy War.’”
403
Ibid.
404

See description of Jose Corazon de Jesus and the Balagtasan in the following chapter.

147
Tagalog Under Threat
The Muling Pagsilang essays on language were of two kinds. The first were the output
of an organization called the Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog (Convocation for the Tagalog
Language), set up in September, 1903 by Lope K. Santos and Faustino Aguilar. The Kapulungan
met regularly throughout 1903 until mid-1904 and its meetings would have a designated speaker
who would talk on a variety of topics: a discussion of general ideas about language such as the
reach of Tagalog throughout the country or the relation of language to culture, language
pedagogy, Tagalog literature, and Tagalog linguistics. The lecture or speech would later be
published in Muling Pagsilang, sometimes over several days, in a manner that was intended for it
to be snipped out of the newspaper and folded into a pamphlet (the pages as they appeared in
Muling Pagsilang were sometimes not in order but would fall into order if collected, cut, and
folded into a pamphlet). The second kind of essay were those that were published as opinion
articles. Most of these were written under pseudonyms and generally were more open about
making statements against the English policy and against colonialism in general. These essays
were also different from the essays written under the Kapulungan as they quite often referenced
the revolution and Philippine nation, the Inang Bayan (mother nation) and the role of Tagalog in
this nation.
The tone of these essays, especially the pseudonymed essays, is decidedly emotional. In
them one detects an almost furious but very moving desire to save Tagalog. This desire to save
Tagalog was a reaction to the equally furious English policy and campaign to transform the whole
Philippines into an English-speaking nation. English had become an obsession for the colonial
officials; it was everywhere and, as an official from Malaya observing the Philippine school
systems had noted: “The curriculum on the theoretical and academic side is simple in all the
courses of study. The note of it is English, more English, still more English.”
405
American
colonial officials would even go as far as to predict the eventual demise of all the local Philippine

languages.
406
Given this very real threat to Tagalog, the Muling Pagsilang writers launched a

405
R.O. Winstedt who had come to the Philippines in 1916. See footnote 54 of Chapter Two.
406
See the discussion of David Barrows in Chapter Four of this thesis.

148
campaign that thoroughly implicated the heart, soul, mind, and body in its envisioning of the
Philippine nation and of the place of Tagalog in that nation.
This campaign is described here by Tagalog novelist Valeriano Hernandez using chivalric
elements (bravery, strength, the quest to save, romantic love).
Ang wikang Tagalog na sadyang may sariling dangal, yaman at kaayusan, ay
wari bagang nagbibigay wili sa sino mang umiirog ng tapat sa kanya at dahilan
dito’y may katwirang pang hinayangan ang kanyang pagkasira at paglubog na
siyang tiyak na pinaghahabol ng buong kaya, buong lakas at buong tapang ng
loob nitong aming maralita nguni’t mayaman sa pagirog na pahayagan.
407


The Tagalog language which has an honor, a richness, and a logic seems to give
enjoyment to whomever loves it truly. Despite this, it has been left to sink and be
destroyed. This impoverished newspaper, which is however, rich in its love for it,
will, with all its capability, all its strength and all its bravery, work to save it.

Sympathy for Tagalog and for the campaign to save it is generated by emphasizing pity and the
underdog position (“left to sink and be destroyed” and “impoverished newspaper”). More
importantly, though, Tagalog is quietly personified as a beloved (most likely) woman. This is

done through the use (twice) of the specific word of irog instead of the more general mahal.
Though both terms mean “love,” the more general mahal, is used to refer to a beloved but also
anything of value (mahal also means “expensive”). Irog, however, is used almost exclusively to
refer to the object of romantic love. The word has an almost personal and private quality to it and
the use of it brings the experience of Tagalog to a deep and intimate level. Both times, the word
is used as a verb and in the first instance, umiirog, as an active verb; and thus in “whomever loves
it truly,” “sino mang umiirog ng tapat sa kanya,” the reader, while reading these lines is made to
simultaneously participate in deep and true love for Tagalog.
Hernandez is a master at teasing out an emotional response, at generating excitement,
and, for an inanimate concept like a language at that. He managed this because he knew the
tangible quality of many of its words. In these lines, he describes the emotional/physical response
to the death of Tagalog:
Mamatay ang wikang Tagalog! Oh, isang bagay na nakapanglulumo, gunitain
lamang.
408



407
Valeriano Hernandez, “Ang Wikang Tagalog,” 1.
408
Ibid.

149
The death of the Tagalog language! Oh, even the thought of it makes one weak.

The power in these lines is all centered on the nakapanglulumo, which cannot, by any stretch of
the imagination, be simply translated as “to make one weak.” Nanlumo does not mean only to
become physically weak, and is never used to express the experience of feeling faint because of a
lack of food or sleep. It is used only to express physical weakness brought on by emotional

stress; it is most commonly used to describe the condition one feels when one is given news of the
death of a loved one. It is not, however, only an emotional response as nanlumo also suggests
physical reactions such as feeling faint and feeling so weak that the knees buckle and one is
almost unable to stand. All the palpable connotations that nanlumo carries with it is brought to
the discussion of Tagalog’s fate. More importantly, the experience that is described when
thinking about Tagalog is both a physical and emotional one. The reader is here, thinking about
Tagalog, and later, by extension, the nation with heart and body.
A different tact is taken by Anak-Bayan (a pseudonym meaning child of the Nation) to
drum up support for Tagalog. Whereas most other Muling Pagsilang writers who were writing in
1903-04 picture Tagalog as being in need of rescuing, Anak-Bayan talks about a resurgence of
Tagalog. Anak-Bayan begins with describing the lowly position of Tagalog used to occupy:
Iyang sariling ari na hangang kahapon ay di natin natutunghan at naririnig kung
di lamang sa ‘Pasion,’ sa mga ‘Novena,’ sa mga ‘corrido’ at awit at sa mga noo’y
pagpupulungan ng mga hamak at taga-bukid at kung nasangkap sa mga
matatandang libro, ang lahat ng ito ay pawing ukol lamang sa mga buhay buhay
ng Santo.

That which is ours but which, up until yesterday, we never met with or heard
unless it was in the ‘Pasion,’ in the ‘Novena’ and in the ‘corrido’ and awit
(traditional metrical romances) or at the meetings of the lowly and the peasants or
in books of old that tell of the lives of the saints.

The lowly position of old is established by recounting Tagalog’s folk and uncosmopolitan
character, its formerly exclusive association with the lowest elements of society, mga hamak at
taga-bukid, and with folk religion and folk literature. Then its resurgence:
ang sariling wikang iyan, ay napapakarurukan na ngayon sa mga dulaan,
natutunghan na sa maraming pahayagan, pinalalaya na ng mga pinuno,
pinagpupumilitan nang matutunan at magamit ng ibang mga bayan, pinanonood

150

na at pinakikingang malugod ng mga tagaritong pagsusuklam-suklam at
naggagaril garilang dati

That language which is our own is now used in plays, is met with in many
newspapers, is used by many leaders, is excitedly being learned and used by
other nations, is respectfully watched and listened to by locals you used to
despised it and could not be spoken.

There is joy in reading these lines simply because it narrates a rising up, a resurrection, if you
will. The spirits of the reader are being lifted up simply by the positive surge that is described
and by the movement from the association of Tagalog with sullen earth (taga-bukid or “from the
countryside” and hamak which is the strongest word to select to personify abject pitifulness
because it means “lowly” but also means “harmed” or “endangered”) to its association with the
most respectable and intelligent symbols of society (plays, newspapers, leaders, international
recognition). Anak-Bayan continues:
sa biglang sabi hindi na iilan lamang ang nagbibigay buhay sa wikang tanging
kaluluwa ng ating Lahi, upang ito ay mabuhay naman magpasa walang hangan.
409


In other words, it is not just a few who now give life to the language, which is the
single soul of our race, so that it may live again in eternity.

A reader might recognize a subtle illusion to resurrection and though Christ is never mentioned,
the passage certainly suggests a connection between the Tagalog language and spirituality with
the mention of “the soul” and the idea of eternity (magpasa walang hangan). The description of
the rise of Tagalog here is a holistic one that links the aspects of the human person to that of a
society: Tagalog is at first simple, and dwells within (those who are normally considered as
mindless) bodies (taga-bukid, peasants or folk practices) but then comes to be recognized by the
mind (writers, leaders). It is at that point, when the mind or those above recognize what the body

or those below have valued all along, and it is at that point of unity that the soul of the race
(which is language) may live in eternity.
Unlike some of the other depictions in the Muling Pagsilang essays, the depiction here of
the simple folk and their practices is not derogatory. The high position of Tagalog now is
achieved through the recognition by the more “respectable” aspects of society. This is important

409
Anak-Bayan (pseudonym), “Ang Wikang Tagalog,” El Renacimiento, 16 February 1903, 1.

151
because it is through this coming together and the fact that “it is not just a few who now give it
life” that the soul (Tagalog) can live in eternity. However, it used to be that “that which is ours”
(emphasized twice) was recognized and respected only by the lowly; in this respect the lowly
served as a kind of vanguard or originator of the idea. The idea of the nation (and here also the
word used is not a modern concept of nation but lahi—the following section will discuss this
further) is the coming together of the two sectors of society through the language that originates
from below.
It is rather strange that the condition of Tagalog is here placed positively while all the
other writers spoke about, often times in very emotional language, a fear for its demise. The
mystery is even more puzzling when one realizes that Anak-Bayan was one of the pseudonyms of
Lope K. Santos
410
, the moving spirit behind the Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog. Within a seven
months of writing this essay, Santos will deliver his inaugural address that launches the
Kapulungan.
411
In this address, Santos harps over the near death of Tagalog and therefore the
need to resuscitate it by purifying and promoting it.
412
Tagalog at that point was really at a point

between being strong after having gone through a resurgence but also being weak and in danger
of demise. Its strength (as will be explained later) comes from the idea, forwarded by some of the
Muling Pagsilang writers, that the recent revolution had united the nation in spirit and through the
use of Tagalog during the revolution, had brought it to the fore. Soon after, with the arrival of the
Americans and with the implementation of the English policy, Tagalog is again under threat. The
fate of the language here parallels the state of the nation and the Filipino people and Tagalog
under threat is a nation under threat.
The call of the Kapulungan, done through their essays and answered through them as
well, was a reaction to the threat to Tagalog and the local languages brought by the American

410
See Virgilio S. Almario, Balagtasismo Versus Modernismo: Pamulaang Tagalog sa Ika-20
Siglo, (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1984), 49. Almario here identifies the many
pseudonyms of various authors who were writing in the early part of the century. Lope K. Santos,
according to Almario wrote under the pseudonyms “Anak-Bayan,” “Doktor Bejuco,” and “Katubusan.”
411
The address is published as the first of the series from the Kapulungan in September of the
same year in El Renacimiento. Although El Renacimiento had a Tagalog version beginning 1903, it was
only in 1904 that it received its own name, Muling Pagsilang, which also means “rebirth.”
412
See the discussion of this particular essay in the previous chapter.

152
colonial language policy. The call was for the preservation, modernization, standardization, and
promotion of Tagalog. This was to be done, as the essays recommended, through various venues:
the writing of dictionaries and grammar books, the establishment of schools dedicated to the
study of Tagalog, the writing of histories, the translation of important books from other cultures,
the lobbying for the use of local languages or Tagalog as the medium of instruction, the conscious
use of a more pristine Tagalog in novels, poems, and plays.
Though the project of rescuing Tagalog was envisioned as a mammoth task involving

much study, academic production, and political maneuvering, it was to be accomplished as well
through declarations of pride in the language as Andrea Vitan, here demonstrates:
Dapat nating ikaligaya ang matuto ng Wikang Tagalog, sapagka’t ang isang
taong kusang magtapon ng wikang sarili, wari’y hindi anak ng kanyang Bayan
kung di nakikipamayan lamang. . . tawad ang aking hingi, sapagka’t itoy udyok
ng nais na mapatunayang di sapala ang karangalan ng paggamit ng sariling
wika.
413


We should find joy in learning Tagalog because those who willingly throw away
their language are not children of their nation but are merely visitors of the
nation. . . I ask for forgiveness [for my arguments] for they come from a desire to
prove that there is no greater honor than to use one’s own language.

The almost hyperbolic declaration here that there is great honor in doing the most mundane
thing—speaking one’s own language—is symptomatic of the threat these writers felt Tagalog was
in. The anomalous situation that these writers found themselves in was the situation where the
most natural and ordinary parts of one’s culture was at risk of being forcibly transformed.
Although the task outlined by the Kapulungan for the revival of Tagalog was centered
around intellectual production (writing of books, opening of schools), Vitan here specifies that
saving the language is also an emotional task: Tagalog must be approached with joy. The
proposal is put forth by Vitan with some amount of shame as she asks for forgiveness for bringing
the discussion into the realm of the emotional. Although the begging for forgiveness (paghingi ng
tawad) and the feigning of humility are common parts of Tagalog aesthetic conventions, they
appear here to be quite sincere. The project of the Kapulungan was perceived by its members as a

413
Andrea Vitan, “Kailangan pa Kayang Pag-aralan ang Wikang Sarili?”, 14.

153
rather scientific and systematic project.
414
The attempt to appropriate a modern approach toward
language would have been part of the new and larger objective of transforming Philippine society
into a modern one. Yet, here Vitan lets slip the impossibility of approaching one’s language
purely from an intellectual perspective and hints at the relationship between Filipinos and their
language as being intimately tied to their being and that the full understanding of it cannot be
accomplished through the use of the mind alone.
Vitan also uses a trope that is often used in Tagalog to describe one’s relationship with
one’s language and inevitably one’s nation: the mother and the child. The use of the image of the
mother (ina) to refer to the nation (Inang Bayan), the language (Inang Wika) and the race or
heritage (Inang Lahi), common in the Tagalog language, suggests that the relationship between
the people and the nation, language, or heritage is seen as a natural, genetically-encoded one; it is
also seen as a caring one when one is under the loving protection of the nation, language, or
heritage. The image of the mother carries with it many positive emotions (care, concern,
kindness, protection, nourishment), which become employed when used to describe the nation,
language or heritage. When Vitan identifies those who throw away their language (kusang
magtapon ng wikang sarili), as not being children of their nation (hindi anak ng kanyang Bayan)
she emphasizes her point by suggesting the idea of wayward children and the pain of a just
exclusion and disinheritance from an imagined family. The onus is not on the parent who
disinherits but on the child who has rejected the loving and natural bond.
Lope K. Santos also drives the point of one’s emotional connection to Tagalog in his
inaugural speech:
Ito ang totoong di ko maatim, ito ang kahawa-hawala: salita ng ating mga ina ay di natin
nalalaman. Ipatong sa dibdib ang kanang kamay: sandali tayong makiramdam sa tibok ng
puso, at saka itanong: Ilan na sa ating Tagalog ay marunong ng Wikang Tagalog?
415

This is the truth that I cannot accept: this is the reality: we no longer know the language
of our mothers. Place your right hand on your chest: let us feel the beat of our hearts for

414
The summary report delivered by Faustino Aguilar for the Kapulungan lists decisions mode on
such matters as spelling, the correct alphabet, the proper use of ng, the attitude toward foreign words, etc.
See Faustino Aguilar, “Ang Mga Nagawa ng Kapulungan ng Wikang Tagalog, Mula Ika-3 ng Setiembre ng
1903, Hanggan Ngayon,” Muling Pagsilang, 24 February 1904.
415
Lope K. Santos, “Isang Wikang Filipino,” (serialized). This quote appears in the September 9
issue.

154
a moment, and then let us ask ourselves: How many of us Tagalog know the Tagalog
language?

Here, Santos also makes use of the image of the mother and of the possibility of a separation from
her. However, the emotional power from these lines comes more from the use of the word
maatim (accept) which is more specific and emotionally charged than the more general word for
“accept” which is tanggap. Maatim is always used only in the negative, and therefore always
hindi maatim, (I cannot accept) and only used to refer to the inability to accept a painful reality
and never for anything else (thus one cannot say Hindi ko maatim ang regalo, I cannot accept the
gift).
The experience of the language is emotionally charged because the language itself is
emotionally charged. The local languages were also under serious threat from the English policy
and thus it becomes clear why the discourse on Tagalog was such: often expressing strong
emotions of fear (of loss), loyalty and love. When Santos commands his audience to put there
hands to their chest and feel their hearts in order to find the truth about their knowledge of their
language, he puts into tangible form the Tagalog’s experience of Tagalog: you feel a real
heartbeat in order to know. The experience of Tagalog is physical, emotional, and intellectual,

and, as we will see in the following section, the experience of Tagalog is spiritual as well.

Lahi and Recent Philippine History
The key to really understanding the connection between the Tagalog language and the
idea of nationhood is in the understanding of the concept of lahi.
416
The word lahi, translated for
convenience to either “race” or “heritage” makes an appearance in many of the essays. One
suspects that it is sometimes used interchangeably for bayan or “nation” as it is used in this 1906
essay by Taga-Danaw (a pseudonym which means “observer”) which encourages the reader to:

416
The kind of analysis used here, one that finds meaning by focusing on particular significations
of words, is similar to the kind of analysis used by Zeus Salazar to explain how the ideas of nation (nacion,
bansa, banua) and revolution (rebolusyon, himagsikan) take on particular meanings (different from that
imposed from Western culture) through a nuanced understanding of words and word origins. See Z.A.
Salazar, Wika ng Himagsikan, Lengguwahe ng Rebolusyon: Mga Suliranin ng Pagpapakahulugan sa
Pagbuo ng Bansa, (Quezon City: Likas, 1998).

155
Ibaliog ninyo ang alaala sa mga nakaraan, inyong masdan at kuruin ang ang
kasalukuyan, hinaharap at haharapin, at sa pagmumuni-muni sa mga aral ni Rizal,
Mabini, Bonifacio at iba pang bayani ay makikilala ninyo ang kahalagahan ng
pagpapayabong ng sariling wika, na siyang tunay na Diwa ng Bayan.
417


Etch the past in your memory, study and learn from the present, that we face and
will face, and in your reflections on the lessons of Rizal, Mabini and Bonifacio,
and other heroes, you will recognize the importance of enriching our own

language which is the true spirit on the nation.

The author lists a number of things that should be done: see to the production of Tagalog
grammars, teach our children in the mean time that the proper books have not been written,
campaign for education in our own language, etc. The writer then reminds the reader:
Huwag ninyong kalimutan ang ganito, yayamang siyang totoong
pangangailangan ng ikabubunyi at ikadadakila ng ating pinakairog na Lahing
Pilipino.

Do not forget these proposals as they are sorely needed for the pride and honor of
our most beloved Philippine heritage/race.

The concepts of bayan (nation) and lahi (race or heritage) here work as interchangeable ideas,
the spirit of which are both found in the language. The concept of nation or bayan is a more
modern concept and yet in the second quote, the work of the modern nation (education, textbook
production, legislative campaigns) are connected to bringing honor to the lahi/heritage; while in
the first quote knowledge of the past (Rizal, Mabini, Bonifacio) which more directly connects to
the idea of a heritage is made to have bearing on the nation.
What these essays on language evidence is the struggle in the process of creating the
concept of the nation: between a new, modern concept (political sovereignty, clearly defined
boundaries, a citizenry under one government) and a recent lived experience of a united struggle
against a colonizer. In the essays, one finds an effort to insert other meanings into this new,
quickly becoming reified definition of the nation.
The bond between these three concepts of language, nation, and lahi are best illustrated in
these lines from 1903:
Kung unang kailangan ng bayan ang wika, gaya baga ng kaluluwa’t buhay sa
isang katawan, ay di matututulang ang wika ay siyang kaluluwa’t buhat ng Lahi,

417
Taga Danaw (pseudo.), “Pagtuturo sa Mga Anak II,” Muling Pagsilang, 12 June 1906, 1.

156
pagka’t ang lahi ay siyang bayan: pag may lahi ay may bayan at pag may bayan
ay may lahi.
418


If the nation’s first requirement is language the way a life and soul is needed by a
body, then it cannot be denied that language is the life and soul of Lahi, for lahi
is the nation: when there is lahi there is a nation and when there is a nation there
is lahi.

The argument is actually quite simple: lahi and the nation are one and the same and language is it
its soul. Here there is no confusion in the terms. The nation is found most certainly in lahi.
The term lahi can correspond to any of the three following concepts “race; people of the
same ancestry” or “clan; lineage” or “breed, stock.”
419
In this case it most closely resembles
“lineage” not so much in the sense of “blood relations” as much as a common historical lineage.
The use of the term lahi to refer to stock, ancestry, or parentage (blood relations) is almost never
used in a wider or more general context such as it is used here. When it is used in the context of
ancestry and parentage, it is used in a more personal context. One, for example, claims that
someone else is “ka-lahi” or related by blood. The concept of lahi here also does not correspond
to the concept of “race” in the sense of “similar physical characteristic” as much as it might mean
“ethnicity or having a common language, culture, and history.” The lineage referred to in this
sense of the word lahi is not a certain genetic similarity but rather a collective knowledge and
even experience of history that will tie a people together. Lahi is probably a difficult terms to
translate, not only because it has many different and nuanced meaning but also because it is a
word that, even when carefully translated, cannot fully convey a sense that the word carries with
it of the intimate connection of one’s identity with one’s lineage.

In this quote then from Liborio Gomez, the nation is not something that is yet to happen
or to be granted; instead it is already present through a shared heritage. Heritage does not
function merely as a symbol of the nation but is the nation itself in as much as language is not a
symbol of the nation. Life, body, and soul cannot exist separate from each other and thus the
shared heritage and the language are what make the nation.

418
Liborio Gomez, “Ang Wika ay Siyang Pag-iisip ng Bayan at Kaluluwa ng Isang Lahi,” El
Renacimiento, 16 December 1903, 9-10.
419
Vicassan’s Pilipino-English Dictionary, abridged version, (Manila: Anvil Publishing, 2006),
217.

157
The most remarkable thing about most of the references to a shared history or lahi in
these essays is that they are really a reference to a very recent but very decisive moment. This
moment is of course the Philippine Revolution, of which, in reference to around 1905 when these
Muling Pagsilang essays were written, was not ten years old and could therefore hardly qualify
for the term often used for them: kasaysayan (history).
In this excerpt from another essay by Apo ni Kapampangan (pseudonym meaning
grandchild of someone from Pampanga or Wiseman from Pampanga), the term lahi is used in all
the senses of the word but then finally emphasizes history as the unifying factor.
Bagaman tunay na ang ating Lahi, na binubuo na may mahigit na 8 angaw
(miliones) na Pilipinong bihasa, ay nababahagi sa maraming angkan, gaya ng
tagalog, bisaya, iloko, bikol, kapampangan, pangasinan at cagayan, hindi
nararapat ipalagay na ang mga Pilipinong civilizado at cristiano ay mga tribu
lamang at hindi iisang bayan.

Although it is true that our Lahi, which is made up of eight million people, who
belong to many families like the tagalog, bisaya, iloko, bikol, kapampangan,

pangasinan and cagayan, it is not correct to assume that the civilized Filipinos are
members of tribes and not actually one nation.

Here, lahi refers to people of the same ancestry, who, although they belong to different families
(different language groups) actually compose one nation. The reference to the nation here,
contrasted to tribes, is the modern concept of the nation. In this sense, lahi does approximate one
of the elements of the modern nation, which is a unified people. The passage continues:
Tayong lahat na mga Malayo-Filipino ay galing sa iisang lahi at lugar. Ang
katotohanang ito’y pinagtitibay ng atin ding wagas na kasaysayan, ng atin din
namang sing isang pagmumuka, sing isang kulay, at magkakawangis na
kaugalian, magkakawangking mga wika o “dialekto” na pawing mga anak ng
kaisa-isahang Wika sa una ng Katagalugan (Kapilipinuhang Taga-ilog)

All of us who are Malayo-Filipino come from one lahi and one place. The truth
of this is strengthened by our true history, by our common physical
characteristics and skin color and our similar character and similar language or
dialect which are the children of just one language, the one of the tagalogs
(Filipinos from the river
420
)

Here, the term lahi is used in another sense, that which most approximates “race.” Genetically,
therefore, we are one people because of the many similar “outward” characteristics: similar skin
color and physical characteristics, similar dispositions, similar language and history. Yet when

420
The origin of the name “Tagalog” is supposed to come from “taga-ilog” meaning “from the
river.” Ilog means “river.”

158

talking of race (similar physical characteristics), the qualifier of “Filipino” for “Malayo-Filipino”
is added as it would have been impossible to think of a unity with the Malay people of nearby
Borneo. Yet there was a need to include as well “Malayo” and the idea of race (similar physical
characteristics) as it alludes to an even longer history. It is clear here that nationhood, race, and
heritage intertwine. Then, in the rest of this passage, becoming of one lahi happens through the
unity of “inward” experiences.
Malimit namang mangyari na tayong lahat ay mangagdamayan at
magmalasakitan sa pagtatangol laban sa mga dayuhang may nais maminuno o
maghari sa ating lupain gaya ng nagyari (kailangan isaala-ala kailan pa man)
pagbabanging puri at paghihimagsik ng buong Kapilipinuhan sa Kastila at sa
Americano (1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, 1900).
421


It often happens that we are united in our help/sympathy (damayan) and care
(malasakit) against foreigners who want to take over and rule our lands, much
like what happened (we should forever remember) in the defense of our honor
and in the revolution by all Filipinos against the Spanish and the Americans
(1896, 1897, 1898, 1899, 1900).

It is extremely difficult to translate and capture the sense of mangagdamayan and magmalasakit
but it is in the understanding and experience of these concepts where unity happens. Damay
(from Mangagdamayan) means a combination of to being involved, sympathizing, and helping.
Damay includes within it the concept of the receiver of the help or sympathy or the occasion or
event in which one sympathizes with. That receiver or even or occasion is usually one who is
experiencing suffering or that involves suffering. Thus, damay is a concept that involves the act,
not just of anonymous helping or alms giving but of actually empathizing with the suffering
victim or experiencing the difficult even. Through pagdadamay one becomes one with the victim
or with the experience. Malasakit (from magmalasakit) is only very limitedly translated into
“care” and probably means something closer to the idea of the combination of care and sympathy.

The kind of “care” provided by someone who is nagmamalasakit is a kind of care that is also not
anonymous but is a care that is given by someone who is in sympathy with the whole situation.
What these two words have in common is a kind of extension or giving of one’s self (a kind of

421
Apo ni Kapampangan (pseudo.), “Ang Bayang Pilipino at ang Kanyang Sariling Wika,” (part 2)
Muling Pagsilang, 19 May 1905, 1.

159
generosity), but not in any anonymous sort of way but in a way that truly understands and feels
the situation.
Thus, lahi is consolidated through all the senses of the word: common ancestry, race,
shared experience. The stress, however, of what brings us together as a nation is not language but
history, and in particular, a history of resistance against colonialism. It is a very recent history,
which the author underscores by listing the years. It is a history that is so recent that for almost
all Filipinos during the first ten years of American occupation (when these essays were written), it
was an experience that was not learnt from history books or from oral accounts and thus is not
simply a symbol of the nation. The experience was total and involved damayan and
pagmamalasakit: not just knowing the struggle but feeling it as well. One almost understands
why an understanding of the nation often had to be phrased in terms of the body and the soul.
The understanding of the nation and of lahi was a physical, emotional, and spiritual experience
that one felt all the way into one’s inner being or loob and all the way down to the bone.
Contrast this declaration of unity and nationhood to a parallel description of the Filipino
people by Worcester:
they are descendants of originally distinct tribes or people which have gradually
come to resemble each other more and more, and have more and more in
common. The very large majority of them have been brought up in the Catholic
faith. In physical characteristics, dress and custom they resemble each other
quite closely. They are alike in dignity and bearing, their sobriety, their genuine
hospitality, their kindness to the old and feeble, etc. . . . Two things tend to keep

the several people apart. The first is the present lack of any common medium of
communication. . . The second important barrier between the several Filipino
peoples is built up of dislikes and prejudices, in part handed down from the days
when they were tribally distinct and actively hostile.
422


Here, Apo ni Kapampangan and Worcester agree on the unity of physical characteristics and
character attributes but also differ dramatically. Whereas Worcester attributes unity to
Catholicism, the Muling Pagsilang writers hardly ever discuss nor mention it. For Apo ni
Kapampangan, unity and nationhood is evident in the exact two points that Worcester identifies
as the two points that are the cause of disunity. Apo ni Kapampangan envisions Tagalog as the

422
Dean C. Worcester, The Philippines Past and Present, (New York: The Macmillan Company,
1921), 933-936.

160
language that was historically the source of the other Philippine languages; it’s use as a common
language strengthened even more during the revolution. The revolution itself, or the practice of
having to constantly fend of foreign occupiers, is also seen as the moment/s that bring us together
as a nation. The difference could not be more striking. One perspective sees the potential for
unity in religion and Catholicism, which is traditionally seen as an institution that reinforces
obedience and submission while the other sees it in resistance.
A more thorough discussion regarding the connection between lahi, bayan (nation), and
wika (language) is found in another psudonymed essay, this one the most openly critical of the
American language policy and of American colonialism in general. From the essay’s title alone,
“Pagbabaka ng mga Wika’t Lahi,” (“Struggle off the Language and Race/Heritage”), one gleans a
clear concern with the intimate connection between language and identity. In the essay, the
author, Simoun, seems to be using lahi and bayan (nation) as two distinct terms. As he is

concerned in this essay with a discussion of how a people become subjugated, not politically or
militarily, but culturally, the use of the term lahi is favored and the essay is replete with it. To
say, however, that Simoun is speaking merely of cultural imperialism does not fully capture the
kind of subjugation that he is talking about. He seems to be concerned with an even more total
subjugation, perpetrated through the imposition of language; one that captures even the spirit.
pag-inamin ang isang wika ay di mangyayaring di sumunod naman ang pag amin
sa ugali, hilig at pananampalataya.
423


in admitting a language [into one’s world] it is impossible that what will not
follow is the admittance of attitudes, inclinations and faith.

Once again, translation will fail when dealing with the words ugali and hilig, “attitude” or
“custom” would be the easy translation for ugali but the dictionary offers a second meaning for it
which is: “character or nature (of a person).”
424
Hilig, as it is most commonly used, refers to
“likes” or “inclinations” but a less common meaning for it, is also “natural inclination” or even
“inner call or summons.
425
” Pananampalataya is translated easily to faith, although it carries with

423
Simoun, “Pagbabaka ng mga Wika’t Lahi,” Muling Pagsilang, 19 May 1905, 1. This citation
applies to all quotes from this essay.
424
Vicassan’s Pilipino-English Dictionary, 637.
425
Vicassan’s Pilipino-English Dictionary, 178.

161
it a strong connotation of religious faith. Thus, Simoun here really talks about a total conversion
of the identity and being of the subjugated even to the point where that which is natural to a
people, their inner selves, are converted.
Simoun’s perspective about the clash between America and the Philippines is seen not as
a matter of just territorial occupation but as a struggle between two races or lahi, what he
describes as: “walang hintong pagtutungali ng dalawang lahi: ng nananaig at ng nasusupil” (non-
stop battle between two lahi: the one who vanquishes and the subjugated.) Simoun refers to an
apparent denial of the existence of this battle:
Dito’y may nag lulupigang dalawang lahi—mamutla mutla ang tanang ayaw
makarinig ng ganyin, ni mabangit na dito’y may pagtutungaling lihim ng lahi!—
at sa paglulupigang iyang di maiilagan ay maghanda tayo o upang ilagan ang
pasaning iniaatang sa atin o upang isabalikat hangang tayo’y mapisanan tuloy.

Here there is a battle for conquest between these two lahi—they can turn pale,
those who refuse to believe this or who refuse to accept that there is a secret
conflict between the lahi!—and in that conquest which cannot be avoided we
have to prepare in order to avoid the burden given us and we will be made to
carry this burden until we are truly married to it/accept it.

As this essay is a strong critique of the English policy, the “secret battle” alluded to here most
probably refers to the American discourse on the language policy, that the imposition of English
in no way is an attempt to Americanize Filipinos. Simoun, however, sees this battle as a quiet
and insidious one that aims to make Filipinos quietly accept Americanization in familial terms; as
though it were a marriage. Simoun of course objects to this and, as the next passage will show,
takes issue with the American idea of the relationship between language and nation:
Here, Simoun finally uses the term bayan (nation):
Isang halimbawa ang ibinibigay sa atin ngayon ng Estados Unidos, sa gawa
niyang iyang pagpapalakas sa lahat nang sulok ng wikang ingles, na

pinagnanaisang maging wikang salig ng pagkakaisa ng bayan, sa loob nang
lalong madaling panahon; sa makatwid baga’y maging pangulo’t pinakamatibay
na sangkap ng ating pagiging bayan. [italics are Simoun’s]

An example [of language imposition] is what is given us by the United States, in
Its action of strengthening in all the nooks and crannies of the English language,
which they hope will be the language upon which a unified nation will be based,
in as quick at time as possible; in other words the thing that will become the
primary and strongest ingredient of our nationhood.


162
Bayan here is associated with an objective of the Americans for the Filipinos. As language
imposition necessarily means the colonization of the self (as he explained earlier), this idea of a
Philippine nation with English as the central unifying ingredient was, for Simoun, an alien and
unacceptable concept. Yet, Simoun is not averse to the concept of the creation of a nation.
Instead, for him, a nation cannot be imposed as it is inseparable from a people’s lahi.
Sumapit na ang taning upang ang bawa’t bayan ay magsimula sa pagguhit ng
sarili niyang palad at pagka nacion, upang idaos ang kapangyarihan ng
kanikanyang lahi.

The time has come when each nation will start to write/determine its own destiny
and its nationhood, in order to fulfill/continue/celebrate the power of their own
lahi.

Here, the focus of nationhood is the lahi. Nationhood is something that is yet to be achieved; lahi
is already there and preceded it, although is also the central element of it. The purpose of
determining or scripting one’s nationhood is in order to “idaos”—make happen or carry on—the
lahi. Again, translation is difficult with idaos. The most popular meaning for the word is actually
“to celebrate,” however, here, the sense is beyond just that of a celebration (as merely celebrating

the lahi makes it almost just a symbol of the nation) but rather an allowing of the lahi to be. For
Simoun, the focus of nationhood is clearly not determined by an outside force and therefore is not
accomplished by a simple legislative act that grants it. Nationhood is yet to come and yet,
because lahi is strong, ever-present, and the essential element of nationhood, nationhood is, in a
sense, already there. The nation is imbricated in the lahi, the heritage, the common history, the
oneness of the inner selves or loob.
The historical importance of the loob or “inner self” in defining the Filipino path toward
independence has been discussed thoroughly in Reynaldo Ileto’s Pasyon and Revolution.
426
Ileto
tells us that among the members of the Katipunan, the concept of loob and finding the right path
for the inner self was inscribed into the understanding of freedom. Andres Bonifiacio had called
on the Filipino people to “be one in our inner selves and one in thought” and that wholeness was
to be achieved through kalayaan (freedom), which Ileto tells us is a complex concept that melds a
political sense of kalayaan (freedom) with a familial one (laya, meaning a kind of pampering care

426
Reynaldo C. Ileto, Pasyon and Revolution, 85-88 for the Katipunan and 115-117 for Aguinaldo.

163
from parents). Later, during the American occupation, politicians fighting for independence will
appropriate the idea of loob in the sense of the unity of the loob in aspirations and views but will,
Ileto argues, drop the old Katipunan sense of the transformation of the inner self and on the
emphasis of the individual experience of struggle.
The importance of that inner self in the struggle for the lahi and for nationhood is evident
in the next few passages:
Pagalingin nating lalo sa ating sariling pagsisikap ng pagpapakalinis sa tunay na
kagalingang ayon sa kabihasnang dapo, nguni’t alin man dito’y huwag manaig sa
layon na mahalinhan ang ugali at lahi.

Let us further improve ourselves, and try hard for the refinement of our true
abilities based on the foreign civilization, however, none of it should ever be
overtaken by the objective of the replacement of the natural self (ugali) and lahi.

Simoun here reveals his position as also being somewhat in the middle, that is, of one who
accepts foreign influences or western concepts but maintains the ugali and lahi. There is an
admission here of a need to improve the self along the lines of someone else’s civilization.
Perhaps the idea of improvement here is based on a modernization of certain aspects of the
culture and practices. The primary concern though, should be, first and foremost, always with the
preservation of that which is essential to the self and to the nation, which is lahi. This is
emphasized again in these lines:
ibig kong ang lahi ko’y magkaroon ng sariling pananagumpay, sa pamamagitan
ng isang gawang buhat sa loob na papalabas at huwag buhat sa labas na
papaloob.

I wish for my lahi to have its own life, through an action coming from inside
going outward and not from without going in.

The sense of loob used by Simoun is unlike the Katipunan idea of “the right path that the inner
self must take.” However, neither is it referring to the more modern notion of a nation as a people
unified in views and aspirations. Bonifacio spoke of the task, yet to be accomplished, of
“magkaisang loob” or uniting the inner beings. The American colonial government spoke of a
unity through the common language that is also yet to be achieved. In the Muling Pagsilag
essays, the concept of lahi, the race of people whose inner selves (loob) are united by a heritage,

164
is always presented as accomplished, and, in the case of Simoun, in a struggle with new, modern,
and foreign modes of thinking and being.
Historians often place the rise of Philippine nationalism at the 1880s and 1890s.
Schumacher, for example, argues that there were small pockets of resistance against Spain that

yielded a sense of love for country. These revolts that occurred throughout the nation that
occurred even centuries before, may have united people from different Philippine language
groups, however it was only during the last twenty years of the 19
th
century when Filipinos
became aware that they were “one people with a common destiny of its own.”
427
Schumacher
distinguishes these local revolts, which were always suppressed by Spanish authorities from the
Revolution of 1896 and 1898, which, by contrast, “was no longer a local mutiny but a national
revolution.”
428
The Muling Pagsilang writers picked up this moment of nationhood from ten
years before as the definitive mark of the nationhood and used it to assert their own concept of
nationhood. American occupation of the Philippines interrupted the dawn of Philippine
nationalism. These essays, through their campaign for language revival and preservation were
also reviving, preserving and remaking the Philippine nation.
429

As these writers asserted that the nation was to be found in the experience of the
revolution, they also asserted that the lessons from the revolution would affirm the importance of
language and in particular the centrality of Tagalog. In the following lines, Tagalog is described
as being always the language in use during meetings involving people from different regions and
that this practice was prevalent during the time of the Philippine Revolution: “Hindi lamang
noong panahon pa ng Pangangasiwang Kastila, kundi lalong lalo na mula ng Panghihimagsik ng
Kapilipinuhan (1896) ay naging pangkaraniwan na ang Wikang Tagalog, hindi sa paraang

427
John N. Schumacher, The Making of a Nation: Essays on Ninteenth-Century Filipino
Nationalism, (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1991), 37.

428
Ibid.
429
It was of course not only these language essays that participated in the discourse of resistance.
During the period, virtually all forms of literary production—plays, novels, poems—and even traditional
forms like the awit were used to articulate alternative ideas of the nation. For the seditious plays see Amelia
Lapena Bonifacio, The “seditious” Tagalog Playwrights, Early American Occupation, (Manila: Zarzuela
Foundation of the Philippines, 1972). See also Vicente Rafael, “White Love: Census and Melodrama in the
U.S. Colonization of the Philippines,” in White Love and Other Events in Philippine History, (Quezon City:
Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2000), 19-51.

165
pagpilit, kundi sa talagang pinagkakagawian ng marami.
430
” (not only during the time of Spanish
rule but most especially during the Philippine Revolution (1896) when the use of Tagalog was
common, not through force but through habit). One other essay that argues for the campaign of
language revival recommends the study of the works of the martyrs and heroes in order to
understand the place of language in the spirit of the nation:
sa pag mumuni-muni sa mga aral ni Rizal, Mabini, Bonifacio at iba pang bayani
ay makikilala ninyo ang kahalagahan ng pagpapayabong ng sariling wika na
siyang tunay na Diwa ng Bayan.
431


In reflecting on the teachings of Rizal, Mabini, and Bonifiacio and other heroes
you will recognize the importance of developing our own language, the true spirit
of the nation.

Rizal, Bonifiacio and Mabini are spoken about here the way we would today speak about them: as

sages from an ancient past who have a secret wisdom to reveal. And yet the Muling Pagsilang
writers were contemporaries of Rizal, Bonifacio, and Mabini and could very well have met or
even known them.
The importance of and centrality of the revolution was not limited to these essays on
language. It was present in almost all expressions of Philippine culture during this period.
Virgilio Almario describes the poets of this period as being gripped by the revolution: “Hindi
mahirap isipin samakatwid ang pangunahin bukal ng kanilang pagsulat. . . maliwanag sa kanilang
akda at buhay ang pagtatangkay sumunod sa yapak ng mga manunulat na Propagandista at
Katipunero . . . at bawat manunulat noon ay hindi umiwas sa tungkuling italaga ang sarili bilang
tinig ng sambayanan.”
432
(It is not difficult to guess what the principal source of their writing was.
. .it was clear to see, from their writing and their lives, the attempt to follow in the steps of the
writers of the Propaganda Movement and of the Katipunan. . .and each writer during this time did
not avoid the duty of being the voice of the whole nation.) In poetry, in novels
433
, and in
newspapers of this first few years of the 20
th
Century, the recent past occupied a central role.

430
Apo ni Kapampangan (pseudo.), “Ang Bayang Pilipino at ang Kanyang Sariling Wika,” (part 1)
Muling Pagsilang, 18 April 1905, 1.
431
Taga Danaw (pseudo.), “Pagtuturo sa Mga Anak II”, 1.
432
Virgilio S. Almario, Balagtasismo Versus Modernismo, 41.
433
See also Soledad S. Reyes, Nobelang Tagalog, 1905-1975: Tradisyon at Modernismo, (Quezon

City : Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1982), 4. It should be noted that many of the writers discussed

166
In as much as these writers were fashioning their own Philippine nation in a manner quite
distinct from the Philippine nation the American colonial officials had in mind, they were also
fashioning their own lahi—identity, ancestry and history. This identity is an identity based on
continuity, or if you will, a kind of present-in-the-past. Quite different from the usual idea of the
lessons of history resonating in today’s events or the “past-in-the-present,” their project was to
make what is in effect the present part of an enduring past. At the time of the writing of these
essays, it may have seemed that the Philippines had crossed over into another historical period;
that it had closed its door on the Spanish epoch and had now stepped into the American era. This
period shift would be underscored by the fact that it was all happening at the close of a century
and the start of a new one. Yet, given the particular historical moment they were in, given that it
was still “the American period” and not yet “the Philippine nation,” this identity had to be found
still in the struggle against a foreign aggressor. A century had closed and the whole world
seemed to be moving into an American era but conditions did not move on for Filipinos. Thus,
these writers found their identity and their nation in what appeared to be a deep and ancient past
but was in fact actually very recent.
The meanings that were generated to be the ingredients of this nation were in no way the
Philippine vision. Certainly, all around them other imaginings of the nation were being created.
Yet, for various reasons, principal of which is that this campaign was Manila-based, they were
going to become part of what was later to become official nationalism. Marginalized as it was
during their time, the vision of these Muling Pagsilang writers for their lahi and for their nation
would be reworked and re-visioned to become, in a matter of just a few years, that common idiom
(language, culture, history) that would officially bind the nation.
Nowhere is this sense of the-present-in-the-past more clearly seen than in Taga Danaw’s
counsel to turn to the works of Rizal, Bonifacio, and Mabini to find the wisdom in honoring and
preserving one’s own language. Writing a mere ten years prior to when these sage-heroes were
active, his lines sound as though they were written a hundred years hence.

here: Santos, Aguilar, Hernandez Pena, Aurelio Tolentino, and a few others are the same writers discussed
by Almario and Reyes. This should help in the understanding of how much the Muling Pagsilang writers
were the vanguard of Tagalog/Philippine culture, especially Philippine culture expressed in the vernacular.