Relevance

Filipinos are, have been, and hopefully will no longer be, the best kept secret in the cultural melting pot that is America. However, it is surprising to me that most non-Filipinos don't know who we are and what our culture is about. I feel that this is due to the simple fact that while we may be prevalent here in America, we do not work hard enough to make ourselves relevant.



Let's look at some facts: We are the second largest Asian demographic, only second to the Chinese. We are the LARGEST Southeast Asian demographic in this country. The first Filipino-American settlement was located in Saint Malo, Louisiana in 1763...THIRTEEN YEARS before this country was even born. We are your doctors, nurses, lawyers, police officers, janitors, teachers, cooks, and maids. We are your mechanics, hair stylists, fire fighters, electricians, businessmen, accountants, and carpenters. We are, without a doubt, prevalent.



But, are we relevant? Do we seek to step out of the background and truly make our influence and importance on this society known? Do we wish to make the world see us for who we are and what we have to offer? Do we wish to make ourselves pertainable to the current society we live in...or are we simply satisfied blending into the background?



The aspect of assimilation is very present in Filipino culture. As a people who have been colonized several times by foreign powers, it is natural for the Filipino to blend in and adopt the culture of foreigners as their own as a means to survive and adapt. When many Filipinos immigrated to this country, most of the Filipino parents told their kids to stop speaking Tagalog and to start speaking English as a means to better fit in among the Americans at school. Many Filipinos began to shun their culture as a means to better fit into the American social landscape. This appears to be different from many other Asian or ethnic groups that came to this country. While the other Asian ethnic groups did adapt to American customs to some degree, they still nontheless retained their cultural ways: their langugage, traditions, and food...and ensured their children did the same. Instead of letting their indigenous culture adjust to the American social landscape, it seems that other ethnic groups weren't shy of who they were and were able to bend the American social landscape to adjust to them to some degree...not the other way around.



It must be noted that many Filipino families retained their language, their beliefs, and traditions in the home. However, it seems that the children of these immigrants were not sure how to view the relevance of their culture to the American culture that surrounded them at every moment the instant they walked out the door. To make matters even worse, Filipino kids couldn't even settle for just being "Asian" since there are so many shades of Asian out there: Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Cambodian, Hmong, Vietnamese, etc. As a result, the Filipino kid would begin to feel like a minority within well...a minority. Add the fact that there are few, if any, Filipino role models in the mainstream media, and eventually the Filipino kid begins to blend into the melting pot, almost to the point of not truly being seen as the unique person they are.



It is important to know how NOT to stand in the background and blend in. Rather, it's important for us to figure out how we can be better SEEN.



So now we are faced with a question: Is Filipino culture relevant? I am not speaking of the "I-don't-know-anything-about-the-Filipino-culture-other-than-lumpia-and-hip-hop-competitions" watered-down pseudo-culture that most people are trying to pass off as Filipino culture. I am talking about the true Filipino culture: Loyalty to one's family, Bayanihan (if you Fil-Am's don't know what that means, then look it up), the history, the traditions, the art forms, and yes, the food. It's a culture that's rich in beauty and tradition...yet for some reason, Filipinos tend to not know much about it nor really give a damn about it. Due to this lack of knowledge, it is difficult to expect the Filipino culture to find any relevance in this society unless people truly know about it well enough to spread it....and even if you did spread it...no one would buy into it unless they felt it related to them or bore any importance on them.



It is up to US as Filipinos to make sure the culture is relevant to our society. We set the tone. The way to accomplish this is threefold. First step is knowledge. You cannot promote something unless you know about it. You need to possess knowledge of whatever it is you are trying to spread. The next step is willingness to spread that knowledge. All the knowledge in the world doesn't mean squat unless you have the passion and courage to rise above stereotypes, critics, and the ignorant. Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, and other men of that era were not great Filipino patriots because they knew a bunch of facts. They possessed the willpower and strength to speak out and apply that knowledge.

Once these two steps are accomplished, the next step is to find ways to make that knowledge relevant...not just to Filipinos, but to all people. If you want to know how to do this, check out my video blog on the "Colonial Mentality".

While we may be large in numbers, our size means nothing if we do not choose to make ourselves known and our culture relevant.