Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
These new twists are, of course, difficult to grapple with: our argument above that there are
fundamental connections between past and present forms of social relations may inadvertently gloss
over equally fundamental shifts in power structures in the postcolonial era brought about by
concentrations of capital and transnational alliances of the powerful.
Conclusion
The main arguments in this chapter are not new since a number of scholars around the globe
have voiced similar sentiments as well. For example, the politics of hybridity (apart from postcolonial
work on this concept, of course) in relation to the power of English in the world today has been
discussed animatedly, for example in an exchange between Rajagopalan (1999a; 1999b) and Canagarajah
(1999a). The postcolonial politics of knowledge production and consumption in academic writing has
been vigorously pursued by Canagarajah (2002), which, in turn, has been vigorously challenged by
Kandiah (2005). Likewise, the politics of equality of languages and varieties of a language has been raised
in various theoretical and disciplinal contexts as well (eg. Mazrui, 1998; Blommaert, 2001; Hymes, 1985).
In the case of the pitfalls of postcolonial theorizing, there is immense work on this matter as well (cg.
Ahmad, 1992; Dirlik, 1994; Shohat, 1992; San Juan, 1998; Goss, 1996: Friedman, 2003). What this
chapter hopes to contribute is to shed light on some political questions that-accrue to the paradigm of
WE. Some work has been done on this matter as well (see Parakrama, 1995; Holborow, 1999;
Canagarajah, 19991); Pennycook, 2003), but this chapter locates its critique within the pitfalls of WE's
own (postcolonial) discourse itself, of course by drawing on class-oriented questions which some earlier
work has done.
Linguistic imperialism
This grand design is elaborated on by Robert Phillipson in his comprehensive work Linguistic
Imperialism (1992), which focuses on the dramatic spread of English especially in the last century. The
book sets out to expose the ideological underpinnings of English Language Teaching (ELT) and examines
the roles of the various institutions implicated in a linguistic power play with clear Manichaean poles. On
the one hand, there is the essentialized Centre' (suggested by the use of the capital letter), which
consists primarily of the UK and the USA and institutions that are more or less affiliated with them,
including the US information Agency, the British Council, the Peace Corps, the Rockefeller Foundation,
the lMF, the World Bank, Hollywood, the Internet, etc. The 'Centre', the book argues, advances its own
interests through financial aid and the export of material and human resources. On the other hand,
there is the 'Periphery (also capitalized and singular), which consists mainly of former colonies that are
unable to distinguish what is good for them and what is not. The 'Periphery thus ends up infused with
the norms and values of the 'Centre and languishing in a state of protracted cultural dependence. This,
in turn, is a precondition for the economic exploitation and domination of the Periphery by the Centre.
To the extent that Phillipson employs his theoretical framework to describe both the colonial and the
neocolonial situations, one gets the impression that linguistic imperialism is an invulnerably closed
system that is able to travel through time and across geographic space unchallenged and, indeed,
unchanged. Except that history has shown time and again that any assertion of dominance is bound to
elicit some form of resistance.
Fortunately, there has never been a dearth of Filipino scholars that have adopted a more sober
view of the persistent popularity of English in the Philippines. They recognize English as an indispensable
medium of local exchange and appreciate its status as language of wider communication that enables
them to participate in transnational knowledge production as active agents and not simply as objects of
various theorizing.
Conclusion
It is high time that the Philippine government re-examined its language policy and admitted that
its aim to dislodge English from its privileged position in the controlling linguistic domains and make
Tagalog the sole official language is a costly and divisive project, devoid of any merit save perhaps for the
symbolic triumph of ridding the Philippines of another colonial legacy. Instead of waxing Romantic in
anticipation of the day Filipinos would speak one indigenous language, nationalists are better off
acknowledging that the culture of the Philippines is 'the sum total of different ethnicities, linguistic
backgrounds, and foreign influences The integrity of Philippine society is not necessarily guaranteed by
language unity, let alone by the imposition of one indigenous language which is viewed with skepticism
by other ethnolinguistic groups (Hidalgo, 19987 27-8; A. Gonzalez, 1991: 12). A more pragmatic
alternative is the adoption of a two-pronged strategy that enhances the surviving indigenous languages
in the country, even as it pushes for Philippine English as the primary means of communication among
the different ethnolinguistic groups and as a legitimate vehicle for their visions. The nationalists'
objection to English is a matter of pride - false pride. More than half a century alter the Philippines
claimed its independence from the USA, they are still wailing over the legacies of colonialism. N. V. M.
Gonzalez put his linger on the problem as early as the mid-1970s when he admonished detractors of the
English language in the Philippines to "ask whether ... the despair is real or only an expression of ... self-
flagellation' (1976; 424). It is one thing to be critical and to resist attempts to hold up one nation, race, or
belief as worthy of emulation, or promote inegalitarian relations between the sexes or among different
social classes. It is an entirely different matter to wallow in cultural insecurity and nationalistic paranoia.
Filipino nationalists will be doing themselves a huge favor by put[ting] away [their] childish things.
Mestiza envy
To understand the logic of this envy of and for mestizaness, it is useful to recall that in the
Filipino historical imagination, the mestizo/a has enjoyed a privileged position associated with economic
wealth, political influence, and cultural hegemony. Unlike the United States, but more like Latin America,
mestizoness in the Philippines has implied, at least since the nineteenth century, a certain proximity to
the sources of colonial power To occupy the position of mestizo/a is to invoke the legacy of the
ilustrados, the generation of mostly mixed-nice, Spanish-speaking, university-educated nationalists, from
the Chinese mestizo Jose Rizal to the Spanish mestizo Manuel Quezon both credited with founding the
dominant fictions of Filipino nationhood. Betwixt and between languages and historical sensibilities,
mestizoness thus connotes a surplus of meanings as that which conjures the transition from the colonial
to the national indeed, as the recurring embodiment of that transition.
Bakya and the prospects of overhearing
The link between mestizoness and Taglish might be better understood with reference to the
historical workings of a hierarchy languages in the Philippines. English as the legacy of US colonialism as
well as postwar neo-colonial relations has functioned as the language of higher education and, until the
mid-1970s, the dominant medium of instruction in public and private schools. Its use is associated with
the elite circles of multinational corporations, the diplomatic corps, the tourist industry, overseas labor
recruitment, metropolitan newspapers of record, and the medical and legal professions; it is the chief
official language of the, legislative, judicial, and other policy-making bodies of the state, And English is, of
course, the, language of foreign movies, mostly from the United States. which continue to dominate the
countrys film market.
Conclusion
Taglish in contemporary movies, then, functions to domesticate the crowd into consumers
receptive to the alternating invocation and revocation of linguistic hierarchy. Movies routinize the shock
of hearing and speaking otherwise. In consuming suc h films, audiences buy into the pleasures of
anonymous hearing and seeing. But in doing so they give in to the reified version of anonymity. That is,
they experience it in the mode of envy for those who appear most fluent in Taglish yet, unlike the baklas
or bakyas, are capable of ordering its circulation: the movie star. Indeed. Filipino films would never
survive financially without well-known names. The sight of stars is avidly awaited in networks of publicity
such as gossip sheets, personal appearances, talk shows, and even the occasional political scandal. It is
the stars who become the focus of audience interests, and movies are vehicles for anticipating their
recurring appearances.