40th Year of the UH Ilokano Program

40 Years of History and History-Making:
The UH Manoa Ilokano Program

The Fil-Am Observer Staff


Part of the diasporic narrative of the people of the Philippines in the United States is the accounting of programs that have served their various communities in exile.

Of landmark achievement, for instance, is the Operation Manong that paved the way for a respectful recognition of the contributions of the many hardworking people of Philippine descent, such as the Visayans and the Ilokanos.

The two groups have come to Hawaii to eke out a life far better than they had in the homeland.

And they have found a better one over here, thanks to their industry and perseverance, and their untold, at times unnamable, sacrifices

It was a catchall phrase—this search for the good life as a reason for leaving the familiar landmarks of the land of one’s birth.

But this grand reason has the ability to capture the mixed motivations of those who had come here more than one hundred years ago—and these mixed motivations can still be encapsulated by that phrase.

But history was not always on the side of these people of the Philippines.

The tragic histories of execution, and other forms of oppression, in the fields and outside the fields, are now ingredients of the larger story of the presence of the various peoples of the Philippines in the State of Hawaii.

But the accounts of their resistance and persistence are everywhere to give instruction to the next generations of people of the Philippines, immigrants and local-born alike.

One of the institutions that have survived all through the years is the Ilokano Language and Literature Program of the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Established in 1972, it began to offer Ilokano courses to children of immigrants who came to the university to further their studies.

Many of these students have now become professionals, and are now leaders of the community in their own right.

The forty years of service to the students and the community—the forty years of bearing witness to what language and culture resources can do to enrich the larger community of Hawaii—are years of struggle and surprise.

Tapped to lead in designing the Ilokano Program that in later years was called the UH Manoa Ilokano, Philippine Drama and Film Program, was Professor Precy Espiritu.

For more than thirty years until her retirement from teaching in 2006, Professor Espiritu expanded the program until it became a degree-granting program in 2002.

The fact that Ilokano is being taught with academic rigor is something that the various universities in the Philippines have missed for the last forty years that the UH Ilokano Program has consistently been offering Ilokano courses each semester.

As a direct result of the institution of a national language, Ilokano has since been practically banned in the Philippine basic education infrastructure.

In the name of unqualified nationalism, and in the name of the sacrosanct national language, all Philippine languages—the mother languages of the children who are going to the schools—have been practically banned.

Empirical studies document the prohibition, directly and tacitly, by the fine-system being imposed upon students caught speaking a word in the Ilokano language, his very own language.

The going rate is at five pesos per word, according to some educators who are in the know.

The State of Hawaii, in 1972, adopted a different tack to the whole story.

After years of denial and deprivation as a result of many factors, including the cultural denigration of Ilokanos themselves, the Ilokano language finally gained a public space in the halls of academia as an academic and foreign language course, one that could take its place side by side with the other major languages of the world, including the majors languages of Asia, languages that have strong connections to the economy, politics, and culture of Hawaii.

The one-course program became two courses, and the two-course, one-year program became two years, until it became a full-blown bachelor’s degree program under the rubric of Philippine language and literature.

All through the years, students have come and gone—and those who passed its portals went out to the world and brought with them a renewed appreciation of what the Ilokano language can offer, of what the Ilokano culture can share, and of what the university program can do to students who are interested to reclaim their heritage, or students who want to learn more about the language and culture of their parents.

Part, therefore, of the Filipino-American History Month Celebration is the institution of the Ilokano language at the university.

Prior to 1972, the Ilokano people had to wait for seventy-four years before their language could take its own place in the academic discourse of the university.

Coming in 1906, with the centennial of their coming to Hawaii celebrated in 2006, the absence of the language of the plantation workers in the intellectual discourse of the state is something that begs explanation.

The children born of these plantation workers did not have access to the intellectual resources of their ancestors.

Some did not even have access to the language of their parents, by reason of the systemic denial by the educational institution—the schools—of the children of these workers of their own heritage language, a repeat, or duplication, of what was happening in the homeland.

The Tagalog Program of the University, instituted in 1971 through the leadership of Dr. Teresita Ramos, antedated the Ilokano Program for a year.

It was also Professor Ramos, cognizant of the need for the intellectual space for Ilokano discourse and practice, that made it sure that the Ilokano Program would have a good start, and hence, giving the free rein to Professor Espiritu to develop the Ilokano Program and push for its growth and development through all the years.

Many students of the Ilokano Program speak fondly of their own experiences as students of this program.

Three of these students, Julius Soria, Abe Flores, and Jeffrey Acido have joined the instructional faculty.

Other graduates of the program are either working as interpreters, youth development workers, teachers of Ilokano language in Waipahu High School and Farrington High School, both on Oahu, or government workers.

In partnership with other civic and culture organizations, the UH Ilokano Program has been in the forefront in mother language advocacy, in heritage language education, in cultural nationalism, and in cultural pluralism and diversity.

In 2006, the Ilokano Program began the Nakem Conferences, a movement that aims to pursue the very aims of diversity and the need to celebrate—and cerebrate—it.

Today, Nakem Conferences movement has grown, and has spread all over the Philippines.

In the summer of 2012, it will hold its 7th International Conference on “Pag-angkon: Our Right to Our Language, Our Right to Education That Emancipates,” in Tacloban City, Philippines.

More needs to be done, and one of them is to continue erasing totally the acquired—even learned—cultural denigration of the Ilokanos, their hatred of their language and culture, a hatred that makes them conveniently deny they are Ilokanos, a hatred that makes them bury any sign that they have anything to do with the Ilokano language and culture.

Even at the 105th year of the presence of the Ilokanos in Hawaii, we continue to experience this denigration everyday.

For it is not easy becoming the doormat of history.

It is not easy becoming the subject matter of an immigrant history that does not even want to remember itself.

It is for this reason that during this Fililipino-American History Month—a commitment to memory and to memory making, a commitment to resist forgetting—becomes urgent.

In May 2012, the UH Ilokano Language and Literature Program will hit its 40th year.

In the years to come, another good 40 years would assure us of Hawaii’s commitment to diversity and heritage, and another 40 years afterwards would make the UH Ilokano Program a commitment for all time.

Six or seven instructional faculty now run the university’s Ilokano Program at any given time.

These are the new breed of leaders who inherited the wisdom and vision of the first leaders who have since retired.

From a faculty of one and a handful of students, the Ilokano Program has grown and hopefully, it will continue to grow even as it assists, and partners with, other llokano Programs in schools and colleges, in Hawaii, and outside Hawaii.


FAO Features/
October 2011

4th Nakem International Conference

The poster of the 4th Nakem International Conference convened and hosted by the Ilokano Language and Literature Program, University of Hawaii at Manoa, November 11-14, 2009.

Co-sponsors of the conference are the Indo-Pacific Languages and Literatures Department, U of Hawaii at Manoa; the College of Languages, Linguistics and Literature, UH Manoa; the UH Leeward Philippine Studies Program; the Filipino Heritage Fund; the Oahu Filipino Community Council; the Ilokano Writers Guild Global/America/Hawaii (TMI Global/America/Hawaii; the GUMIL Hawaii; the UH Center for Southeast Asian Studies; the UH Center for Philippine Studies; the UH National Foreign Language Resource Center; the Nakem Conferences Philippines; the Nakem Conferences International; Talaytayan Mother Language Education Alliance; the Fil-Am Observer; and Timpuyog: Ilokano Student Organization.

Cabugao talk on Ilokano language and culture

TI AKEM DAGITI ILOKANO NGA ORGANISASION ITI HAWAI’I ITI PANNAKAPADUR-AS TI KULTURA KEN PAGSASAO NGA ILOKANO ITI NAGAN TI DIVERSIDAD KEN PUDNO NGA EDUKASION ITI DEMOKRASIA KEN JUSTISIA

 

Ni Aurelio Solver Agcaoili

 

(Bitla iti 2009 Cabugao International Celebration, Waipahu, Hawai’i, Enero 3, 2009)

 

 

Thank you, so much, Mr. Brigido Daproza, for your generous introduction.

 

They say that when a true friend introduces you to his true friends such as his friends at Cabugao International, you must believe—you must believe that that is sincere.

 

On this note, therefore, I wish to say that Manong Brig has honored me tonight, for which, this honor I will take it to heart, and I will take it to heart forever.

 

I must also give my thanks to the president of your organization, Mr. Ernie Garcia, whom I had the pleasure of co-directing in his acting for a play with Annak ti Kailokuan iti Amerika last year. Manong Ernie, my gratitude for having me over here tonight.

 

My gratitude also goes to Mrs. Remy Baclig for believing that I can do justice to your celebration tonight as your guest speaker.

 

Manang Remy knows that the only thing I can do is to write and recite a lousy poem for birthday celebrators of GUMIL Hawai’i.

 

Even if she knows how limited I am in terms of my knowledge of what you do, she nudged me to come and speak before you believing that perhaps, just perhaps, I would be able to change course from poetry to public speaking.

 

I know that there are visitors here who are not Ilokano speaking so please permit me to first speak in English, and then switch to Ilokano to conclude my talk.

 

When I asked Manang Remy what I would talk about, she said, suit yourself, talk to them, talk to the Cabugao International from your heart.

 

 

I took that to mean that I could talk to you about anything—and the meaning of anything, for me, is something that is close to my heart, something that is related to the kind of advocacy work I am doing personally, and I am also doing professionally as administrator of the Ilokano Language and Literature Program of the University of Hawai’i.

 

I must say—for the information of everyone here present—that our Ilokano Language and Literature Program of the University of Hawai’i is the only such program in the world that offers a scientific and academic study of our Ilokano language and culture.

 

I say this with the hard facts: there is no other University or College in the whole world that does what we do at the University.

 

Even the Universities and Colleges in the Philippines do not even have the vision and courage to think for our people, to have a vision of Ilokano language and culture promotion for and in the name of our people.

 

It pains me to tell you that a University that is more than 7,000 miles away from the Philippines has the courage to admit, and the brilliance to execute its plan to promote our being Ilokanos, and proudly so, to the world.

 

Our program at the University is the only one that offers any of the three courses: a bachelor of arts in Ilokano—the only one in the world; a minor program in Ilokano—the only one in the world; and a certificate program in Ilokano—the only one in the world.

 

It pains me also to tell you that in the Philippines, there are problems in the educational system. It is not that there are no problems in the educational system of the United States—there are a lot, including students who have the temerity to talk back to their teachers, or even kill them with a gun.

 

I know: I have been a teacher in Los Angeles before I moved to Honolulu, and I have seen for myself how our students need to be reformed and now. 

 

But the problem with the Philippines is that the educational system is based on a false—a very false belief—that the only way for our people to get an education is to be educated in English and in Tagalog, which they now call Filipino. Filipino, the term for this national language, is of course a lie—the foolish legislators’ and educators’ way of making us believe that Tagalog is different from Filipino.

 

We know, of course, that they are the same, even if this foolishness has gone on the inane TFC—The Filipino Channel—that airs all those equally inane shows that make mockery of our women in mini-skirts, as in Eat Bulaga, or make commerce of the misery of our poor people, as in the TV show of Willie Revillame, Wowowee.

 

This kind of use of Tagalog in the TV medium has invaded our own living rooms, and every Ilokano right now has gone on to believe that the only way to become a true Filipino is to speak Filipino, which is, in fact, Tagalog.

 

I have nothing against Tagalog as a language.

 

I have nothing against the Tagalog people.

 

I have everything against this imposition of Tagalog on our souls—and the way this imposition is turning all of us as Tagalog-speaking at the expense of Ilokano, our very own language.

 

Something is wrong here—and that something that is wrong must be described with determination and daring as wrong.

 

That which is something wrong is the making of all Ilokano people as Tagalog-speaking people. This is a most terrible thing.

 

It is the making of Ilokanos as a people that has become incompetent in their own language.

 

A people that is ashamed to admit that they are Ilokanos.

 

A people who would prefer to be known as Tagalog-speaking even if their accent shows simply that they grew up in Libtong.

 

I call this the “saan-ka-dimmakkel syndrome”—a kind of mental incapacity that reveals that in the mind is that insecurity one feels when one is found out that he is not Tagalog but Ilokano.

 

I do not understand why an Ilokano has to hide himself, away from the brilliant lights of his being an Ilokano.

 

I know some people who would almost always come up with a lame excuse that they did not grow up in the Ilocos, even if they were born there, and that is why they do not know Ilokano that much, and that they are more adept at speaking Tagalog.

 

If you open your radio station in the morning, you will uncover this pretense of Ilokano announcers and disc jockeys and newscasters trying to hide away from their being Ilokanos, and masking off themselves with their absurd and funny way of speaking Tagalog, their pronunciation clearly the hard, guttural Ilokano even if the words that come out of their lips are Tagalog words.

 

Clearly, this ‘saan-ka-dimmakkel syndrome’ is hitting us so hard—and it is killing our sense of self, our sense of who we are, our sense of being Ilokanos.

 

Why have we come to this point? What brings us to the point where we are embarrassed to even admit that we are Ilokanos, when we are embarrassed to admit that we know how to speak Ilokano?

 

I can surmise several guesses.

 

One, we have come to believe that our being called Filipino is enough. That is not true.

We are Filipinos because we are a people of the Philippines but we are Ilokanos as well. We cannot pretend that we are Tagalogs, even if we know how to speak the language.

 

Two, we have come to believe that knowing Tagalog means we are civilized, that we know Manila or that we have been there, that we have lived there, and that Manila, only Manila, is the measure of our worth as Filipinos. This is equally wrong.

 

Before Manila was ever a city that now makes us linguistic parrots and zombies, and cultural caricatures, there was an Ilokano nation.

 

Before there ever was a Philippines, as we understand it today, there already was Ilocos, there already was Ilokano.

 

This means that the Ilocos and the Ilokano language existed first, that we came first, and our language came first, before this political fantasy and invention we call as Philippines came into existence.

 

How come now that we have lost the pride of being Ilokanos? How come now that we cannot even say with self-esteem and self-respect that we are Ilokanos?

 

We are a people with a heritage—with a culture and a language—and this heritage is being denied of us, in the Philippines and elsewhere.

 

Three, we are continuing to fight for our right to our language and culture—in the Philippines and in the United States.

 

In the Philippine educational system, we are fighting that Ilokano be returned as the medium of instruction in the public schools, from the pre-school to high school, alongside the teaching of English and Tagalog.

 

Our view of the matter is this: that students who are taught in their own language are able to understand better those things that they do not know if they become competent in their own language.

 

In Hawai’i, for instance, this experiment is being done by GEAR-Up at Farrington High School, and which experiment is going to be duplicated at Waipahu High School next year. The seven-year experiment at Farrington High School has given you the facts: that those going through a heritage language in Ilokano are able to hurdle better the challenges of going to college and university and to work for their degree.

 

In the Philippines, what we have got in the Ilokos are students, who like us in Hawai’i, are ashamed of their being Ilokanos.

 

For one, they cannot even speak in good Ilokano anymore.

 

Number two, they cannot read in Ilokano anymore.

 

Number three, they cannot write in Ilokano anymore.

 

These same mistakes are repeated all over, and in Hawai’i we hear terrible stories from parents.

 

One parent has argued with me: Why would I send my son or daughter to an Ilokano class? She or he knows Ilokano already? What would he or she learn in an Ilokano class?

 

Let me translate this insult for you to understand—an insult directed to us at our Ilokano Program in the University, an insult that is also heard among parents in the Ilocos and in the Ilokanized provinces of the Cordilleras and Cagayan Valley region:

 

Apay pay laeng a pagadalek ti anakko iti Ilokano? Ammona metten ti agilokano. Ania ngarud ti masursurona dita?

 

Kunada a ti karigatan a makita ti mata ket ti agong, uray no agkarrubada, uray no aginnasidegda.

 

Paggaammotayo nga agkarruba ti utek ken dagiti bibigtayo—ti utek a lugar ti adal ken dagiti bibig a paggubuayan ti pagsasao. Ngem gapu kadi ta agkarrubadan ket ammo aminen ti utek ti rummuar iti bibig?

 

No kastoy ti panagrasrason dagiti Amerikano, apay pay laeng a dagiti naiyanak ti Amerika a ti umuna nga aweng a mangngeganda ket aweng ti Ingles, ket adalenda pay laeng ti pagsasaoda manipud iti pre-school aginggana iti universidad?

 

Dagitoy akikid a kapampanunotantayo ti maysa kadagiti rason no apay a marakrakrak ti kinaasinnotayo.

 

Dagitoy saan a nawada a panagpampanunot nga agbalin a pagtuladan dagiti sabali ti mangdaddadael iti nainkalintegan koma a panagrespetotayo iti karbengantayo iti lengguahe ken kulturatayo.

 

Iti Amerika, partikular iti Estado ti Hawai’i, adda dagiti programa a mangitantandudo iti panagrespeto iti lengguahetayo, kas iti programatayo iti Universidad.

 

Kadagiti sistema ti korte ken paglintegan, kas pagarigan, adda dagiti pagalagadan a mangdawdawat iti panangusar iti bukod a lengguahe. Kadagiti interpreter iti korte itatta, narugianen ti panaglisensia dagiti amin nga interpreter babaen ti panagalada iti examinasion nga ituyang ti govierno a federal.

 

Iti bukodmi a biang, bitbitibitenmi ti pannakapadur-as ti pannakaiyadal ti Ilokano.

 

Itay napan a tawen, rinugianmi ti Ilokano Plus Program iti Maui Community College, maysa a programa a pangpangalantayo koma a mangituyang iti respetado a programa ti Ilokano iti Maui.

 

Kaniak a biang, adun dagiti panggedan a nagpaspasarak.

 

Malaksid iti panagisurok iti nadumaduma a pagadalan, nagpapaayak pay a periodista, trabaho nga inaramidko met laeng iti panagimigrantek idiay Los Angeles. Kadagitoy a pakaseknan, inar-aramatko ti lente ti kina-Ilokanok, lenta nga inaplikarko met laeng iti panangirupir iti kalintegan dagiti sabali pay nga etnolingguistiko a grupo, dagiti minoria a grupo, iti Abagatan a California babaen kadagiti editorial ken salaysayko, babaen ti panangisurok kadagiti migrante nga ubbing, babaen ti panangiyabogko kadagiti mamaestra a Filipino nga agsublida iti eskuelaan tapno makipaggamuloda iti pannakaipasdek ti mas sensitivo pay a komonidad iti Amerika, maysa a komunidad a sensitivo kadagiti kultural a kinabaknang nga awit-awit dagiti amin nga imigrante. 

 

Pinanawak ti Los Angeles tapno sarangtek ti karit a kakibin ti panangtagiben ken panangpadur-as iti program ti Ilokano iti Universidad ti Hawai'i. Diak ammo a kastoy ti karigat daytoy a karit gapu ta saan met amin a suporta a masapul ket ited ti govierno.

 

Malaksid laeng kadagiti sumagmamano nga organisasion a makaamiris iti rigat ti panangpataray iti kastoy a programa, a pakairamanan ti GUMIL Hawai’i, mabilbilang laeng iti ramay dagiti tumultulong.

 

Awan babalawen ti kastoy.

 

Umuna, adu dagiti di makaammo nga adda programa iti Ilokano iti Universidad, nga adda kastoy a programa a makasapul iti tulong.

 

Maikadua, nakurang siguro ti pannakikammayet daytoy a programa iti komunidad iti naglabas a 37 a tawen, ta naipasdek daytoy a programa iti Universidad idi 1972, nga inallawatko idi 2006.

 

Gapuna nga iti panagsaritak ita iti sanguananyo, sapay ta maallukoyko ti liderato ti Cabugao International tapno iti kasta ket tulongandakami a mangtagibi iti daytoy a programa.

 

Ti dua nga umuna a pakaseknanmi ket ti pannakapataud ti fondo para iti scholarship dagiti adalanmi a numan pay nalalaingda, ket saan isuda a kabaelan a gastosan dagiti dadakkelda. Maysa pay ditoy ti pannakapataud ti fondo tapno maiwayattayo dagiti sabali pay a projekto.

 

Inton Noviembre—iti daytoy a Noviembre, isayangkattayonto ti maikapat nga internasional a kumperensia ti Nakem.

 

Daytoy Nakem Conferences ket maysa nga internasional a tignayan iti pannakaprotektar, pannakataripato, ken pannakaipromover ti lengguahe ken kultura nga Ilokano agraman dagiti lengguahe ken kultura iti Amianan.

 

Daytoy met laeng ti mamagtaripnong kadagiti amin nga edukador, agsuksukisok, cultural worker, mannurat ken policy maker iti kultura dagiti Ilokano ken taga-Amianan.

 

Sapay ta makikammayetto kadakami ti sibubukel a Cabugao International tapno naimballigian a maisayangkattayo daytoy a kumperensia.

 

The challenge for all of us Ilokanos is for us to make it certain that our language and culture will not only survive but thrive, and last forever.

 

At the present, there are an estimated 20 million Ilokanos and Ilokano-speaking people of the world. Our population is that of the population of Australia. Our Ilokano speaking population is almost 20 times that of the population of the State of Hawai’i. But pray, tell me, where are we? There is such a thing as the death of language. If we did not do anything to make it certain that our Ilokano language thrives, God forbid, it will die sooner than we least expect it.

 

At the Laoag International Airport in Ilocos Norte, there is this streamer that cries out to the heavens that says only English and Tagalog, or what they call Filipino now,  are spoken there. 

 

When I first saw that sign in 2007 when we had the Nakem International Conference in Batac, I felt sad, very sad. I could only grieve—I could only cry from within.

 

Kasano nga iti bukodmo a paraangan, kasano nga iti bukodmo nga ili, kasano nga iti bukodmo a pagtaengan ket maiparit ti panagsao iti bukodmo a lengguahe?

 

Ania koma a kita ti kararua ti mangipagel iti bukodna a pagsasao iti lugar a dayta a pagsasao ket natural, a ti aweng dayta a pagsasao ket isu dagiti immuna nga aweng ti panagtao, sa panagubing, sa panagnakem?

 

No, we cannot continue with this injustice against our language.

 

No, we cannot say that we are going to allow Ilokano to be relegated to the dustbin of history, relegated to the corner, and left there to rot.

 

No, we cannot allow that the 20 million Ilokanos and Ilokano-speaking people will simply be wiped out by the unjust language policies of countries where we are found, including the Philippines where our language should have found a cultural public space as a matter of our basic human right.

 

No, we cannot allow that this injustice in our educational system in the Philippines will continue to be the reason for our oppression as a people.

 

In the State of Hawaii, there is now this Senate Concurrent Resolution 210 that takes very seriously this issue of respecting our heritage right and thus, the teaching of the heritage languages of the Philippines that we initially defined as Ilokano, Sebuano, and Tagalog.

 

We need each other then to advance and pursue our case of promoting our Ilokano language and culture. We need each other in this act of correcting the linguistic injustice that has been our lot for a long time.

 

For indeed, there is injustice in making us believe that we are more Filipino if we speak Tagalog, and that we are less Filipino when we speak Ilokano.

 

This statement is a sham; it is one big lie we must unmask, as our being Ilokano is what makes us Filipino, and vice versa.

 

Together, we can make this happen—if only we stopped hating ourselves as Ilokanos because we cannot speak Tagalog enough.

This thinking that has become a false and empty value has got to stop.

 

I hope that Cabugao International will take up this challenge of renewing ourselves as Ilokanos, of helping us with our work of promoting a more scientific study of our language and culture as a people, and of helping our program and our students through their moral and financial support to our various projects.

 

I hope that in the future, Cabugao International will take up the cudgels, as GUMIL Hawai’i has done, and come to help us so we can help our students.

 

 

Dios ti agngina. Naimbag a rabiiyo amin.

 

Thank you and good evening to all of you.