User:Mdelrosario

Comparative Analysis Between Spanish and American Colonization of the Philippines

There are obvious differences on the colonial designs and the educational agenda, goals and objectives of Spain and the US. While Spain sought for the Christianization of the Philippines through almost four hundred years of Christian religious education, the US aimed for its Americanization through an education anchored on the knowledge on civil and self-government. As Zaide (1957) notes, in the case of Spain, the basic philosophy of Spanish education was "to prepare the Filipinos for life in heaven rather than to train them for citizenship on earth" (p.90). In the case of the US, however, as Lardizabal (1991) underscores, training for self - government or democracy meant training for the American way of life, in short the Americanization of the Philippines.

In pursuing these objectives, Spain and the US employed their respective set of strategies centered on two critical spheres of implementation: the system of primary education, and language policy. From the initial stage of its occupation, Spain established parochial schools to teach the Christian faith. It only implemented a primary education in 1863, two centuries after the establishment of the higher institutions of learning. The US, on the other hand, at the very outset, established a system of free primary education for all. Based on this, it could be argued that Spain used a top-to-bottom approach while US adopted a bottom-to-top model. From the literature it is clear that Spain had no intention of educating the Filipinos, especially the Filipino child, in anything outside the Christian doctrine. It did not establish a primary school system not until two centuries after it created the first university in the Philippines. Such could be attributed to the fact that, as Laubach (1925) indicated, universal education was frowned upon at that time.

But arguably, the real reason why Spain established universities prior to primary schools was to provide liberal education for the Spaniards and their sons and daughters on one hand; and, on the other, to harness the education of the Spanish clergy who were decidedly and exclusively the only ones whom the friars believed should and could propagate the teaching of the Christian faith. From all indications, the education of the Filipinos, outside the Christian doctrine, was never part of the friars' plans. As Fonacier Bernabe (1987) noted the friars believed that "a happy Indian need only how to pray, to plow and to be obedient" (p.19). This was fully supported by Del Rosario's (1903) point as cited by Laubach (1925) that "their educational establishments were places of luxury for children of well-to-do families rather than establishments in which to perfect and develop the minds of the Filipino youth" (p. 322).

On the other hand, America's strategy of assimilating every Filipino child through free education runs completely counter to that of Spain's. America's bottom-to-top approach, where a free primary education for all was established first, targeted the Americanization of the Filipino child from the start. Atkinson's (1902) unabashed declaration as cited by Lardizabal (1991) that, "the home government demands rightly that as soon as possible the people of these islands shall become Americanized. We must begin with the child. You cannot make Americans of the adult Filipinos… we may make of the child what we choose" (p. 45), could not have made the terms of America's assimilation strategy any clearer.

Thus, with primary education system as a parameter, it is evident that while Spain used such system to keep the Filipinos in the dark except about the Christian doctrine, America used the primary schools to blind them with everything American. While Spain relentlessly preached the sacraments and teachings on Catholic faith, America preached the supposed glory of America, the superiority of its society and the blessings of its democracy and the sacredness of its constitution. Fry (1997) notes how General Arthur Mac Arthur in 1902 declared that "when the Filipino people realize the grandeur of their future destiny by reason of association with the great Republic, and come to understand that they are a chosen people to carry out not only American commerce but also republican institutions and the principles of personal liberty throughout Asia, they may be relied upon to … follow and support the American flag" (p.387).

Essentially therefore, while Spain dogmatized the Philippines with religious education anchored on Catholic faith, America secularized the Philippine education with a romanticized ideology on democracy. Such polarity with the two countries' strategies is made even sharper with their respective language policies, the very element from which such strategies found expression and thus realization.

Laubach (1925) and Fonacier Bernabe (1987) illustrated in detail how the friars deliberately ignored royal decrees to use and teach Spanish in the Philippines. The clever way in which the friars made the Spanish language inaccessible to the Filipinos while helping themselves with the local dialects, assured them unlimited access to the daily lives of the Filipinos, while building an invisible yet almost impenetrable wall around themselves from which the Filipinos, except for the very few rich families, could gain no entry. With the Spanish language as their shield, the friars and the colonial officials successfully separated themselves from the natives and kept the lines deeply drawn between them and the Filipinos. Invariably, they not only exploited the absence of a unifying common language in the Philippines but also used this to the hilt so as to perpetuate the Filipinos' "cultivated dependence and disunity" (Fonacier Bernabe, 1987, p.19)

The exact opposite obtained in the case of the US. With its goal of assimilation, the US went on a full scale "Englishation" of the Philippines to the extent of transporting American teachers from the US to the interiors of the Philippines. Through the teaching of reading and writing and US history in English of the Filipino child, the US successfully miseducated the Filipinos. As Constantino (1975) declared, with English, the Filipino did not only learn a new language but also a new culture, a culture which Reinsch (1904) reiterated was totally alien to the Filipino's tradition, history and racial needs. Because of this, Lardizabal (1991) argued, "…a new generation, moved by American ideals, ways of thought, and behavior brought up under American civilization and American temperament has been born" (pp.106-107).

Through the use or non-use of their respective languages therefore, both Spain and America clearly inflicted irreparable damages not only on the Filipinos as a people but, more importantly on the psyche of the Philippines as a nation. The friars' success in denying the Filipinos access to the authorities by using the Spanish language as a barrier, and in exploiting their disunity because of the absence of a common language, enabled them to live off the Filipinos through the encomienda system for close to four centuries. Such a long stretch of time of servitude, punctuated with a daily dose of Christian indoctrination, effectively obliterated anything indigenously Filipino. In the case of the US, the American teachers' efforts in the "Englishation" of the Philippines proved to be critically integral to the assimilation of the Filipinos. It is argued that with English, the Filipinos found a common language; but, on the same breath, it is also argued that with English as a common language, which is the expression of the American culture, the Filipinos traded their culture for English and thus, lost what is essentially Filipino. Constantino's (1975) view on language as not being a neutral vehicle of thought unmistakably resonates.

From here, another difference between Spain's and the US's educational policy could be observed: with the friars hiding behind the cloak of Spanish language and their intent of keeping the Filipinos ignorant, a case could be made that Spain adopted the policy of separation, whereas, the Americans, needless to say, adopted the policy of assimilation.

As already noted, the friars separated themselves from the Filipinos although they relied on them for support and sustenance from the tributes the Filipinos had to pay from the encomiendas controlled by the friars. In so doing, the friars managed to preserve their so-called superiority and hegemony while continually exploiting the Filipinos economically. These very conditions are well established as characteristics of the policy of separation. The US, on the other hand, without any argument, completely assimilated the Filipinos and made them embrace and adopt the American culture.

In terms of similarities, there is only one striking feature that could be drawn from the literature: the fact that the Philippine government and the Filipino people paid for such expensive exploits of Spain and the US in the Philippines. If as Reinsch (1904) remarked that, at least the US, [or for that matter Spain], like France and Germany, paid for its colonial experimentations, the expenditure of America's [and Spain's] colonial endeavors would not have involved so great a risk of the misapplication of the very limited resources of the Philippines. Clearly, two rich colonies living off the poverty of a so-called dependent state, one in the name of the Catholic Church, and the other, in the name of democracy, demands a reinvestigation on what or who is the dependent state, and consequently, a reassessment on the notion on the white man's burden for undoubtedly, in both instances of Spain's and US colonialism, the white man proved to be the burden.

Category:Education [target: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippines] [target: http://www.columbia.edu/~mtd2002/intl_ed/two_empires_final.pdf]

--Mdelrosario 04:39, 1 April 2006 (UTC)Mdelrosario