Reddit mentions: The best phillippines history books

I am not Filipino but I have enough connection now to have more than a passing interest. By reading "In Our Image: America's Empire in the Philippines," I feel somewhat more informed on the topic than even well-educated Americans and Filipinos I run into. I would be curious to know of similar or better books to read on the topic.

The wikipedia page for Bonifacio goes into some detail as well.

There are two ways to read history -- one focuses on the personalities, the "great men" if you will -- while the other is more of a study of culture, resources and demographics. Both aspects are important. To make history approachable for normal people, you have to kind of shine the light on individuals. However, I think the great movements and outcomes are generally determined by less personal forces. Who one chooses to illuminate and elevate often reveals more about an author or speaker than it does about history.

If I remember correctly, Bonifacio went to Hong Kong to buy guns from and enlist support of the Americans but they had already set sail without him. If that story is correct, it seems to me that his political ground game was not so tight. Like he may not have been in the same league as other figures he was dealing with on a pure power-politics level. But he also seems like a more admirable guy than Aguinaldo.

Where it seems the Philippine independence movement fell short is that Aguinaldo was basically fighting on behalf of the elite to preserve the status quo just without the Spanish. His idea of Philippine nationhood was not terribly expansive or inclusive and he didn't really have the regular people behind him in a committed way.

When it sounded like the independence was going to offer them a good deal, the elite of the Philippines were cautiously for it. (But almost certainly keeping their options open just in case.) Later, as dealing with the Americans promised greater riches and became less threatening, the enthusiasm for independence among them subsided. Aguinaldo also lost support of regions through the trial and execution of Bonifacio.

The main concern for Philippine elite was protection of their land titles. The prospect of trade deals leading to export contracts with the US -- then rapidly becoming one of the hottest markets -- was also a major draw. What could independence offer that would be better than that for them? For the regular Juans also, Americans offered education and other benefits.

I wonder what would Aguinaldo's Philippines have looked like had he succeeded. But then again I also wonder what America would have looked like had it remained part of the British empire -- a similarly improbable outcome.

Here's my list from months ago...

Well, here they are:

I recommend Luis Francia's History of the Philippines: From Indios Bravos to Filipinos. This book is the best introduction to Philippine history, period.

And then...

• The Huk Rebellion by Benedict J. Kerkvliet
  
• Sakdalistas' Struggle for Philippine Independence 1930-1945 by Motoe Terami-Wada
  
  Both books are still available in major bookstores (NBS, Powerbooks, Fully Booked).
  Mrs. Terami-Wada wrote about the Sakdalistas much earlier and so here's the monograph on the subject.
  
  On the pre-colonial era, the one great expert is no other than William Henry Scott, and here's a list of his books:
  
  
• Cracks in the Parchment Curtain
  
• Prehispanic Source Materials for the Study of Philippine History
  
• Looking for the Prehispanic Filipino
  
  Unfortunately, out of stock. And as you noticed, none of these authors are Filipino.
  
  I'd recommend any book by Ambeth Ocampo, btw.
  
  And finally, on Muslim Philippines, there's only one must-read:
  
  
• Muslims in the Philippines by Cesar Adib Majul
  
  Have fun~!
  
  Lest I forget, books on the Marcoses and the Martial Law era:
  
  
• The Conjugal Dictatorship of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos by Primitivo Mijares (a free e-book, with the permission of a Mijares' relative)
  
• The Untold Story of Imelda Marcos by Carmen Navarro Pedrosa (available in bookstores)
  
• James Hamilton-Paterson's America's Boy
  
• William C. Rempel's Diary of a Dictator -- Ferdinand & Imelda: The Last Days of Camelot - This one contains excerpts of FM's journals, the originals of which lies deep in the National Archives (?)
  
• Myles A. Garcia's Thirty Years Later...: Catching Up with the Marcos-Era Crimes
  
• Raissa Robles' Marcos Martial Law: Never Again
  
  That's all, for now. :)
  

If you worked in the BX & the Commissary we likely did see one another. I left before you did. Those killings happened after I left. Your dad was very lucky.

Remember the time between the election and the overthrow of Marcos? Weird times. I remember riding a bus in to work one morning and seeing a jeep full of Filipino soldiers riding down the road in front of us with yellow ribbons tied around the barrels of their M-16s. The US still supported Marcos, but those guys were definite Aquino supporters.

I still have a book of images from then - called "Bayan Ko". If you've not seen it, you should check it out. It will bring back the memories for sure.

EDIT: http://www.amazon.com/Bayan-Ko-Images-Philippine-Revolt/dp/9627160032/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1369339096&sr=8-3&keywords=bayan+ko - you can pick it up cheap.

Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:


amazon.com

amazon.co.uk

amazon.ca

amazon.com.au

amazon.in

amazon.com.mx

amazon.de

amazon.it

amazon.es

amazon.com.br

amazon.nl

amazon.co.jp

amazon.fr

Beep bloop. I'm a bot to convert Amazon ebook links to local Amazon sites.
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This comment recommends Victor Lieberman's Strange Parallels

I've read some of it myself and would definitely recommend it

Edit: paging /u/lukeweiss who answered the original.

Also, I've noticed that Volume II discusses spice trade and it's relevance to the Majapahit Empire.

>Majapahit's wealth let it equip those "expeditionary forces" that a contemporary account boasted "annihilated altogether" "commandment-breakers" in the seas beyond Java, while its rice surplus let it supply food-deficit ports around the archipelago, especially in the east, where it sought to access spices.

It mentions spices in passing elsewhere too, but the main focus of the book isn't on the spice trade.

Ancient Southeast Asia discusses the spice trade as well, but it's in the context of archaeological evidence and political development. Here, too, the spice trade isn't the main focus.

Edit 2: Formatting

History of the inarticulate. This one is interesting.

Another one that maybe different is Pacific Rims if you love Philippine basketball.

Vestiges of War an excellent book on the subject. Covers US-Filipino relations to the present. Contains essays on politics, culture. Lots of good stuff.

It wouldn't hurt to read a good history book on whatever country you're going to. For PCVs going to the Philippines, I highly recommend In Our Image by Stanley Karnow.

The Marcos era has a lot of good books, but volumes that cover the presidencies of Roxas up to Macapagal is scarce. I recommend Patricio Abinales and Donna Amoroso's State and Society in the Philippines as it has a chapter that covers the terms of the first five post-war Presidents of the Philippines. Marcos, of course, has his own chapter.

Writer Ian Casocot recently compiled a working bibliography of Martial Law literature; the history books are grouped under the category 'General Non-Fiction' in his list.

Some recommendations:

• China Wakes - former NY Times correspondent details his experiences during the 1980-90's
  
• In Our Image - history of America's colonial empire in the Philippines
  
• China: A New History - a nice overview of dynastic China
  
  

Being white and asian, I'd say whats helped me with identity issues the MOST is expertly knowing the history of the places my ancestors came from. Language was good too but in my area, schools for both my sides' language were readily available. My white half was super connected with the old country still and asian half was born in the old country, so that's why I learned both - grateful I did. Im actually reading this book right now on the Philippines. HIGHLY recommended to learn the REAL history of what America did over there with primary documents! Surprise - its pretty racist. http://www.amazon.com/The-Philippines-Reader-Neocolonialism-Dictatorship/dp/089608275X

But if you're insisting the kid learn Tagalog and not, for example, German or Swedish (or whatever you're descended from) then that's kind of racist b/c you're saying when you're Asian American, you're not 100% American, so you should know the language of your REAL home.

And that kind of IS how America is for Asian people (so you're excused for wanting your kid to be fully accepted while living in this racist system) - Asian Americans, if they don't speak their "native" language are given shit by some of their fellow Asian Americans and fellow non Asian Americans, and from both its kind of BS. White Americans arent shamed for not speaking German or Gaelic. English is ENOUGH because they're All-American. End rant on hyphenated Americans being held to a different standard

History of the Filipino People by Teodoro Agoncillo

>Teodoro A. Agoncillo (November 9, 1912 – January 14, 1985) was one of the pre-eminent Filipino historians of the 20th century. He and his contemporary Renato Constantino were among the first Filipino historians who earned renown for promoting a distinctly nationalist point of view of Filipino history (nationalist historiography). He was also an essayist and a poet.

I found this book in my school library. my parents were pretty open about our family's history, but they are both Filipino.

For logistics, chances and pitfalls, try something modern. Say, Counterinsurgency in Paradise, Paradise Afire, or Rwandan Patriotic Front

One of the most interesting parts of Marcos downfall was that of Dovie Beams, an American actress whom he had an affair with. Tapes leaked of Marcos receiving oral sex from Dovie Beams and those tapes were broadcast on university campuses across the Philippines (I read about in the book The Marcos Dynasty by Sterling Seagrave; https://www.amazon.com/Marcos-Dynasty-Sterling-Seagrave/dp/0060158158/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=).

my guru recommended this book to me a while back:

http://www.amazon.com/Filipino-Martial-Culture/dp/0804820880/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1343415989&sr=1-1&keywords=filipino+martial+culture

I read it, was pretty legit. lots of stories about masters chopping people's heads of with machetes and shit.

Filipino Martial Culture by Wiley

https://www.amazon.com/Filipino-Martial-Culture/dp/0804820880/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

captain here... [amazon link] (https://www.amazon.com/The-History-Of-Burgis/dp/9719146761)

flies away

Floro Quibuyen said in his book A Nation Aborted said that Rizal had something grander than independence during that time, hence him fighting for assimilation instead of independence. Keep in mind that the Philippines, even as a colony of the Spanish Empire back then, was still in its infancy, and when assimilated, we could've been developed into something big. The lack of national identity (we were fragmented to provinces back then), the fucked-up government system (friars control the government), and god knows what else, we still had a long way from becoming a country ourselves. The assimilation was just to lay the foundation of the country, and who know what could've happened after that. Rizal saw the possibilities, and the revolution aborted the whole thing.

I learn relatively small amounts of info from many different sources. Not necessarily specifically Philippine ...


For linguistics (may be heavy reading):

Blust's monumental book on Austronesian languages

Jason Lobel's dissertation on Philippine-type languages



For a more archaeology-oriented perspective, how about this:


First Islanders


I'll have to think about other sources ...

Or people could seriously start looking at this angle.

http://www.rense.com/general49/sece.htm

http://www.amazon.com/Asian-Loot-Unearthing-Secrets-Yamashita/dp/0940777088

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/720070/yamashita-treasure-70-years-after

We need to add a lot more states:

• Puerto Rico
  
  
• District of Columbia
  
  
• Guam
  
  
• Delmarva (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delmarva_Peninsula#Proposed_state)
  
  
• West Kansas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Kansas)
  
  
• Baja Arizona (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Arizona#Secession)
  
  
• Downstate Illinois
  
  
• The Other Five Californias (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_and_secession_in_California#21st_century)
  
  
• Long Island (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Island_(proposed_state))
  
  
• Franklin (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Franklin)
  
  
• Splitting up New Jersey (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Jersey#Statehood_movement)
  
  
• Westsylvania (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westsylvania)
  
  
• Jefferson (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_(proposed_Pacific_state))
  
  
• Marthas Vineyard (https://web.archive.org/web/20110714141528/http://www.mvmagazine.com/2007/september-october/secession.php)
  
  
• New York City (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City:_the_51st_State)
  
  
• Philadelphia (https://www.phillymag.com/news/2016/12/20/philadelphia-statehood/)
  
  
• Northern Colorado (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Colorado)
  
  
• Cascadia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascadia_(independence_movement))
  
  
• Absaroka (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absaroka_(proposed_state))
  
  
• Upper Peninsula (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_(proposed_U.S._state))
  
  
• Chopping up Texas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_divisionism)
  
  
• South Florida (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Florida#Partition_proposals)
  
  
• Lincoln (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Florida#Partition_proposals)
  
  
• American Samoa (http://www.samoanews.com/local-news/future-prospects-american-samoa%e2%80%99s-political-status)
  
  
• The Philippines (https://www.amazon.com/PHILIPPINE-STATEHOOD-U-S-ANYONE/dp/144156604X)
  
  
• Canada (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_movements_of_Canada)
  
  
• Mexico
  
  
• Dominican Republic (annexation failed in 1870 due to a tie vote in the US Senate, see https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Treaties.htm#5)
  
  
• Italy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Unionist_Movement)
  
  
• Cuba (https://www.nytimes.com/1860/12/13/archives/annexation-of-cuba-made-easy.html)
  
  
• Nicaragua (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Walker_(filibuster))
  
  
• Albania (https://web.archive.org/web/20080209004242/http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/06/08/frontpage/albania.php)
  
  
• Others (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/51st_state#Use_internationally). The link here mentions among others Central America, Dominica, Greenland, Haiti, Hong Kong (https://lihkg.com/thread/304415/page/1 but I don't read Chinese), Israel, the Azores, and Sicily.