Historian Anderson Describes Social Innovation Tools – 2 of 2
Note: This post has been re-written in a more accessible and longer style. Please click here for link to Post 136, the better version.
Start of Part II of II. Professor Benedict notes that governments build nationalism, for good or for bad, through emblems like cenotaphs and tombs of the unknown soldier. He says they are empty symbols that, in classic marketing, can be filled with desired facets of nationhood.
I ask, can these concepts be used with anticipated history for community-building? For example, can the need for unity to have better bargaining power viz powerful neighbors like China and India be enough for ASEAN to come together? Or, can the looming reality of climate change affecting the littoral areas of ASEAN people, who already ‘share a love for fermented fish and mollusks,’ force the nations together into a supra-national embrace? The good Professor implies yes. He uses a phrase, ‘historical destinies‘ to suggest such use is possible.
There seems to be a tipping point when these imaginations overpower self-interest in getting a community together. When Chip Tsao shamed Filipinos by falsely calling the Philippines a ‘nation of servants,’ the collective response was just to get him to apologize. Those of us who have worked in Hongkong and Singapore have lived with many Chip Tsaos. We suffered quietly and strove to improve the picture. Nobody raised the true issue that Chip Tsao’s comment calls for: “What ought Filipinos change in the countryís political economy to avoid the being called a ‘nation of servants’ again when confronted with a big issue like sovereign territory, the Spratlys?” Maybe the tipping point is yet to come.
But not to despair, and off to work. As a teacher, myself, I give you an assignment. Go to the bookstore, buy, and read our “young” historians (given below with some of their opus in PN Abinalesís introduction to the Philippine edition of Imagined Communities):
- “Jojo” Abinales, a townmate from Ozamiz, Making Mindanao;
- Aguilar, Jr, Clash of Spirits;
- S. Hau, Necessary Fictions;
- Ileto, Pasyon and Rebolusyon;
- Ocampo, whose books are ubiquitous;
- Rafael. Contracting Colonialism; and,
- Joel M Rocamora, Nationalism in Search of Ideology.
I had much more fun and less drudge reading them than textbooks by Zaide and Agoncillo. And I think the book titles doest shout dialectics much more than the sea changing contemplation within – for me a barrier to break through, really. They must share the same title editor. The good Professor’s title, Imagined Communities, is benign in comparison – as befitting a paradigm shifter, perhaps. As I turned page six, and right at the top, its meaning and implications hit me. Reading the rest of the book was a rush and those of his student-teachers a continuation.
All of them have been touched by Professor Benedict and have touched him in turn. One can sense in their works a reboot to the emerging Filipinos of Mabiniís time (Also read Cesar Majul’s Mabini) – when most of them start their research. Like Mabini, they directly connect to the thought threads of the wider world outside instead of straight-jacketing facts into a doctrine. All of them are Professors and thinkers. With their thinking hats, the six (w/ Ambeth) I have read thus far have drifted away from dogmatic materialism and into more multi-disciplinary approaches. While seeking and questioning, they have stayed true to the nation by keeping close and always smelling the flowers. In their own time, it will be great to see them break through as had their teacher – especially, starting with the titles. Ha! Ha!
It may seem contradictory to talk about nationalism and pushing for ASEAN unity in one breath. Yet, it is precisely because of my anticipation of the need for a regional supra-community that this call to distill and instill our own nationalism becomes important.
P.S. What I had to read in hiding in 1974 – still, thanks to Audie O – is now available on the shelf at Fully Booked, Rockwell – Joema Sisonís PSR. Circa 2009, reading it again is a really hard slog.
Click here for Part 1 of 2.
