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Filipino Mestizo
Notable Filipino Mestizos: Manuel L. Quezon, Andrés Bonifacio, and José Rizal .
Total population
Official population numbers are unknown.
Regions with significant populations
Philippines
Languages
Filipino, other Philippine languages, Spanish, English, other European languages, and Chinese.
Religion
Christianity (Predominantly Roman Catholic, with a minority of Protestants); and other religions.
Related ethnic groups
Other Filipino people, Austronesian people, Spanish people, European people, Latinos, and Chinese people.

Filipino mestizo is a term used in the Philippines to denote Filipinos of mixed indigenous Filipino (Austronesian) and foreign ancestry. The word mestizo is itself of Spanish origin stemming from the Spanish colonial period. It was employed to denote people of mixed European (most often Spanish) and Amerindian peoples in the American colonies.

In the Philippines, the term "mestizo" originally bore the connotation of mixed Spaniard and indigenous Filipino. In the 1980's, the “Diccionario de Filipinismos” of Wenceslao Retana, defined the term “mestizo” as individuals who are descendants of Chinese Christians and their indigenous Filipino wives.^[1] Today, it refers to all people of mixed Filipino and foreign ancestry.

There are no reliable sources for the proportion of mestizos in the Philippines at present, this is due in part to the lack of government statistical study regarding the racial makeup of the Philippines. The Philippine Statistics Department does not account for the racial background or ancestry of an indivdual. The number of Filipino mestizos that reside outside the Philippines is also unknown.

[edit] Brief history of major Filipino mestizo groups

[edit] Spanish colonization

Main article: Filipinos of Spanish descent

A Filipina mestizo of part Spanish descent.

The Spanish conquest between 1521 to 1565, prompted the colonization of the Philippine Islands that lasted for more than 377 years.^[2] The Roman Catholic Church played an important role in allowing Spain to gain a foothold in the Philippines. Spanish missionaries were quick to learn indigenous languages, and Catholic rituals were interpreted in accordance with indigenous Filipino beliefs and values. As a result, a kind of folk Catholicism developed in the Philippines.^[3] As with most of the Spanish colonies, marriage to indigenous Filipino women and Spanish men was encouraged. The offspring of Spanish men and indigenous Filipino women may have adopted the culture of their fathers and grand parents, however only a few mixed race families in the Philippines still speak Spanish among themselves^[4]; in addition, Chavacano (a creole language based largely on Spanish vocabulary) is spoken in Zamboanga del Sur and Zamboanga del Norte.

[edit] Chinese immigration

Main article: Filipinos of Chinese descent

Although there had been a pre-Hispanic interaction with and presence of people from what is today China, the arrival of the Spaniards to the Philippines attracted further Chinese traders, and maritime trade flourished during the Spanish colonial period. The Spaniards restricted the activities of the Chinese and confined them to the Parián which was located near Intramuros. With low chances of employment and prohibited from owning land and engaging in agriculture, most of the Chinese residents earned their livelihood as petty traders and skilled artisans serving the colonial authorities.

Many of the Chinese who arrived during the Spanish period were Cantonese, who worked as stevedores and porters, but there were also Fujianese, who entered the retail trade. Deeply distrusted by the Spanish authorities, the Chinese resident in the islands were encouraged to intermarry with indigenous Filipinos, convert to Catholicism and adopt Hispanic surnames and customs. Those who refused were either expelled or massacred. As a consequence, most Chinese immigrants in the Philippines were left with no other choice but to integrate themselves into the colonial society. A few wealthy merchants married Spanish mestizos. The children of unions between indigenous Filipinos and Chinese were called Mestizo de Sangley or Chinese mestizos, while those between Spaniards or Spanish mestizos, and Chinese were called Tornatrás and were classified as white together with the Spanish mestizos and Spanish Filipinos. There were a total of six massacres conducted by the Spaniards against the Chinese, two of which were successful. During the American colonial period, the Chinese Exclusion Act^[5] of the United States was also applied to the Philippines.

After World War II and the fall of the Chinese mainland to communism, many of the Chinese who opposed communism moved from the Fujian province in China to the Philippines. This group formed the bulk of the current population of Chinese Filipinos.^[6] After the Philippines regained its independence in 1946, those Chinese became naturalized Filipino citizens; the children of these new citizens were born and raised in the Philippines and had Filipino citizenship from birth.^[7]

[edit] American occupation

Main article: Filipinos of American descent

After the defeat of Spain during the Spanish-American War in 1898, the Philippine Islands and other remaining Spanish colonies were ceded to the United States in the Treaty of Paris, for 20 million dollars.^[8] Civil government was established by the Americans in 1901, with William Howard Taft as the first American Governor-General of the Philippines. English was declared the official language. Six hundred American teachers were imported aboard the USS Thomas. In order to subdue sporadic uprisings throughout the country, the U.S had to station American Troops on the islands. Many of the American (Caucasian or otherwise) soldiers stationed on the islands had children with the local women. American culture became one of the dominant influences on the islands, leading to the implementation of the American education system.^[9]

While the Philippines was still classed as a U.S. colony, a condition that changed with the promise of independence and with commonwealth status that accompanied Congress's passage of the Tydings-McDuffie Act in 1935, Filipinos were considered resident-aliens of the United States and were thus able to move back and forth without official documentation such as visas. Many male Filipinos then migrated to the continental U.S. and Hawaii to work primarily as agricultural and industrial laborers. Some Filipino migrants subsequently married Americans of all races, producing further Filipino mestizos.

[edit] See also

• Amerasian
• Eurasian
• Mestizo
• Multiracial

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Bahay Tsinoy
• Filipino American Heritage Institute