Announcements

1. Announcements • Presentation 2/13 • April, Daniel, Stephani, Isaac Hong, & Sith • 1pg description of contribution by 6pm Tuesday night (2/12) • BRIEF summary, emphasis on analysis and relation

2. The Queer Trans-Nationalism of Jose Garcia Villa colonialist and/or critic

3. National Fictions • “Such a notion of Filipinoness, of a Filipino culture that was fixed, yet flexible, historical yet history-making, had the advantage of being attuned to social and historical processes, to development and change. Yet the very distinctiveness of this malleable national character served only to render its instability as a concept more apparent” (2) • State paradoxically must intervene to shape national spirit • Commonwealth period  supposed cultural/spiritual development of nation obfuscates state’s material subordination to US culture politics “What is and what should be the basis of political action that aims at transforming society? How does culture (and literature) formulate an account of political action and help to actualize it?” (8)

4. 1940 Literary Awards • Mandated by Quezon, administered by League of Filipino Writers • Short story, novel, essay and poetry categories in Spanish, Tagalog and English • Poetry in English: • R. Zulueta da Costa – first place • Jose Garcia Villa – honorable mention • Angela Manalang Gloria – first Filipina poet in English; entry censured for being overly erotic

5. Like the Molave • Celebration of Rizal • 1901 – Taft renames District of Morong into Rizal Province and erects national monument • Rizal versus Bonifacio • Paradox of Commonwealth Philippine nationalism: • “Philippines – (Spain + America) = Molave”

6. National Excess • “…these excesses [heterogenous elements] are not just engendered by the ‘productive violence’ of the nationalist project in the sense that they are necessary by-products of different nationalist projects of imagining and making community. Instead, these excesses are a constitutive feature of nation making, an irreducible component of the nationalist project of making community” (7)

7. Poetic Excess Revolt from Hymen O to be free at last, to sleep at last As infants sleep within the womb of rest! To stir and stirring find no blackness vast With passion weighted down upon the breast, To turn the face this way and that and feel No kisses festering on it like sores, To be alone at last, broken the seal That marks the flesh no better than a whore’s! • Criteria for judgment of literary awards: • “aesthetic test” • “social significance” • Gloria’s poetry determined to be: • Socially insignificant • Overly romantic and underdeveloped artistically 1940 Literary Awards re-enforces false dichotomy between public and private, political and personal

8. Jose Garcia Villa • 1908 - Born in Manila • Father was physician to Aguinaldo • Mother was from wealthy land-owning family • 1929 – immigrated to US after suspension at University of Philippines • Epitomizes the Filipino pensionado– upper class Filipino sent to US to pursue higher study • Bachelor’s degree at University of Mexico • Graduate training at Columbia University

9. Colonialist or Critic? • What are Chua’s arguments? What makes Villa a colonialist? What makes him a critic? • P. 182  neutrality as compliance • P.183  mastering the master’s tools • P.184  fucking with English

10. Divine Play with God • McKinley’s “Address to a Methodist Delegation” • Divine Poem 76 • Divine Poem 77