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Photo by Tom Murphy VII (as posted in WikiMedia)
The sometimes contentious topic that is Philippine literature in English may perhaps be traced back to the American military's pacification campaign in the late 19th century.

As John M. Gates points out, in his Schoolbooks and Krags: The United States Army in the Philippines, 1898-1902 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1973), General Arthur MacArthur, then military commander in the Philippine Islands, sought to divide the civilian population from the revolutionaries who had continued their struggle for independence from the Spanish and later American forces. 

Gen. MacArthur used unconventional strategies, employing American soldiers to teach civilians the three Rs (reading, 'riting, and reckoning or 'rithmetic) with English as the medium of instruction. This was perhaps the first successful case of America's pacification campaign to "win the hearts and minds" of a people.
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I thought it would be easy.

Turns out doing a seminar course on contemporary Philippine literature for a graduate class was easier than this. All I had to do then was to choose critical texts on trends in contemporary Philippine literature.

This time, however, I had to choose literary texts -- poetry, fiction, drama, and creative nonfiction -- from the 1940s to the present.

I decided to pick one of each for every decade from the forties to the aughties -- that's seven decades of Philippine writing, with about 28 writers all in all.

It would be easy choosing definitive works per decade, or so I thought. Fiction in the forties, easy -- you just choose from Arcellana, Gonzalez, Joaquin, Santos, etc. And some of these writers had works in different genres, I would have some elbow room.

But that was easier said than done, especially when I had to consider that some of these writers' works were also part of other subjects' reading lists.

And because I wanted students to have a sweep of the writing through the decades, variety had to be the operational keyword. Texts already assigned in other courses were out, to give way to other texts or to other writers not usually included in survey courses like this one.

Then there was also the idea of capturing the zeitgeist for every decade. I wanted to choose texts and writers who epitomized the "spirit of the times."

And so I found myself in a quandary. While decisions were easily made as to what selections to include for the 40s and 50s, I soon faced a challenge coming into the 60s and onwards. So many writers to consider, and so varied the selections.

Well, I hope the final syllabus (downloadable from the sidebar) does justice to the course. Some will argue about my choices, and all I can tell them is: I'm teaching the course.
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