The Pinoy According to Neni

I came across a few short books this morning (or rather digests, as they are short and very read easy to read). I found one book that captured my attention, “You Know You’re Filipino If…” by Neni Sta. Romana-Cruz. The book seeks to help you find out just how Pinoy you are, and is loaded with a checklist of practices in 11 categories that is totaled at the end and is equated with labels on your degree of being Filiipino. Interesting, eh?

When I first scanned this book last month my initial reaction was, “Is it valid, is it reliable?” or is just another commercial book? I’ve been warned in my early years of study that novelty books pervade the bookstores. Many academic questions came to my mind, and one in particular as it is a question I share with a classmate in Filipino Psychology – “Who is the true Filipino?”

Often, the concept of the true Filipino is pegged on the common knowledge on the practices of the indigenous Filipino. I dare say this is not fair. If I subscribe to this idea, then indeed I am a lost individual. I am Pinoy, flesh and blood. To base the standard of the Filipino identity in the context of the indigenous Filipino is to claim that culture is static, which it is not.

This leads me to another argument- that the Filipino is not a “damaged culture”. To find the Filipino culture as complex is not the same as considering it as “damaged”; if one does not have a concrete picture of an object then how can you say it’s broken?

Out of curiosity, however, I allowed myself to go through the process this particular book prescribed. On my own, I went a little beyond the total scoring and explored my scores per category. This is where it took me:

1. On family matters – 6/17 = 35%
2. Where we live – 6/22 = 27%
3. Health & Hygiene – 5/10 = 50%
4. The way we eat – 27/39 = 69%
5. The way we drive – 1/15 = 7%
6. The way we pray – 3/14 = 21%
7. The way we travel – 0 = 0%
8. The way we shop – 5/10 = 50%
9. Body language – 7/8 = 88%
10. The way we speak – 26/30 = 87%
11. The way we are – 17/27 = 63%

The last category is a little off, I know. I think it was poorly labeled (like an etc. bin), but like I said I allowed myself to go through the process.

In total I achieved a score of 103/203 items in the checklist, 51%, which is what was called “Amoy na amoy ka, Pinoy!” and described as: You look like a Pinoy. You walk like a Pinoy. You talk like a Pinoy. You even smell like a Pinoy. You must be Pinoy!

Body language, speech, and eating habits – my three highest category scores. For now and for this game, that would be enough.

Koreanovelas (Part 3)

Filipino-Korean Contact. Fluidity of inter-cultural contact is more acknowledged lately despite the fact that actual contact between Filipinos and Koreans is more widely known to have happened during the Korean War in the 1950s. During that war, five Battalion Combat Teams of the Philippine Army comprised of more than 7,000 Filipino soldiers, served in Korea from 1950-1955 under the flag of the Philippine Expeditionary Force to Korea of PEFTOK on the United Nations Command during the North and South Korean conflict.

Bernaldez (2003) is inclined to believe differently. In an article, he told of a possibility that peoples of what is now the Philippines and the then Silla Kingdom have had contacts much before the colonial period. Apparently, a young Malay Datu sailed northwards and reached the territories of the Silla Kingdom sometime in the middle of the first millennium. The Malays failed to go back to their place of origin and was hosted by a royal Shilla nobleman until his death. The Malay datu was supposed to have been entombed in a giant mound similar to the burial places of the Silla royalty, speculated to be somewhere in the vast area of Kyongju City.

In recent times, Koreans have flooded the Philippines. They are not just found in tourist sites (largely in baguio City), but moreso in our universities, and residential and commercial areas as well. They have established their own communities, with commercial establishments, churches, and recreational facilities. Filipinos have begun to recognize their difference with the more familiar Chinese and Japanese, not just physically but in terms of their social behavior as well. How much the Koreanovelas have contributed to this familiarity is still empirically unknown.

Tayo and Sila. Social identity theory takes off from three basic assumptions: a) people categorize themselves and other people according to similar attributes, b) people identify with certain groups by associating with them to gain self-esteem, and c) people compare their own groups with other groups favoring their own in the process. Social identity theory posits that a shift from personal to social identity becomes imperative when an individual sees the value of including others or being included by others with whom the individual perceives similarity. This shift from “me” to “we” is triggered by something salient in the situation and when the perceived membership is foreseen to increase self-worth. The third premise provides for the distinction between ingroups (similar others) and outgroups (different others). Ingroup members are evaluated more favorably than outgroup members. This is known as ingroup-outgroup bias. In larger social groups, it is termed as ethnocentrism. The magnitude of ingroup-outgroup bias varies with several situational factors, yet it has been considered robust on the account that it is essentially a combination of two biases: selective favoring of the ingroup and derogation of the outgroup.

In fleshing out Filipino psychology, Enriquez (1992) noted three pronouns used by Filipinos to refer to the English pronoun “we”: a) kita (dual), which focuses on the listener in relation to the speaker, b) tayo (inclusive), which includes the listener, and c) kami (exclusive), which excludes the listener as referent. Such levels of distinction from the English structure connote the Filipinos’ concept of kapwa. Kapwa is recognizing that one is not different from others. It refers to the Filipinos’ awareness of this shared inner self, a shared identity stemming from collective values shared with the whole humanity. The Filipinos’ shared inner self depends on the social interaction that happens in pakikipagkapwa (collectivistic levels of interaction) and in pag-iisa (individualistic levels of interaction) (Enriquez, 1994). These do not necessarily operate exclusively among Filipinos. Even foreigners who demonstrate conformity to the Filipino subjective norms experience informal membership (“Pilipino na ‘yan”).

Ingroups and outgroups are defined very flexibly for Filipinos. The saling-pusa, the informal member who enjoys privileges not particularly enjoyed by the legitimate member and is allowed to break some rules that are for strict compliance by the legitimate members (Enriquez, 1992), is common practice in involving honorary members in groups. The tulay (bridge) is valued as an important person in achieving or elevating social interaction in courtship, joining formal and informal groups, and in field researches (Sto. Domingo, 1991; Protacio-Marcelino, 1996).

Recognizing the difference between individualistic and collectivistic cultures, Triandis (1997) also explained the behavioral difference regarding ingroup-outgroup bias- collectivistic cultures manifesting high helpful and cooperative behaviors among ingroups while taking as much advantage over their outgroups.

The Contact Hypothesis. The contact hypothesis introduced by Allport (1954) is considered to be among the most prevailing ideas in the history of social psychology. Its basic premise is that bringing groups in contact with one another reduces existing tension between them. The principles of dissonance theory by Festinger (1957) are applied in the conditions for contact hypothesis. That is, when people find themselves working with outgroup members, they resolve their cognitive dissonance by justifying their behavior and changing their attitudes toward the outgroup.

Researches on this hypothesis have dwelt largely on necessary conditions for contact to be successful. These are social and institutional support, personal interaction, equal status, and cooperation.

Contact has been found to have stronger impact on prejudice reduction when the necessary conditions are met (Pettigrew & Tropp, 2000 cited in Forsythe, 2006). Contact hypothesis has been found to be mostly effective in cooperative learning programs where inter-racial children are required to help each other learn in desegregated classrooms. In cases where intergroup contact is facilitated without these conditions, conflicts either remain or escalate.

Recent findings have also shown that anxiety can be induced by intergroup contact, and this anxiety can lead to avoidance behaviors or in the case of unavoidable situations, increased reliance on stereotypes.

Reduction of Prejudice. After several years of research on the conditions for contact hypothesis to work, process models began to emerge from studies on social identity theory. Alternative models on altering intergroup cognition, taking into account the cognitive nature of ingroup and outgroup categorization, were proposed towards reducing prejudice. These are the decategorization, recategorization, subcategorization, and cross-categorization models.

Decategorization (personalization model by Brewer and Miller, 1984) proposes that contact will be most effective if interactions are person-based rather than category-based. Hence, it suggests that interactions should be structured towards reducing the salience of category distinctions. Hewstone & Brown (1986, cited in Gilbert, Fiske, and Lindzey, 1998) criticized this model and posited that positive interpersonal experiences do not always effect to positive attitude towards the group as a whole. Instead, it only increases the complexity and variability of representations of the outgroup (Brewer & Miller, 1998 cited in Gilbert, Fiske, and Lindzey, 1998), which may ultimately reduce the possibility of applying the stereotype to individual group members in the future. The mutual-differentiation model was then proposed (Hewstone and Brown 1986, cited in Wright & Taylor, 2003), where salience of group categories during interactions was imperative.

Recategorization (common ingroup identity model by Gaertner et al, 1993) suggests structuring the contact situation so that focus is driven away from the salient group categories towards a superordinate category, without eliminating the salient subgroup differentiations.

Subcategorization (distinct social identity model) suggests structuring the contact situation so that members of the respective groups have distinct but complementary roles to contribute towards achieving common goals (Marcus-Newhall et al, 1993 cited in Brewer, 2000).

Cross-categorization takes into account the possibility that the three models proposed may not be stable once the context is altered. Hence, cross-cutting categories may be utilized to replace hierarchical representations of multiple category identities.

Cultural Proximity Thesis. Kwon (2005) cited the cultural proximity thesis of Straubharr (1991) as utilized by Ryu and Lee (2001) in analyzing the contents of widely accepted Korean television dramas among East Asia countries. The study concluded that the Korean dramas that have been widely accepted in Asia contain the Confucian values that are close to Chinese culture, or contain the common culture and value between Korean and Chinese. From this theory, a model of Korean television program exports based on cultural factors in relation to the “cultural proximity” thesis was drawn.

In his study, Kwon (2005) found some cultural similarities between Korean culture (as depicted in Koreanovelas) and Filipino culture in terms of social aspects such as hierarchical family relation between elders and younger ones and extended family relationships. He found that when the Filipino audience recognized these cultural similarities, they felt more relevance and close sympathy, which eventually have led them to closer viewership of Koreanovela.

Koreanovelas (Part 2)

Mass Media and Stereotypes. Most of the researches on mass media effects have dealt with formation of negative attitudes and behaviors (i.e. aggression, violence, consumption, deviant behaviors). It is not surprising that mass media has been viewed as “completely devoted to emotional gratification and entertainment” (Postman, 1985 cited in Wikipedia).

In an article in the Canadian Psychology, McIlwraith (----) elaborated on Marshall McLuhan’s ideas on the effects of television. He differentiated the continuity model (that mental states produced during television viewing will persist into post-viewing time) followed by McLuhan from the complementary model (that physical inactivity during TV viewing will result in a "rebound" of restlessness and hyperactivity in the post-TV period) of Herbert Krugman. According to him, McLuhan postulated that because television was such a high-involvement medium, viewers came to crave the same degree of total involvement in all their experiences. Krugman, on the other hand, regarded TV as a medium of low involvement, and postulated that adolescent viewers, starved for real experience, sought out deep involvement in other areas of their lives as a way of getting what they didn't get from TV. In the end, McLuhan’s and Krugman’s use of different effects models led them to the same conclusion- that is, that activities after TV viewing are affected by the television viewing itself.

Mok (1998), through literature review and first-hand accounts, focused on the effects of media images and stereotypes on Asian Americans. She found that media projection altered Asian American women’s standards for beauty and attractiveness, with the image of “all-American” as the model, including that of their standard for male partners. However, they uplifted their self-perception by thinking that it has been fashionable for American men to marry Asian Americans.

Kwon’s (2006) interest in understanding the popularity of Asian telenovelas in the Philippines stems from the uniqueness of Philippine culture compared to other Asian countries, having been influenced by Spain and U.S. for more than four centuries. He noted how Hollywood has had a major influence in establishing Western standard in many aspects of the Filipino society.

Koreanovelas in Pinoy TV. In 2003, GMA 7 began to import the Koreanovela “Endless Love’ in order to compete with the popular Chinovela “Meteor Garden” from ABS-CBN 2 at that time. Since then, the competition of these major TV networks and their affiliates has not abated and TV viewers continue to enjoy access to Koreanovelas through free TV. Other foreign TV networks are also airing Koreanovelas. With the government’s laxity in reinforcing policies against piracy, DVD copies of Koreanovelas are currently rampant in the market.

The high audience shares of Asian soap operas in TV viewing (30-44% in non-primetime schedules and 41-52% in primetime schedules, compared to the usual 45-56% of local soaps in primetime schedule) have prompted researchers to explore what makes Koreanovelas attractive to the Filipino audience. Two particular studies, both presented at the Conference in Seoul Korea entitled Cultural Space and Public Sphere in Asia 2006, have been of interest to me.

Employing grounded theorizing with 18-21 years old women regular viewers of Asian soaps, Vinculado (2006) conducted a series of FGDs exploring the reasons why Filipinos have embraced these Asian programs (e.g. the qualities of the program, plot, characters, actors, pacing). Her findings highlight the following:

1. They prefer the new and fresh faces, instead of the more familiar local actors.


2. The Asian soaps present good elements (i.e. better characterization, are aired within a finite time period, have realistic conflicts and practical solutions, simple, straightforward, and uncomplicated plot, bold endings instead of the common happy endings).


3. Women characters in the Asian soaps were stronger and more empowered, even in comparison to American and Latin soaps.


4. In terms of cultural affinity,
   respondents feel that they can relate to the physical characteristics of the characters, being Asian and exposed to the physicality of the actors in their everyday lives (unlike Caucasians)
   respondents also feel a cultural connection to the settings used in the programs (e.g. settings where exchanges happen – university, coffee shop, etc.)
   respondents say that they can really relate to close family ties
   respondents claimed they retain their awareness of some cultural differences with these Asian soaps (e.g. show of anger and affection, sometimes to the point of hitting the female characters), but are “forgiving” knowing that these are still foreign products presenting foreign cultures

Kwon’s (2006) FGDs on Koreanovelas with undergraduate and graduate students of the Department of Mass Communications at the University of the Philippines, on the other hand, explored the consumption and attractive elements of Koreanovelas, and the cultural reading and construction of meaning about Koreans through these soaps. He found that Koreanovelas are easily accessed through mass broadcasts and DVD copies. He also found similar findings regarding the attractive elements of these soaps. In addition, respondents felt more comfortable with the implicit and high contextual expression of love, which is not sensual or sexual compared to Western soap operas. The extended viewing of Koreanovelas by overseas Filipino workers was also noted in the study.

The respondents also agreed that the Koreanovelas are just a fad, which will be later replaced by something new, and that they see future regional exchanges in light of the introduction of Korean culture. Further, the respondents considered Koreanovelas as a culture education apparatus, where they can see and understand the everyday life and society of Korea (i.e. food, dining and communication, traditional custom and contemporary fashion).

While Vinculado sought to understand the attractive elements of Koreanovelas for the enhancement of Filipino local soaps, Kwon’s study explored the consumption of Koreanovelas as a mediated communication medium representing certain aspects of Korea and its culture. Hence, he modified the framework of communication and culture interact model (Pernia, Pascual, and Kwon, 2004 cited in Kwon, 2006), shifting from religious programs to Koreanovelas. The model proposed that culture and communication are interactive - culture is transmitted through the act of communication (i.e. the contents of the TV program). This transmission occurs within the particular context; in this case, the Filipino culture.

Aside from accessing Koreanovelas, actors and actresses of these soaps have also visited the Philippines. Most notable was the visit of Kwon Sang Woo (lead actor locally known as Cholo in Stairway to Heaven) in December 2006 to promote a skin product, as well as to personally donate and volunteer for Gawad Kalinga. His visit received good media coverage and is known to most Koreanovela fans. Yang Mi-gyeong (support lead actress locally known as Lady Han in Jewel in the Palace) also visited the country in March 2005 for a series of cooking demonstrations.

Koreanovelas can be seen both as a commercial product targeting economic influence (Rhee, 2003 cited in Kwon, 2006), or a culture medium targeting the enhancement of audience perception about Koreans (Lee, 2003, Chai, 2002, and Xuehue, 2002 and Ying, 2003 cited in Kwon, 2006).