1. The experience of the Philippines during the colonial period had been bedeviled by an antiChinese racism.

But the Chinese, even when they were oppressed by the society and prohibited by the government, the discrimination and hostility against them hadn t stopped them from coming to the Philippines. They prospered and intermarried with the indios and their offspring, eventually rose to economic and social prominence the Chinese mestizos. Rizal was actually a scion of a prosperous Chinese mestizo. 2. But even when he was a mestizo, he never acknowledged that fact about him. In fact, according to Rizal s letters to his mother and a friend named Blumentritt, at one time in Dapitan, Rizal boycotted a Chinese store. He urged the people of Dapitan to unite and be self-reliant and stay away from the exploitative practices of the Chinese merchants controlling their area. So was Rizal a racist? Didn t he consider the ethnic Chinese as part of the Filipino nation? But the Spanish creoles, why could he accept them as Filipinos? Does being a nationalist mean being a racist? Did he have an ethnoracial concept of a Filipino nation? The letters indicate that Rizal s boycott was motivated by personal considerations rather than the racial identity of the storeowner. He was drawn into a lawsuit by the Chinese owner and framed the issue as an economic conflict. So Rizal wasn t a racist. 3. 4. Because if he was a racist and the criterion for belonging to the Filipino nation was based on ethnicity or blood ties, the creoles which he accepted to be Filipinos would have been excluded and he, being a Chinese mestizo, would have been relegated to second-class status. Do you mind having a second rate national hero? Therefore, blood quantum wasn t the basis for national identity and the ethnoracial definition wasn t Rizal s concept of a nation. 5. Rizal went all over Europe and was influenced by an author named Johann Gottfried Herder. Herder s impact on Rizal made the latter come up with a concept of a nation as a community constituted by two perspectives, one is nonracial and the other is. . . 6. Herder s concept of a nation has two dimensions, the cultural and the ethical. On the cultural dimension, language and culture. What about language and culture? What is their relation to one another? Herder said, language is the totality of a nation s cultural life and history. 7. Vox imperium, vox populi the voice of the government is the voice of the people. The government is expressing the will of the people when it decides to make wars, just as when it makes laws. Relationship between the ruler and ruled. (nation-state) The sovereign people can legitimate even the most dreadful actions of the government. 8. Rizal s vox populi, vox dei the bifurcation or distinction between the ruler and the ruled. The ruler is not of the people. The ruler must exercise his power with much more morality. To do otherwise is to be at war with people. Separation or opposition between the state and the people. (antistatist) 9. The mission of Rizal s nationalist movement was the formation of the Filipino nation, building a community which is founded by virtue and sacrifice. A community bound by the commitment to the common good. To accomplish this, Rizal required everyone to have a sense of abasement and misfortune. Because it will not create the national sentiment but awakens it because the national spirit is inherent in every people sharing a common language, culture, and history.

This lesson tells us that the search for national identity and character and the struggles for nationbuilding are continuous processes. They didn t stop on Rizal s time. We have to find this national and revolutionary spirit within us and let it burn out into open flames. How? Be aware of the evil things happening around us which may have been consequences of the Spanish colonization, resist and stop those evil things, avenge for the victims of these injustices and try to promote the common good. Let s think outside of ourselves. Let s think like Rizal. Do we have that love for our country and do we aim for reforms that can lead to progress? I think we do. Maybe we just have to keep reminding ourselves of such things.