{"id":11053,"date":"2022-03-18T22:54:27","date_gmt":"2022-03-19T08:54:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/?p=11053"},"modified":"2022-03-23T05:41:52","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T15:41:52","slug":"book-review-filipino-woman-writing-home-and-exile-in-the-autobiographical-narratives-of-ten-writers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/2022\/03\/18\/book-review-filipino-woman-writing-home-and-exile-in-the-autobiographical-narratives-of-ten-writers\/","title":{"rendered":"BOOK REVIEW: FILIPINO WOMAN WRITING \u2013 Home and Exile in the Autobiographical Narratives of Ten Writers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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by Rose Churma<\/em>

This March, we celebrate Women\u2019s\u00a0History Month, and it is therefore appropriate to review a book by a woman on women.

Although\u00a0published close to three decades ago, the book offers a glimpse of how \u201cthese writers handled common concerns\u00a0of women such as selfhood and identity, marriage, career, and motherhood.\u201d

In 1987, The US Congress expanded the commemoration from a week to a month and has passed a resolution designating\u00a0March as Women’s History Month.

The theme for Women’s History Month changes annually but the foremost goal of the month remains the same: to show how women shaped the nation.

The 2022 theme is\u00a0\u201cWomen Providing Healing, Promoting Hope\u201d\u00a0which honors the tireless work of caregivers and frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic, but also women of all backgrounds and ethnicities \u2013 including Filipinas, who have provided compassionate healing and hope for the betterment of patients, friends, and family.

This\u00a0publication is an analysis of autobiographical narratives also known as memoirs (although the word is not mentioned at all in this book) of ten Filipina writers in English, but one of them, Paula Carolina Malay, has also published books in Filipino.

To some extent, I believe that\u00a0writing these autobiographical narratives provide some self-healing for the authors, and to readers who can\u00a0be empathetic to the issues discussed.

This book was based on the author\u2019s dissertation on autobiographical writing. She was always interested in this genre and was delighted with the\u00a0\u201cimmense richness and variety of\u00a0autobiographical works by women, and their new significance for cultural studies in the societies which had produced them, a significance emphasized by feminists everywhere.\u201d

The author\u00a0provides critiques on the writings of the women writers, and although key phrases of their works are included in the book, it is assumed that the reader has read the writings being analyzed.\u00a0The reader is at a great disadvantage if one is not\u00a0familiar with the subjects\u2019\u00a0works.

Of the ten women writers, the youngest (a baby boomer) is Cecilia Manguerra-Brainard. Unlike the other nine writers, she writes as an\u00a0expatriate and is \u201ctriply marginalized as a Filipino writer\u00a0writing in\u00a0English, as a woman in a\u00a0man\u2019s world, and as an ethnic\u00a0minority\u00a0person in a First\u00a0World country.\u201d

The author observes that Manguerra-Brainard projects an idyllic quality at her childhood home in the Philippines (in this case, Cebu), and writes with nostalgia at past events with her family, and\u00a0describes these as\u00a0\u201csentimentalizing of what is obviously the author\u2019s links with the home left behind\u2026\u201d a trait I find in fellow expats when they talk of the\u00a0homeland they left behind.

The author also notes the\u00a0\u201cgaps\u201d provided in the narratives, and an evasiveness or perhaps an\u00a0unwillingness to confront issues but in the\u00a0most superficial manner. The author opines that it is in gaps and silences that women\u2019s real texts lie and contain volumes.

As aging baby boomers (and those older) scramble to get their memoirs done, this book provides food for thought in how to\u00a0structure one\u2019s\u00a0autobiographical narrative \u2013 what to include and what to delete.

Should it be a\u00a0rewriting of the past to suit our present needs? Should it be perceived as a way of affirming our identity and experience \u2013 rescuing our past from\u00a0oblivion?

In the last chapter, the\u00a0author summarizes her\u00a0observations and notes about the\u00a0\u201clarge areas left out\u201d such as on sex and sexuality (in contrast with the contemporary Western women\u2019s\u00a0explicitness in dealing with the subject) \u2013 which certainly invites further analysis.

The author\u2019s final paragraph states that there are the unpublished works of Filipino women in all\u00a0classes who\u00a0have refused\u00a0\u201cthe graceful obligation of silence.\u201d

It is time for them to be heard.\u00a0It is time for them to be read.

ROSE CHURMA\u00a0<\/strong>established a career in architecture 40 years ago, specializing in judicial facilities planning.\u00a0As a retired architect, she now has the time to do the things she always wanted to do: read books and write about them, as well as encourage others to write.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Rose Churma This March, we celebrate Women\u2019s\u00a0History Month, and it is therefore appropriate to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11025,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[4,7],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=199%2C300&ssl=1",199,300,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"ultp_layout_landscape_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"ultp_layout_landscape":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=424%2C570&ssl=1",424,570,true],"ultp_layout_portrait":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"ultp_layout_square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=424%2C600&ssl=1",424,600,true],"covernews-slider-full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"covernews-slider-center":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=424%2C500&ssl=1",424,500,true],"covernews-featured":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1",424,638,true],"covernews-medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=379%2C340&ssl=1",379,340,true],"covernews-medium-square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?resize=236%2C250&ssl=1",236,250,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Features<\/a> Philippines<\/a>","tag_info":"Philippines","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/BR-FilipinoWomanWriting-1.jpeg?fit=424%2C638&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11053"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11053"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11053\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11120,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11053\/revisions\/11120"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11025"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}