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Head, Body and Feet; or, what I’ve been doing with my life

December 17, 2007 By Isabel Esterman 3 Comments

I’m pretty sure only one person will really appreciate this (and you will very quickly know who you are, my friend) but since I’ve been too busy and burned out to do any extra-curricular writing these last few days, I figured I’d post this:


One of the most common critiques of Rizal’s narrative of nationalism comes from left-leaning academics, who charge Rizal with elitism. Renato Constantino, for example, argues that while Rizal spoke in good faith about human rights and human dignity and used the language of universal ideals, he was essentially “voicing the goals of his class.”[1] He may have condemned the exploitation of peasants at the hands of encomenderos and friars, the argument goes, but did not question the underlying morality of social stratification.  A close reading of Rizal’s annotations in the Morga supports this analysis.  He seems genuinely outraged by the exploitation of peasants at hands of encomenderos and friars; yet while he decries the “tyranny of the oppressor” against the “poor class,” he does not question the existence of class itself. [2] Most tellingly, when de Morga explains the traditional constellation of Philippine classes as principales, plebians and slaves, Rizal simply concurs. “This is the eternal division one finds, and will find (in the future) everywhere, in all kingdoms and republics: ruling class, productive class, and servant class: head, body and feet.”[3]  It is, to say the least, difficult to imagine Rizal aspired to a sense of deep horizontal comradeship with someone he describes as being, eternally, a foot.



[1] Renato Constantino, Dissent and Counter-Consciousness (Quezon City: Malaya Books, Inc., 1970) p.135.

[2] Rizal-Morga, p. 300, referring here to Catholicism’s failure to liberate the poor.

[3] Ibid, 297, n. 2. “Esta es la division eterna que se encuentra y se encontrara en todas partes, en todos los reinos y republicas: clase dominadora, clase productora y clase servil: cabeza, cuerpo y pies.” In other notes, Rizal gives considerable attention to the question of slavery, generally condemning the practice, but noting that slavery in the Philippines was benign compared to European systems, and could more accutately be described as debt-bondage. (see footnotes p. 294.295)

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I should note, also, that I got a chance to slag off Ileto, although I had to confine it to a footnote.  Let’s just say I have convincing evidence that he never read the Morga. 

Did we ever have lives?


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Comments

  1. Joseph says:
    December 18, 2007 at 4:45 am

    OMG! What a great post! And Constantino is right! Wow!

    Seriously, the ‘cabezas, cuerpo, y pies’ quote is stunning. I would love to see your whole paper. I would especially love to see the Ileto bit.

    Pretty please? :)

  2. Isabel E says:
    December 18, 2007 at 11:53 am

    You do know who you are!

    I never completely know who’s reading this, but I’m pretty sure there’s only one Marxist, anti-Ileto scholar of Philippine history.

    You should see what Rizal has to say about the Aeta and the Sangleyes….
    Gender critique, on the other hand, is pretty good.
    (and yes, I can stop teasing and send you the paper. I don’t feel too great about it, but I feel pretty excited about the potential for a lot of great work to be done on the Morga.)

    As for Ileto: he clearly just read Schumacher’s article on the Morga — which is a great article, but only addresses one aspect of the text. If Ileto had read it for himself, he would’ve seen that Rizal was far more torn between an indigenous and a western moral frame of reference than Ileto suggests.

  3. Joseph says:
    December 18, 2007 at 8:06 pm

    Yes I know who I am. Would you mind terribly emailing the paper to me? I’m all excited to see it.

    Thanks.

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