Textiles In The Philippine Landscape

This book compiles textile terms from the Philippine colonial period, drawing on both primary and secondary sources to trace histories and use. The abaca fabric called medriñaque, for example, appears to have been used for men's shirts in 16th-century Peru and was recorded in 17th-century English records as "medrinacles," a coarse canvas used for sails or for stiffening collars and doublets. Castro contextualizes the lexicon with a historical survey of the colonial trade and economy, which, in turn, shaped Philippine textile culture. With photographs of sample fabrics, the book serves as an introduction to those interested in textile history.

This book demonstrates how active and meaningful collaboration between researchers and local stakeholders and indigenous communities can lead to the co-production of knowledge and the empowerment of communities. Focusing on the Asia Pacific region, this interdisciplinary volume looks at local and indigenous relations to the landscape, showing how applied scholarship and collaborative research can work to empower indigenous and descendant communities. With cases ranging across Indonesia, Thailand, Taiwan, the Philippines, Cambodia, Pohnpei, Guam, and Easter Island, this book demonstrates the many ways in which co-production of knowledge is reconnecting local and indigenous relations to the landscape, and diversifying the philosophy of human-land relations. In so doing, the book is enriching the knowledge of landscape, and changing the landscape of knowledge. This important contribution to our understanding of knowledge production will be of interest to readers across Anthropology, Archaeology, Development, Geography, Heritage Studies, Indigenous Studies, and Policy Studies.

This book is published in conjunction with Intertwined: Transpacific, Transcultural Philippines, Ayala Museum's inaugural exhibition for its newly renovated space opened in 2021. It is authored by the exhibition curator Florina H. Capistrano-Baker, Ph.D. and features essays by contributing scholars and field experts—Sandra Castro; Michael F. Manalo, M.Arch; Maria Cristina Martinez-Juan, Ph.D.; and Iván Valdez-Bubnov, Ph.D. Intertwined provides important scholarship on Filipino heritage and transpacific studies. The publication also serves as the catalogue of the exhibition. The exhibition and its joint publication open up visual and verbal conversations on the complexities and contradictions of Filipino art and identity. By illuminating the Filipino’s transcultural heritage resulting from pre- and post-colonial maritime exchanges with diverse cultures in Asia, America, and Europe, Filipinos can gain a better understanding of our culture and take pride in the excellence we've shown throughout history in the arts, diplomacy, entrepreneurship, and the global economy.

Between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, competing European empires, notably Spain, Portugal, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Belgium, and others vied for commercial and political control of transoceanic networks, particularly the transpacific routes between Asia and the Americas. The essays in Transpacific Engagements: Trade, Translation, and Visual Culture of Entangled Empires (1565–1898) address the resulting cultural and artistic exchanges with an emphasis on both the Spanish and American enterprises in the Asia-Pacific region. The essays are grouped into three parts entitled “Entangled Empires,” “Empires and Translations,” and “Empires and Trade.” A common thread in the diverse perspectives presented here is the importance of transpacific engagements to the global connections of the sixteenth century and beyond. While the focus is on the specific connection between the Asia-Pacific region and the Americas through the Philippines, we see how other parts of the world, notably South and Southeast Asia and Europe, were also participants impacted by these transpacific linkages. The goal is to convey the complexity of entangled networks of commercial, political, and religious interests that complicate the Spanish enterprise in the Pacific. Commercial ventures into Canton and Manila by the early American republic, for example, overlapped with and later replaced the Spanish galleons. East, South, and Southeast Asian polities and dynasties remained powerful players in what were often multilateral, rather than bilateral, exchanges. Contributors to this volume are based in Asia, the Americas, and Europe.