as a Filipino-American & someone who has participated in pcn, i think it’s important for us to educate ourselves about the indigenous tribes in the Philippines, especially since we use many of these tribes dances in our suites. already growing up in America, i feel like there’s a

lack of education for 1st gen kids about Filipino culture & history, i was always lowkey jealous of my Viet friends growing up having Viet schools bc they could have a proper environment to learn about their language & culture. for Filipinos, we don’t really have that. for a lot

of my Filipino friends, many may not speak Tagalog (not trying to exclude Visaya, Ilocano, or any other Filipino dialect just cuz most of my friends come from Tagalog speaking families) but understand it or may not speak or understand all together. which isn’t to say that it’s

their fault or even their parents, who may have not wanted to teach them so that they assimilate better to American culture, but to show the overall lack of education for 1st gen kids about our language & furthermore about our history & culture. so in terms of pcn, i can

understand why many ppl may not know the history & importance of the indigenous folx in our community. what i don’t think a lot of Fil-Ams know is that many of these tribes in the Philippines are not considered Filipino citizens.

the way the Philippine government treats these tribes is very similar to way the US government treats Native Americans. often times, the Philippine government does not allocate schools & hospitals to these tribes so many of these communities have to build these things for

themselves. Indigenous folx are often discriminated against & treated as second-class citizens. many of their ancestral lands have been taken away & the Philippine gov often tries to militarize the areas close to or surrounding their communities to control them,

i.e. martial law in Mindanao. so for those of us non-Indigenous Filipinos who participate &/or lead pcn, we need to better educate ourselves on the importance of these tribes & the issues that they face. tbh, as a suite coordinator last year, i did not know many of these things &

tbh still need to learn more & though i know now, i do regret not educating myself more & especially not being able to teach my dancers this & just teaching the value of the history behind these dances in general from what i did know.

as Fil-Ams, we claim that pcn is a way to connect w/ our ancestors & learn more about our culture, but in doing so we often lack understanding the discrimination & problems of the tribal communities that we borrow these dances from.

pcn is amazing & may be the only form of education for Fil-Ams to learn about our culture but if we are to dance these dances we should also have a well-rounded knowledge of the communities they come from to do these dances justice. our indigenous communities are resilient &

have been able to withstand colonialism to this day, but as Fil-Ams we have to be better allies to their communities, especially if we are to borrow from their culture.

In our community, we have the saying Isang Bagsak, “if one falls, we all fall”, & in saying this, this must also include our Indigenous brothers & sisters.

(also disclaimer: i know 1st gen can be considered those born outside of the US/ foreign-born citizens but from research the term can be ambiguous & also mean kids born from foreign-born citizens.)