Hiligaynon

PRONUNCIATION: hee-lee-GUY-nohn
ALTERNATE NAME: ILONGGO
LOCATION: Philippines (Western Visayas)
POPULATION: 5.8 million (2000)
LANGUAGE: Hiligaynon
RELIGION: Catholicism
RELATED ARTICLES: Vol. 3: Filipinos

INTRODUCTION

In 1569, the Spanish conquistador Legaspi transferred his headquarters from food-poor Cebu to Panay, where rice was available in abundance. Long before this time, the island's fertility permitted the Hiligaynon people to develop one of the archipelago's most advanced societies, one that engaged in international trade (as evidenced by large finds of Chinese porcelain) and that created fine work in gold and semiprecious stones. The textiles of Panay remained in high demand throughout the archipelago into the 19th century; the industry thrived until overwhelmed by cheaper British manufactures.

Among Christianized regions, the Western Visayas has been noteworthy for the persistence of pre-Christian systems of belief; here, it was baylan, leaders in the indigenous religion, who led revolts against the Spanish (rather than of Christian millenarian sects as in the Tagalog and other regions). Nonetheless, the church-adorned city of Iloilo on Panay became one of the great centers of Hispanicized culture in the colony (in 1993 Iloilo's baroque Miag-ao church was recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage site). Large-scale sugar production for the world market created a small, initially largely mestizo, elite who enjoyed an opulent lifestyle on vast plantations (and who may have provided the basis for the stereotype of Hiligaynon hedonism, also attributable to the natural bounty of the land). At the same time, economic dislocations (such as the demise of the textile industry) forced a flood of landless Hiligaynon to take ill-paid, backbreaking labor on these plantations of the formerly under populated island of Negros to the immediate east of Panay.

With the recent decades' drop in the price of sugar, much of the region has entered a steep economic decline; Negros has become one of the most impoverished regions in the country and particularly ripe for communist insurgency. Though to a lesser extent than Ilocanos and Cebuanos, Hiligaynon have settled in more sparsely populated parts of the country, such as Mindoro and Mindanao. Economic growth since the 1990s has benefited Iloilo as it has other comparable cities in the country, and one of the country's preeminent destinations for domestic and foreign tourists has developed on Boracay off Panay.

LOCATION AND HOMELAND

Panay is one of the major rice-producing areas of the Philippines (and the most important one by far in the Visayan islands). The landscape consists of broad plains stretching between mountain ranges. Large rivers deposit the volcanic sediments that make the lowlands so fertile. The island of Guimaras in the strait between Panay and Negros is an exception; it is a coral platform.

The Western Visayas region of the Philippines includes the provinces of Iloilo, Aklan, Capiz, Antique (all on Panay island), Negros Occidental, and Romblon; it includes two of the country's largest cities, Iloilo in eastern Panay and Bacolod on western Negros. The region's population numbered 6.2 million in 2000 (up from 5.4 million in 1990 and 3.6 million in 1970), of which 61.57% were speakers of Hiligaynon, concentrated on the facing coasts of Panay and Negros (72% of population of Iloilo province and 77.68% of Negros Occidental province).

According to the 2000 census, Hiligaynon speakers constituted 7.6% of the national population (5.8 million people). Beyond the Western Visayas, they can also be found in southern Mindoro and (as recent migrants) on Palawan (13% in 2000) and Mindanao (11% of the Caraga region and 10.83% of Southern Mindanao—more than half [52%] of South Cotabato's population was Hiligaynon-speaking, and almost half [46.92%] of Sultan Kudarat's).

LANGUAGE

The Hiligaynon language is the language of Iloilo province, which has come to be spoken throughout the Western Visayas region. Hiligaynon (as the name of both a language and an ethnic group) is also called "Ilonggo," though this generally refers specifically to the dialect and people of Iloilo. Hiligaynon intonation is noted for its gentle lilt under which, it is said, a curse may go unrecognized.

Other regions of Panay have their own distinct languages, including Capizeño, Aklanon, and Kiniray-a. Narrow straits link Panay and western Negros, and Hiligaynon is spoken on both shores. Mountains separate western from eastern Negros, whose inhabitants speak Cebuano, a language that Hiligaynon cannot readily understand.

FOLKLORE

The Maragtas epic, an imaginative 19th century reworking of Panay folk memories, tells of the migration to the Philippines in 1250 of the Bornean datus (chiefs) Puti, Sumakwel, Bangkaya, Balakasusa, Paiburong, Dumangsil, Lubay, and Dumalogdog. They had led their followers there to escape the tyranny of the Srivijayan empire. The datus bought the coastal lands of Panay from the indigenous Negritos with gold, pearls, and other ornaments (the Negritos then withdrew to the interior). The meeting of the Negritos and the Borneans is commemorated in many carnival-like local festivals, foremost of which is the Ati-Atihan of Kalibo in Aklan province.

RELIGION

Among the Hiligaynon, a pre-Christian belief system coexists with the Catholic one brought by the Spaniards. The two exert mutual influence on each other, as when the Santo Niño, the image of the Child Jesus as World Sovereign, is bathed to summon rain or attract good luck. The indigenous cosmogony divides the universe into three parts. The upper world houses at its zenith (ibabaw) the udtohanon, i.e., God and his favorite angels who will pass the final judgment but are otherwise remote from human affairs. Lower down in the upper world reside the langitnon, angelic beings that live above the clouds. In the awan-awan (between the clouds and the earth) live the spirits of the wind, rain, thunder, lightning, typhoons, and whirlwinds; supreme among them is the tagurising who lives where the sun rises. The middle world (the earth) is the home to the dutan-on, spirits expelled from the upper world for rebelling against God; they differentiated according to where they first landed, for example, in trees, the river, or the sea. The underworld includes hell, in front of whose gate is a hollow pit where the engkanto, the malevolent spirits, live with their reptilian pets; the nether regions are connected to the middle world through a tunnel called the bungalog.

Each community has specialists who are able to communicate with spirits and heal diseases thought to be caused by spirits, for lack of any other explanation; they also recover lost objects, predict the future, and discover the causes of misfortunes. The most important of these is the baylan, a medium whom a spirit has befriended and granted powers; to augment the potency of his rituals, the baylan often adds Latin prayers and Catholic sacred objects.

MAJOR HOLIDAYS

See the article entitled Filipinos.

RITES OF PASSAGE

Persons wanting to marry consult with their siblings and other relatives before approaching their parents for consent and support. The boy's kin arrange a meeting with the girl's kin to discover if the girl has already been promised to another; this serves as a public announcement to discourage other suitors. The boy's kin employ a spokesperson using allegorical language to ascertain whether the girl's parents have accepted the proposal. If they have, the arrangements, including the prospective groom's term of bride-service, are arranged at another meeting, the padul-ong, after which the wedding becomes binding and the girl is no longer to be seen in the company of other boys.

On the night before the wedding, both sides attend a party at the bride's parents' house. The church ceremony itself includes ritual acts that are meant to ensure the wife's subservience and fertility. Formerly, a sinulang (a machete dance) accompanied the couple out of the church. Arriving at the house, the couple proceeds straight to the family altar to ensure future prosperity; a feast follows. The marriage is not consummated until the second night at the groom's parents' house; on the third day, the couple returns to the bride's parents' house.

When a person is dying, relatives say prayers for the deliverance of his or her soul and to ward off evil spirits (men wave machetes in the yard). The body is washed with water mixed with ginger or bark juice to prevent odor and is laid out in the house next to an improvised altar and a tin can, in which mourners put contributions. The deceased's family refrains from making excessive noise, fighting, combing their hair, and bathing until three days after the burial. Only unmarried men may take the body out of the house; water is thrown on the threshold so that another death will not follow. The entire funeral procession must return to the deceased's house and wash their hands and feet.

Nine days of prayer follow the burial; as many as nine more days may be added, depending on the family's wealth (as all attending must be served food and drink). At a midnight ceremony on the ninth night, all family members must be awake to bid farewell to the deceased's spirit. On the death anniversary, nine days of prayer again take place. On the ninth night, a patay-patay (a dummy of the dead) is set up, consisting of pillows laid on a wooden trunk upon which the deceased's clothes are laid.

SeeFilipinos.

INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS

Hiligaynon share the general Filipino behavioral values, such as hiya (huya in the Hiligaynon language). Violating norms (such as insulting mediums) will earn gaba, supernatural punishment. Those who humiliate others will suffer the same amount of humiliation in turn, a principle called ulin.

LIVINGN CONDITIONS

Houses are raised 3 to 4 m (9−13 ft) off the ground; walls are of plaited bamboo, and roofs are of nipa or coconut palm leaves or cogon grass. Sulay, bamboo, or timber props, are placed against all sides of a house to keep it from being blown away by typhoons. The room for receiving guests is separated from the rest of the house by a wall; a sofa and two side chairs occupy the space immediately inside the front door. Small children of both sexes sleep together, but once they are older, boys sleep near the door and girls sleep in a bedroom at the back. Animals are kept under the house, and rice is stored there (if not in a separate granary structure). The house lot is enclosed with a bamboo fence or a hedge of ornamental plants; fruit tree groves and gardens are nearby.

Average family income in the Western Visayas region amounted to 130,000 pesos (US$2,549) in 2006, relatively low for the Philippines (ranking 10th out of 17 regions), cf. the national average of p173,000, the National Capital Region's p311,000, Southern Tagalog's p198,000, and Central Visayas' regions, p144,000.

According to the 2000 census, the proportion of houses in Negros Occidental province with a roof of galvanized iron/aluminum reached 61% (up from 26.1% in 1990), with a roof of grass or palm thatch 30%; 24.2% of houses had wooden outer walls, 40% outer walls of bamboo or thatch, and 12.9% outer walls of concrete, brick, or stone (5.21% in 1990). In 2000, 13.8% of households in the Western Visayas had access to a community faucet, 14% to a faucet of their own, 22% to a shared deep well, and 17.3% to a dug shallow well, while 9.8% obtained their water from springs, lakes, rivers, or rain. Well over half of households (57.9%) disposed of their garbage by burning it, 10.9% by dumping it into a household pit, and 7.8% by feeding it to their animals; only 14.4% had it picked up by a collection truck. 57% of houses were lit withelectricity, 37.8% with kerosene lamps, and 4.2% with firewood. 725.5% possessed a radio, 42.2% a television, 23.8% a refrigerator, 15.5% a VCR, 9.2% a telephone or cell phone, 9.4% a washing machine, and 8.5% a motorized vehicle.

FAMILY LIFE

Hiligaynon family structure conforms to the general Filipino pattern [See the article entitled Filipinos in this volume]. In wealthier families, the Spanish terms papa and mama, or even the English mommy and daddy, are preferred over the native tatay and nanay. Educated people may address their spouses with such English expressions as honey or darling (often shortened to ling) rather than the native nonoy (for the husband) or neneng (for the wife). Uncles and aunts are addressed as " tay + [name]" ("Papa ———") and " nay + [name]" ("Mama ———"), respectively.

A peasant couple share work responsibilities, e.g., a husband plows while the wife plants; he fishes but she sells the catch. Husbands are the dominant partner outside the house (i.e., in public or in the fields), whereas wives reign supreme within the house. Spouses refrain from showing affection publicly, exchanging only casual greetings. While village people disapprove of a man taking a mistress, saying it will bring bad luck, elite men take mistresses for the sake of prestige.

Family members lavish much attention on a child but also discipline him or her from an early age. Children will gang up on a sibling to whom the parents show favoritism. As they get older, sons become more formal with their mothers and daughters with their fathers (but with puberty, daughters become closer to their mothers). At the age of seven, a boy will start to help his father with farming or fishing.

Parents discipline children by telling them frightening tales (mentioning the aswang or names of old people) or by spanking or whipping them with a stick. When children misbehave, all are punished, even if only one initiates the misbehavior.

CLOTHING

For fieldwork, men wear worn-out short pants and often go shirtless. On formal occasions, however, they wear long pants, shirts, and shoes (otherwise they go barefoot).

Married women wear either a bestida (dress), or a patadyong (tube skirt) with a blouse. Traditional weaving is nearly extinct, having been a thriving industry before the 19th-century import of British manufactured cloth. For pangalap (magical protection), many older men wear tattoos (a crucifix, initials, or female figures). At the time of the Spanish arrival, all Visayans wore elaborate tattoos, earning them the name Pintados, "the painted ones," from their conquerors.

FOOD

The eating pattern is either three meals a day or two meals (at 10:00−11:00 am and 4:00−5:00 pm). Between-meal snacks consist of rice cakes, boiled roots, or bananas. Family members eat at their own convenience but are encouraged to eat together. Ordinarily, people eat with their hands while sitting on the floor; silverware and tables are reserved for the use of guests. Men do not eat breakfast unless, as a gesture of hospitality, they are joining visitors who are being served breakfast.

Around 6:00 pm, men gather for tuba (palm wine) drinking sessions in the tree groves between houses (some women may also join) them.

EDUCATION

The literacy level (population 10 years and older) in the Western Visayas was 93.02%, close to the national figure. See the article entitled Filipinos.

CULTURAL HERITAGE

The Hiligaynon have an epic, the Hinilawod. (See alsoFilipinos in this volume).

WORK

The Western Visayas region is dominated by two very different types of agriculture: rice cultivation by small holders, and sugar cultivation in large plantations. Swidden (shifting-cultivation) farming is still practiced in the highlands.

Tobacco has been growing in importance. Other crops grown include maize, bananas, coconuts, sweet potato, cassava, singkamas (jícama, similar to turnips), squash, tomatoes, beans, and red peppers. Fishing is an alternative means of livelihood. Some Hiligaynon engage in various forms of petty trade: libod, making the rounds of one's village, selling a product; pahumay, selling from one's house; tinda, selling at fiestas and other local events; and tiyanggi, operating a small variety store (sari-sari in Tagalog-Pilipino).

SPORTS

Tumbang patis, popular with both boys and girls, involves two or more children throwing rocks at a tin can while someone who is "it" watches the can, putting it back in place when hit; if a player is caught retrieving the stone he or she has thrown, he or she becomes "it." Other popular games include: "gunfighting" with bamboo popguns; beetle- and spider-fighting; and huyup-huyup, blowing rubber bands out of a circle for bets. Young children catch dragonflies, dig holes in the ground, pile sticks, measure sand with bottle caps, and pull empty coconut shells or sardine cans.

ENTERTAINMENT AND RECREATION

See the article entitled Filipinos.

FOLK ART, CRAFTS, AND HOBBIES

See the article entitled Filipinos.

SOCIAL PROBLEMS

See the article entitled Filipinos.

GENDER ISSUES

According to the 2000 census, in the Western Visayas, the ratio of men to women was 102 to 100. Literacy was higher for women than for men (93.58% vs. 92.45%). While, overall, more overseas workers from the Western Visayas were men than women, 63% of those aged 10-24 were female.

In the past four centuries, Hiligaynon notions of gender differences have been influenced by Spanish Catholic and, later, American and modernizing national secular norms. Urban elite women, especially Spanish and Chinese mestizas, have more closely imitated foreign ideals than women of the rural lower classes. Women and men are recognized as having different characteristics, but in contrast to the case in Mediterranean gender ideologies, these differences are viewed as complementary, not as associating men with good and women withevil, nor as automatically confe rring superior power to men or. Men feel no shame in deferring to an elder sister or to a strong-willed and capable wife. In colonial times, Hiligaynon men often sent their wives to discuss community issues with male Spanish officials, showing none of the concern to keep women in seclusion for the sake of family honor that was so important in Spanish culture. Hiligaynon culture generally regards women as innately more reliable and industrious than men, and there is no cultural preference for having a boy over a girl.

Female virginity is valued, but losing it does not condemn a young woman to permanent exclusion from respectable society, nor does having been a man's mistress (kerida) at one time. Premarital pregnancy is common and, if the couple marries, hardly any stigma is attached to it. Tolerance of this has been a characteristic of Hiligaynon society from earlier times, not a modern development. Modernization has brought both the model of the "liberated woman," new employment opportunities for educated women, and the removal of Spanish patriarchal legal restrictions and disabilities. However, it has also brought the realities of women being objectified in diverse contexts: U.S. military prostitution (a major phenomenon until the end of the 1980s); international mass-tourism; global consumer culture; and overseas labor recruitment, especially of domestic workers and entertainers. Government-led development programs have sought to mobilize women, highlighting the crucial role women play in society while emphasizing women's roles in the domestic sphere.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Blanc-Szanton, Cristina. "Collision of Cultures: Historical Reformulations of Gender in the Lowland Visayas." In Power and Difference: Gender in Island Southeast Asia, edited by Jane Monnig Atkinson and Shelley Errington. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990.

Gordon, Raymond G., Jr. (ed.), 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World, 15th edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International, 2005. www.ethnologue.com (November 19, 2008).

Jocano, F. Landa. The Hiligaynon: An Ethnography of Family and Community Life in Western Bisayas Region. Quezon City: Asian Center, University of the Philippines, 1983.

LeBar, Frank M., ed. Ethnic Groups of Insular Southeast Asia. Vol. 2, The Philippines and Formosa. New Haven, CT: Human Relations Area Files Press, 1972.

National Statistics Office: Government of the Philippines. "Eight Percent of the Total Population Were From the Western Visayas." http://www.census.gov.ph/data/pressrelease/2003/pr0304tx.html (November 19, 2008).

———."South Cotabato: One Out of Two Persons a Hiligaynon/Ilonggo." http://www.census.gov.ph/data/pressrelease/2003/pr0363tx.html (November 19, 2008).

—revised by A. J. Abalahin