BENCHWARMER

Interconnectedness
RAMON S. DACAWI

BAGUIO CITY -- Then Senator Juan Flavier, the Baguio boy and Cordilleran, was the principal author of the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act. Let’s stress that fact and remember it, lest it be overlooked, as it’s appearing to be, now that the landmark piece of legislation has become the model for indigenous peoples all over the world in fighting for their rights amidst the onslaught on their resources in the name of development.

The IPRA “has been a breakthrough in the attempt to correct the historical injustice in the state’s non-recognition of the indigenous people’s ancestral lands and ancestral domains”, noted esteemed Igorot anthropologist June Prill-Brett.

Such remark reflects the substance of Flavier, once voted by the Philippine Daily Inquirer as the “Filipino of the Year” for his innovative work in public health.. He towers among our public servants and leaders, yet his stature has also been overlooked, perhaps because of his diminutive height. Or his irrepressible gift of humor, reason enough for someone to dismiss Flavier’s potential when one who knew better The Doctor to the Barrios floated his name for President.

Flavier and his co-authors fought and won a good fight, for a law that many believed would never get to first base. Its legality was questioned, until the Supreme Court deemed it constitutional. While he and Congress provided us indigenous peoples the legal arm to assert our rights, the fight is far from over. We need to read and discuss it, see that it really gets off the ground and implemented, even amended and strengthened for it to be relevant to the issues ofchange now confronting our region.

We have to discuss. So if you’re reading this, please register and attend the First International Conference on Cordillera Studies (or issues), to be hosted by the University of the Philippines Baguio, through its Cordillera Studies Center (CSC), on Feb. 7-9.

The presentations - 140 papers organized into 42 panels – are mostly from the wealth of studies done over the years by the CSC, making the conference a fitting way to mark the centennial of the country’s premier educational institution.

From their titles, the topics range from the serious to the light, or both. Prof. Brett will focus on “The Indigenous Peoples Rights Act and Legal Pluralism in the Northern Philippines”. Janice Bagawi will discuss “Shiyay Ak Mango: A Semantic Study on the Affective Meaning of the Ibaloi Expression Mango”.

Brett’s discourse is on a really urgent, ticklish but overlooked issue which government agencies and villagers should do well to now address. Changes and conflicts are fast emerging on the application of either state or indigenous laws on rights and access to resources like water and land, be it among neighbors of the same village, between or among neighboring villages, or villagers against outside forces and interests.

The grounded relevance of Brett’s studies became clear during the efforts to establish a Cordillera autonomous region and during the crafting and passage of the IPRA. It was fitting, therefore, that UP Baguio launched last Thursday afternoon “Cordillera in June,” a book of essays on Cordillera issues that celebrates her as an anthropologist.

In his preface, book editor B.S. Tapang pointed out: “Every paper in the collection resonates with a theme that she has worked on as a scholar of the Cordillera. In her season of grace, we at UP Baguio celebrate June through this collection of articles contributed by her peers, colleagues, and one of her former students.”

Prof. Tapang also noted that June – and July – are the months of traditional rice harvest in the Cordillera. “Thus, these months are a season of grace; in the mountain villages, this is reason to celebrate.”

There’s something for everybody in the conference presentations. Consider these: “Lesbians, Gays and Transgenders in Tadian, Mt. Province” by Jennifer Josef; “ “Two Cordillera Songs – Dung-aw and Uggayam: Bridges of Understanding” by Jennilyn Dula and JaimeRaras; and “Constructing Igorotness in Popular Culture”by Jimmy Fong.

There’s a three-topic panel on “Muslims in the Cordillera”, three papers on Benguet history and four on Cordillera languages. One of the topics under the Social and Political Movements panel touches on whether indigenous peoples’ organizations can be prime movers in Baguio’s development.

In her “Tourism in the Cordillera”, Prof. Julienne Dulnuan of UP Diliman most likely will present the downside of an industry almost of all of us tend to espouse. It’s an industry that makes us immediately link the potential of beautiful things we discover or have – such as a wondrous, untouched cave full of stalactites and stalagmites. Most likely, too, Anita Pleumarom of the Tourism Investigation and Monitoring Team based in Thailand .will present examples of how nature and culture can be turned into commodities to boost tourism.

Because the panels will be simultaneous – four or five at a time- some delegates may find themselves torn between the “Baguio History” and “Gender Issues in the Cordillera” panels. For sure, the hosts headed by conference chair and CSC director Delfin Tolentino, Jr. will eventually make available all the presentations so delegates can read on panel topics they’ll miss.

There are four panels on Natural Resource Management and one on Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Practices in Ifugao, which is set at the same time as the second panel on Cultural Heritage.

The forum format will be enriched by presentations on the experiences of other indigenous peoples. It will help us locals relate to and compare them with our own coping with the forces of change and modernization.

Panel 19, on “Enabling Communities To Be Heard: An Australian Perspective”, will offer a glimpse of the plight of the Aborigines Down Under. Hopefully, the topics will touch on the so-called “Killing Time” and the “Stolen Generation” so vividly captured by “Kanyini”, an award-winning documentary. The film stars Bob Randall, a half-Aborigine and traditional co-owner of Uluru, the famous rock sacred to his people, the Yankunytjatjara.

Randall belongs to the “stolen generation” of aboriginal children who were taken away from their parents and brought to special schools – to be educated according to the norms of their colonizers. Since he was plucked from her, Bob never saw his mother again.

In forums, Randall speaks without bitterness, making his presentation more impressive. Like Flavier, Bob oozes with humor and laughter, perhaps his way of coping with the tragic past and the complex issues his people face today as a result of their subjugation.

“The purpose of life is to be part of all that there is,” Randall said during a lecture last March at Schumacher College in Devon, England. “Our parents said we are connected to everything else, and the proof is being alive. You’re one with everything there is.”

The film, directed by Melanie Hogan, a white Australian, comes out with Bob’s message: “We need to heal together.” After all, “Kanyini” means interconnectedness to - and love for all creation : land, family (kinship), belief systems and spirituality.

Interconnectedness. Perhaps that’s what the conference at UP Baguio is all about. The sharing dispels the notion that academic researches –like some government plans - only end up in library shelves after they fulfill the requirements for courses, and to be later used as reference for other studies. (e-mail:rdacawi@yahoo.com for comments)