Philippine history consists of diverse and significant events that have shaped the country to what it is today. A part of this history is analyzed by Dr. Gerard Rey A. Lico of the University of the Philippines’ College of Architecture, in a study on architecture and the physical-spatial dimension of urbanism in Manila during the period of American colonization. His dissertation, “Building the Imperial Imagination: The Politics of American Colonial Urbanism and Architecture in Manila,” investigates the impact of colonial power relations on Manila’s architecture and urban development, thus concretizing imperial imagination in the tropics.
In the period of American colonization from 1898 to 1934, massive urban transformation and reengineering were initiated to facilitate America’s efficient governance of the country and to enhance the flow of economic activities for maximum profit. The colonizers used architecture and urbanism as instruments to expose the “subhuman” and “unsanitary” practices of Filipinos, thereby subjecting them further to American rule. Dr. Lico labels this process as “techno-cosmopolitanism” – the reconfiguration of the public environment into institutions of colonial modernity and discipline. Urban and architectural transformations were means to rehabilitate the indigenous population in Manila and maneuver urban life closer to American standards.
Reconstructing an image of the native Filipino as a reservoir of latent infection involved health and sanitary reforms through military orders and ordinances. Major changes in traditional practices of hygiene were implemented and architectural modifications of the domestic space were introduced. For instance, traditional nipa houses were overhauled, latrines and other domestic services were installed, and the concept of the toilet was introduced in 1902 by way of the pail system or cubeta. However, the American regime also resorted to demolition, burning, and disinfection of existing pathogenic sites which fueled much hatred from the native Filipinos. The regulatory schemes led to native resistances in the forms of flight, evasion, non-compliance and sabotage brought about by political distrust, conflicting cultural values, and lack of awareness of modern hygienic principles and disease etiology. The colonizers later abandoned the house-burning strategy and compromised by producing a hybridized form of nipa house, marking the shift of the American urban policy from ruthless demolisher of indigenous neighborhoods to humane community developer and urban benefactor.
More efforts followed to modernize the Filipino urban house. The colonial architects and sanitary engineers were able to merge the traditional, tropical features of buildings with modern materials and architectonic principles of hygiene. Domestic sanitary surveillance expanded to the larger public environment through the establishment of new developmental urban structures, zoning regulation, and control in the use of public space. The American regime deployed its resources to build markets, schools, hospitals, roads, bridges and other public structures, all suggesting colonial modernity. Filipinos were also given the opportunity to acquire degrees in architecture in universities in the United States. This educational upgrade resulted in the gradual take-over of native Filipinos of the architectural production and the system of architecture education in the Philippines. However, colonial standards in architecture were maintained.
For almost half a century, a metropolitan imagery of Manila was created. Manila’s urban space did not only become a sanitized, orderly and beautiful imperial city in the process. According to Dr. Lico, it also became a symbolic arena for a compromise between the colonial authorities and the native inhabitants who had divergent views on disease and hygienic practices, urban order and discipline, and architecture and urban beauty. It is evident that architecture and urbanism combined with rituals of civility and governance, replaced hostile strategies in the overall design to attain native obedience to the colonial state and define the directions of American colonization in the Philippines.
Dr. Gerard Lico is an architect and art historian. He teaches at the College of Architecture and College of Arts and Letters at UP Diliman. He is the author of Edifice Complex: Power, Myth, and Marcos State Architecture (2003) and a forthcoming textbook on Philippine Architecture and its accompanying four-part DVD documentary. He also edited the interactive CD-ROM, “Arkitekturang Filipino: Spaces and Places in History” (2003) and “Through the Lens of an American Soldier” (2004). For his research work in architectural history and cultural studies, he was conferred the UP Gawad Chanselor para sa Pinakamahusay na Mananaliksik (Arts and Humanities) in the years 2002, 2004 and 2005, installing him in the Hall of Fame. He was one of the recipients of the Ten Outstanding Young Men (TOYM) in 2004. He is curating the exhibition, “Building Modernity: A Century of Philippine Architecture and Allied Arts,” which will open at the National Museum on February 2007.
By MMRParreño
