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Telltale Signs: THE WORDING OF THE PLAQUE |
|
 Rodel Rodis
The proposal to install a corrective plaque by the Dewey Monument in Union
Square that would serve the same educational purpose as the plaque by the
Pioneers Monument in the San Francisco Civic Center has drawn the support of the
city arts official who worked on the wording of the Pioneers Monument plaque.
The city official, Ms. Debra Lehane of the San Francisco Arts Commission, has
researched the history of the period and has drafted a text for the proposed
plaque. A committee headed by community activist MC Canlas is working on
preparing the final text based on her draft. The community is invited to
critique the text and submit suggestions on improving it. (Please send them to
me at my email address below.)
Here is Ms. Lehane's draft:
"Citizens of San Francisco erected the Dewey monument in 1901 as a response to
national and local patriotism. The United States had defeated Spain in the
Spanish American War. Although that war ended with the signing of the Treaty of
Paris in 1898, within months a new conflict began - the Philippine-American War.
This war lasted about three and one half years while the overall conflict lasted
approximately ten years. As many as 400,000-600,000 Filipino civilians lost
their lives compared to 10,000 US soldiers. The Philippines became a direct
colony of the United States from 1899 to 1935. Political independence was
returned to the Philippines by the United States in 1946."
The change from "Philippine Insurrection" to "Philippine American War" was
welcomed by John Silva, a former UC Berkeley professor now based in Manila, who
emailed to note that respected historians and authors like Hampton Sides have
come to reject the "Insurrection" label.
In his book, Ghost Soldiers: The Forgotten Epic Story of World War II's Most
Dramatic Mission, Hampton Sides introduces the Philippines as the colony won
after "a vicious campaign against the Philippine people which came to be known,
inappropriately, as the Philippine Insurrection, as though the local citizenry
were displaying an outrageous insubordination for seeking a voice in the future
of their own archipelago."
On the wording of the plaque, a spirited email discussion has ensued with Oscar
Penaranda, a teacher from Union City, launching the first salvo with his point
that the conflict should be properly called the "US-Philippine War", not the
"Philippine American War."
"It is not accurate to equate the United States with the word America," Oscar
wrote. "Therefore, it is not accurate to call the citizens or any adjective
ascribed to the United States "American". America is not a country. It is a
hemisphere. Half the world is America. To use it, like the majority of people,
as a word appropriated only to apply to the United States, is inaccurate and
acquiescent to an inaccuracy perpetrated by the biased power structure of the
Unites States."
I expressed my view that it was already a giant leap to go from the "Philippine
Insurrection" to the "Philippine American War", a term the US Library of
Congress now accepts, and that his proposal would unnecessarily detract from
this new focus.
MC Canlas chimed in that he would support such a change only "if there is a
strong movement to change Spanish-American War, Mexican-American War, American
Civil War, American Revolution."
On the other hand, author Jorge Emmanuel ("The Forbidden Book" together with
Helen Toribio, Abe Ignacio and Enrique De la Cruz) expressed his agreement with
Oscar that America is not a country.
"I remember years ago," Jorge wrote, "a friend from Bolivia said he was American
but people from the US have arrogated that name to refer to people in the US
only. In the future, Mexicans, Canadians, people in Central and South America
may wish to take back "America" to be more inclusive and we should not stand in
the way."
Jorge added a few other suggestions on changes to the period of the armed
conflict, the number of its fatalities and the length of the colonial status of
the Philippines. Below is Jorge's suggestion for the plaque:
"Citizens of San Francisco erected the Dewey monument in 1901 as a response to
national and local patriotism. The United States had defeated Spain in the
US-Spanish War. Although that war ended with the signing of the Treaty of Paris
in 1898, within months a new conflict began – the US-Philippine War. The war
in the Philippines was declared over in 1902 even though armed conflict actually
lasted about fifteen years. Hundreds of thousands of Filipino civilians and
4,200 US soldiers lost their lives in that conflict. The Philippines became a
colony of the United States in 1899 and was granted formal independence in
1946."
Please join the discussion and send in your own proposed wording. We hope to
install the bronze plaque by the Dewey Monument in Union Square on May 1, 2006.
* * *
ERRATUM. In my "Boondocks and Jazz" column of two weeks ago, I wrote that the
San Francisco Examiner op-ed editor who called my attention to the Buffalo
Soldiers and Jazz was James Finefrock. As I now recall, it wasn't Jim who called
me although Jim was kind enough to email my article to the one who did, his
friend, now retired, who was also an op-ed editor five years ago. The source of
my information was Lynn Ludlow.
After receiving Jim's email, Lynn contacted me to remind me of our phone
conversation. He wrote that he shared the information with me to stress "the
contribution to jazz in San Francisco by musicians who had served with the black
Army units in the Philippines and Hawaii. As they were mustered out at the
Presidio between 1903 and 1916, many settled in Oakland and found work in the
black nightclubs of the Barbary Coast -- Sam King's and Lew Purcell's So
Different. The details are reported in "Jazz on the Barbary Coast" by Tom
Stoddard, a compilation of oral histories by Sid LeProtti, Reb Spikes and other
musicians of the time."
Thank you for the information, Lynn.
Send comments to Rodel50@aol.com.
******************************************
Posted in Gutom.org with permission from Rodel Rodis.
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Posted on Monday, June 13 @ 13:43:07 CDT by don |
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