Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2022
Abstract
This article discusses how Philippine writer Nick Joaquin applied the ideas of Oswald Spengler in his historiography; notably the collection Culture and History (1988); his contribution to the post- authoritarian renegotiation of a national history fraught with colonial conflict and loss. This article argues that Joaquin adapted Spengler’s ideas; proposing the presence of a “Faustian” Filipino soul formed during the Spanish-colonial period; to a contradictory effect. It allowed him to assert a national identity that challenged the dichotomous ways in which Philippine history was conventionally conceived; but it also reintroduced Eurocentric and homogenizing schemes; reinforcing existing hegemonies in the postcolony.
Recommended Citation
Hidde van der Wall, (December 2022), Tropical Faustian: Nick Joaquin’s Spenglerian Imagining of Colonial History in the Post-Authoritarian Philippines. Philosophical Journal of Conflict and Violence
Included in
English Language and Literature Commons, South and Southeast Asian Languages and Societies Commons
