A Study of Asian American Issues in the United States - Nicoline Pedersen - Krista Celo - Eden Stilman - Seren Ventullo

CONFORMITY TO THE NARRATIVE OF WESTERN INFLUENCE

The "coloniality of power" is an expression to name the structures of power, control, and hegemony that have emerged during the modernist era, the era of colonialism, which stretches from the conquest of the Americas to the present.

Coloniality persists as a byproduct of previous colonization exploits. Despite the destruction of colonialism as an explicit political order, western hegemony persists as a universal narrative that maintains a global influence. The Philippines is merely one example by which colonized bodies conform to the narrative of western hegemony and commit themselves to practices intending to appease their subjugators.

The willingness of the Philippines to imitate their colonial subjugators alludes to their compliance to the stereotypical narrative of Western authority as "teachers" or "big brothers" to their child/juvenile state.

By offering migrants what is essentially a portable set of “rights,” the state can represent itself as a caring and virtuous state committed to its citizens.

The false endowment of rights is an American-Western commonality that the Philippines assumes as an additional means of fulfilling the necessary template to gain acceptance from global powers.

The urgency to invalidate their feminized status renders the Philippines to prioritize “masculine” pursuits; namely their economic endeavors.

The Philippine state is invested in recuperating its feminized status through policy interventions that conform to hegemonic white, masculinized global conventions.

The mass emigration of Filipino laborers is not minimized to isolated, individual pursuits. Rather, the Philippine state facilitates “labor brokerages” as a means of appeasing overseas, western authorities by evincing their contributions to globalization and economic pursuits.

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