Based on the last blogpost, I’ve asked the Question “Are we going to stick with ‘The Philippines’ as a name for our Nation?”, “What do we want to call Ourselves?”
It is a well-established fact that what we call our country today is derived from what our Spanish colonizers ‘chose’ for us. Being named after a colonizer’s monarch is not exactly flattering. Yet we choose to continue this ‘tradition’ simply because we do not have a strong proposal for a change of the name.
In the Marcos era, there was a move to change the name to ‘Maharlika’. This did not prosper, for the reason I encourage you to discover in the posted readings. And because it is associated with the Marcos era, the term ‘Maharlika’ is already tainted.
I’ve been playing with the PC game ‘Civilization’ ever since I discovered it in the 1990s. Now that I’m thirty, I still play the addictive civilization-building game in its 4th incarnation, Civilization IV (with the expansion packs ‘Warlords’ and ‘Beyond the Sword’). The game lets you change the name of your ‘civilization’ and I’ve always experimented with what name I would call a ‘Filipino’ civilization. The game asks you for the Full Name, a Shortened Name, Adjective, and Noun use of the civilization name.
I have used the following names for all my games:
- Full Name: “Dakilang San-Lahi”, “Dakila”
- Shortened Name: “San-Lahi”, “Dakila”
- Adjective: “Dakilan”, “Kadakila-an”
- Noun: “San-Lahi”, “Dakilan”
Translated, “Dakilang San-Lahi” is “great/noble-people-of-one-heritage”. It shows that the people of these islands are a great and noble people, diverse in culture, but with one common heritage that is embraced and enriched.
I am unfamiliar with other languages, but will this pass for Ilokano, Bikolano, and Cebuano translations? I hope that this suggestion is not too ‘tagalog’.
“Republikang Federal ng Dakilang San-Lahi”
“Kapuluan ng Dakilang San-Lahi”
An what do we call ourselves? “Dakila”. “Dakilan”, “Ka-Lahi”.
What do you think?
4 comments
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August 14, 2008 at 7:55 pm
Steven Baldesco
I would like to propose to change the Official Name of our country
from the present “Republic of the Philippines” to the “Federal Republic of the Philippines” as the Filipino term shall be “Federal na Republika ng Pilipinas”.
I personally think that we should not change the name of our country as it has represented our identity for many generations.
What do you think?
August 17, 2008 at 12:20 am
Steven Baldesco
If we are allowed to change the Constitution, sorry.
August 19, 2008 at 3:28 pm
elijah
The name Philippines and its Spanish counterpart Filipinas are derived from the name of Philip II of Spain.[8] Ruy López de Villalobos used the name Las Islas Filipinas in honor of the then-Crown Prince during his expedition to the Philippines, originally referring to the islands of Leyte and Samar. Despite the presence of other names, the name Filipinas was eventually adopted as the name of the entire archipelago.[8]
Before the arrival of the Spaniards, the Philippine archipelago was collectively known as Maharlika, which may have come from the Old Malay language meaning “noble creation”.
The Philippines once contemplated to rename itself as Malaysia, although the present-day Malaysia adopted the name first in 1963 before the Philippines could act further on the matter.[9]
The official name of the islands, however, changed throughout the course of Philippine history. In the Philippine Revolution, the Philippines was officially called the República Filipina or the Philippine Republic. From the time of the Spanish-American War until the Commonwealth, American colonial authorities have referred to the Philippines as the “Philippine Islands”, a translation of the original Spanish. It was in the Commonwealth period that the name Philippines began to appear, a name that persists as its current official name.[2]
December 15, 2008 at 6:09 pm
Arben Saavedra
in Chavacano that would be: Republica Federal di Dakilang San-Lahi
(dakilang san-lahi= /gran uno rasa/ spelt as “gran uno raza”)