Fertility and Kinship in the Philippines.

Abstract

The objective in this book is to describe how the people from 1 area of central Philippines (Cebu Province) have coped with the realities of large family size i.e. what have they done to limit their number of births; what do they know about contraceptive methods; how successful have they been in using contraceptive methods; and how do people of lower socioeconomic status deal with the psychic and economic burden of raising children. Focus is on how the family serving as an intermediary between the cultural system and the individual shapes the individuals perception of kinship duties and obligations assists her/him in coping with the exigencies of sheer survival and reproduction and in turn influences his/her family building processes. The attempt is made to identify some of the social institutions and value systems that encourage the propagation of large families and to provide a preliminary understanding of the patterns of interaction between husband and wife families and relatives friends and neighbors. The data presented come from 22 unstructured intensive interviews and a total of more than 2000 cases obtained through sample surveys conducted in the city and in the barrios. Of the total 1521 cases were from the metropolitan area of Cebu City. The Filipinos regardless of their socioeconomic standing and educational attainments were found to be enmeshed in a web of kinship which impinged on and is impinged upon by conjugal relationships and childbearing. There was a fair amount of ignorance regarding family planning yet it is erroneous to believe that Filipinos are without aspirations toward the ideal of a smaller family. It is simply that in the daily lives of the Cebuanos the ideal must take its place in a hierarchy of priorities of which economic survival is highest. Modern medicine and western contraceptive technology were found to have little functional significance in the lives of the humble residents in the central Philippines. The policy implication is that the dissemination of modern contraceptives goes beyond the mere transplantation of new methods.