Nationhood and Transborder Labor Migrations: The Late Twentieth Century from a Late Nineteenth-Century Perspective

Abstract

This paper seeks to provide a perspective on contemporary Philippine labor migrations by viewing this phenomenon in light of analogous transborder movements of workers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Based on information about so-called Manilla men in Australia and British Malaya, the paper discusses living and working conditions of migrant workers in the earlier period. The paper takes up the broader context of indentured work in the nineteenth century and the reaction by such countries of origin as China and Japan to interrogate the pervasive sense of shame and victimization felt in present-day Philippines arising from the export of labor. The broad parameters of the Philippine national narrative are explored in view of the continuities and changes in the relationship between national identity and long-distance movements of workers.