The malevolence of ‘benevolent assimilation’: cultural critique in early Philippine literature in English

Abstract

Abstract: Two Filipino novels that were written in English during the American colonial period, Maximo Kalaw's The Filipino Rebel: A romance of the American colonization of the Philippines and Juan C. Laya's His Native Soil, are explicitly interested in analyzing American colonialism and its effects on the Philippines. Maximo Kalaw examines the political system of the colonial Philippines and lays bare the inherent corruption in a system that pretends to be democratic, while still under American control. Juan C. Laya questions American racial tolerance and the transformative power of capitalism. Though each comments on the colonization and explores issues of collaboration with and resistance to the American regime, they do not speak with one voice. Indeed, the debates that characterize the late twentieth‐century post‐colonial studies, particularly with regard to the potential for resistance in the colonial setting, are clearly evident in this early colonial fiction. The texts reveal strong differences as to whether resistance is at all possible and, if it is, how it operates and to what effect; however, what they share in common is a desire to expose the malice behind the American policy of ‘benevolent assimilation’.