tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post2602246066843170206..comments2023-03-24T22:04:31.825+08:00Comments on Social / -Isms: Why Are We Writers Shallow?: A Voltairean ExplorationJojo Soria de Veyrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10755588651423753783noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post-32217494746943448372011-09-16T18:38:18.182+08:002011-09-16T18:38:18.182+08:00Getting riled up
over a stupid article
on filipino...Getting riled up<br />over a stupid article<br />on filipino shallowness.<br />Shallow me,<br />another tanka written!<br /><br />[from my tanka diary]hadvhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509025772524925053noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post-84554179199138578902011-09-16T07:35:32.531+08:002011-09-16T07:35:32.531+08:00Deep into their fields of expertise. And that is a...Deep into their fields of expertise. And that is also why I took Jose to task on his quack and shallow sociology---if he wants to be a deep sociologist he must stop being a shallow one, otherwise he'd best get back to writing short stories about families in old stone houses.<br /><br />Apart from that, I was offended by his use of the "man does not live by bread alone" tenet, especially as it is dangled in a landscape where bread is precisely the daily issue and point of tension. Add to that, his disgust towards people in hospital corridors gazing into space instead of reading books. It was clearly an attitude that betrays an elitist lack of understanding of a people who can only access the price of tabloids and the Tagalog romance novelettes and who'd find the books at his Solidaridad bookstore as luxury stuff for the rich.Jojo Soria de Veyrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10755588651423753783noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post-77697313405373672272011-09-16T07:31:16.704+08:002011-09-16T07:31:16.704+08:00Although I agree there is some advantage to be gai...Although I agree there is some advantage to be gained from immersing citizens in classical history, philosophy, ethics and morality, and other "classical" subjects, I cannot also argue against the point of economics concerning specialized training. Thus, I do not take it against anyone who's chosen to course-specialize in the history, philosophies, and ethics of nursing practice, for instance, or the same for IT engineering, or for the chess sport. And even if I can agree with Jose's suggestion to a degree, I cannot agree with the colonial valuation he places on "Western culture", as if our age has not yet been the beneficiary of the legacies of Edward Said and Lyotard concerning postcolonial literatures and the identification of colonial and hegemonic metanarratives. To say that a study of Byzantine literature and art is on a higher plane than a study of quantum physics or air conditioning repair for the humid tropics is simply . . . shallow. That was my satire's first point. And so, to go back to your query, my answer is: any book or subject an individual chooses to go deep into is "deep" enough for me. I object to Jose's attitude that judges people as shallow simply because they are deep into the area of pigment restoration or the area of Kiwi cuisine or the area of Philippine horticulture, and therefore do not fit into his Kiplingian vision of a deep person---one well-informed about the story of Phocas. Fuck that. Sure, there are shallow people, but I respect people who are deep into their fields of expertise. (...continue below)Jojo Soria de Veyrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10755588651423753783noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post-18152539982648973402011-09-16T07:25:22.197+08:002011-09-16T07:25:22.197+08:00Danny, thanks for posting your data. I also agree ...Danny, thanks for posting your data. I also agree with Sionil Jose to some degree. But as for your query (what should we read?), that was precisely the first target of my satire: Jose's formula of drowning us in the classics and in Roman Catholic and other religious text. (...continue below)Jojo Soria de Veyrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10755588651423753783noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post-78602563896853984742011-09-16T06:59:10.352+08:002011-09-16T06:59:10.352+08:00Also, I’d rather be ‘shallow’ than vomit the Filip...Also, I’d rather be ‘shallow’ than vomit the Filipino culture I've imbibed. :)Danny Castillones Silladahttp://dannysillada.weebly.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-284558144284322260.post-78061570781435387972011-09-16T06:43:38.319+08:002011-09-16T06:43:38.319+08:00To some degree, though, I also agree with F. Sioni...To some degree, though, I also agree with F. Sionil Jose, but what materials should we read in this consumerist and digitized society to make us intellectually profound?<br /><br />To give you an idea of where we are in the survey of how many books are published per country per year in Asia based on UNESCO statistics, Philippines ranks last. Although the figure available for the Philippines was one based on a 1996 survey, even then, Sri Lanka already had a number three times higher, with the Philippines only publishing 1,507 books. Here are the current available numbers:<br /><br />China (2007) 136,226<br />India (2004) 82,537 (21,370 in Hindi and 18,752 in English)<br />Japan (2009) 78,555 <br />Taiwan (2007) 42,018 <br />South Korea (2010) 40,291 <br />Vietnam (2009) 24,589 <br />Indonesia (2009) more than 24,000 <br />Malaysia (2009) 15,767 <br />Thailand (2009) 13,607 <br />Hong Kong (2000) 9,773 <br />Sri Lanka (1996) 4,115 <br />Philippines (1996) 1,507 <br /><br />Most of the books published by the mainstream publishers in the Philippines are those by mainstream writers, professors, and award-winning writers in literature both local and foreign. No philosophy, physics, mathematics, psychology, or computer science books are published except, of course, textbooks. But even these textbooks have those basic book themes or subjects that could make us intellectually profound, it's not just literature and aesthetics that would make that possible.<br /><br />On the other hand, Filipino culture is also shifting, inevitably so, as well as our perceptions of reality by way of what the mass media and mass culture are promoting to the masses. Our culture is not promoting a serious ‘reading culture,’ like Singapore, Thailand, India, and China, to name a few. It is a culture of telenovelas, vampire and teenage love stories, crime movies, etc.Danny Castillones Silladahttp://dannysillada.weebly.comnoreply@blogger.com