Filipino American Sporting Cultures: The Racial Politics of Play

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Constancio R. Arnaldo, Jr discusses the significance of sports in the lives of diasporic Filipino Americans

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Constancio R. Arnaldo, Jr discusses the significance of sports in the lives of diasporic Filipino Americans

Image courtesy of interviewee. August 30, 2024

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In an interview discussing the motivations behind his book on Filipino American sporting cultures, the author shares his personal journey growing up in the Bay Area and his experiences in sports. He reflects on a lack of information about Filipinos in sports during his upbringing and how this led him to pursue higher education in ethnic studies. The author emphasizes that sports have been a critical aspect of Filipino American identity, providing a means for belonging and engagement with American culture.

He explains how he conducted extensive research through experiential ethnography, involving personal participation in sports and interviews with community members. The findings reveal that sports serve as important arenas for race and identity formation, challenging stereotypes and providing a sense of community among Filipino Americans. The author highlights the significance of figures like Manny Pacquiao, who embodies the aspirations of the Filipino community, showcasing ideals of masculinity and success.

He also discusses how future research could explore the experiences of diverse populations within the Filipino diaspora, particularly looking beyond prominent figures and mainstream sports to understand the broader implications of sports in different cultural contexts. The author believes that analyzing these dynamics can contribute to a more nuanced understanding of identity and community among Filipino Americans and their counterparts globally.

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Here are five key points from the video:

1. **Personal Journey and Ethnic Identity**: The speaker reflects on their upbringing in the Bay Area, California, and how their experiences in sports prompted them to explore their Filipino heritage. They describe a lack of information about the Philippines in their education, which fueled their curiosity about understanding what it means to be Filipino.

2. **Lack of Representation in Academia**: The speaker notes a scarcity of scholarly work on Filipino Americans in sports, attributing this to historical barriers that prevented people of color from entering academia until the 1960s. They emphasize the need for a critical examination of sports in relation to race, class, gender, and sexuality.

3. **Sports as a Site of Race Making**: The speaker discusses how sports serve as a significant site for understanding racial dynamics and identity claims. They highlight how Filipino American athletes challenge stereotypes by excelling in sports like flag football and basketball, thus asserting their presence and America in the convideo of historically marginalized communities.

4. **Manny Pacquiao as a Symbol**: Manny Pacquiao is portrayed as a vital figure for Filipino Americans, representing success and resilience. His narrative of rising from poverty to fame allows Filipino Americans to claim his achievements as part of their identity, fostering a sense of belonging and cultural pride.

5. **Potential for Future Research**: The speaker calls for further exploration of sports among Filipino Americans, particularly in queer and everyday convideos, beyond the prominent figure of Pacquiao. They suggest investigating the experiences of diasporic Filipinos in different countries and examining lesser-known sports and community practices to expand the understanding of Filipino American identity in sports.

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Here are some key quotes extracted from the video:

1. **The Search for Identity**:
- "I was also like wondering for myself, like what it meant to be a Filipino."

2. **Initial Discovery**:
- "I pull out an encyclopedia and I look up the Philippines and... the encyclopedia was like a paragraph of the Philippines."

3. **Impact of Ethnic Studies**:
- "I took my first ethnic studies class... my ideas were fresh."

4. **Lack of Research**:
- "I find nothing on Filipino Americans in sports."

5. **Historical Convideo**:
- "People of color were not allowed in academia in the US until like the 1960s."

6. **Critical Approach to Sports**:
- "I was really interested in thinking about sports in a really critical way... in terms of race making and class and gender and sexuality."

7. **Sports as Belonging**:
- "For Filipino Americans, a way in which to belong to claim an Americanness."

8. **Assimilation and Colonialism**:
- "A kinder, gentler way of colonizing the Philippines... while it is a way in which to think benevolently about sports and the relationship to US colonialism, it was really violent."

9. **Contradictions in Sports**:
- "Sports can be racist, it can be sexist, homophobic and transphobic."

10. **Performing Identity in Sports**:
- "They start to challenge the stereotypes of the Asian American woman as a lotus blossom... embodying a certain kind of toughness and physicality."

11. **The Meaning of Manny Pacquiao**:
- "Manny Pacquiao... becomes a way for them to claim him as one of their own."

12. **Narrative of Success**:
- "His life story is one where he 'pulls himself out of poverty'... makes it."

13. **Sports and National Identity**:
- "Sports are a way for them to claim a certain kind of American belonging."

14. **Call for Broader Research**:
- "Future research needs to look beyond somebody like Pacquiao and to look at maybe everyday sporting spaces... not just basketball or flag football."

These quotes capture the essence of the video, highlighting themes of identity, the socio-political convideo of sports, and the role of figures like Manny Pacquiao in shaping the narratives of Filipino Americans in sports and society.

X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

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Grew up in the Bay area of California,

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and I had played sports all of my life.

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Um, but I was also like wondering for myself, like

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what it meant to be a Filipino.

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And so I was, I went to the local library.

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Um, I, I had,

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was wondering about the Philippines.

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And so I pull out an encyclopedia

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and I look up the Philippines and I remember reading,

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and this is probably when I was like in middle school,

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and the encyclopedia was like a paragraph

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of the Philippines.

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Um, and so didn't really have a lot of information

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grew up in, again, in, in the Bay Area.

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I go to college,

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I play sports in college, amateur sports.

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I'm not a professional. I wasn't a division one athlete.

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Um, but I play intramural basketball, flag football.

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I go to these tournaments and,

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and then I take my first ethnic studies class.

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And I remember the ethnic studies class was

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about Filipino Americans.

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And so that really intrigued me.

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And I, the professor, encouraged me to go to grad school

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and she was like, Hey, have you ever thought of a PhD?

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And I was like, I don't know what a PhD is.

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But, apparently she believed in my ideas

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and thought my ideas were fresh.

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And, so I go to grad school

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and I find nothing on Filipino Americans in sports.

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Um, and so part of it was

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'cause people of color were not allowed in academia

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in the US until like the 1960s.

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So people weren't really writing about,

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Filipino Americans.

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Um, Asian Americans have been in the US for a long time

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and they have played sports,

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but it hasn't really been talked about, hasn't been,

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in scholarly conversations.

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Um, and so when I got to grad school,

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I was really interested in thinking about sports in a

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really critical way, right?

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Uh, in terms of race making and class

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and gender and sexuality.

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Um, and I learned that sports were part

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of the US colonial process in the Philippines.

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And so that led me down to wanting to do research,

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and that the risk research, that I uncovered was

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for Filipino Americans, a way in which to belong

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to claim an Americanness.

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It's been a part of their everyday lives.

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Um, there have been tournaments, basketball tournaments,

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hardcore boxing fans.

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Um, and so it was really not my story to tell,

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but my story is kind of embedded into the book.

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It was a way for me to, belonged

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to the American national fabric.

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It was, and that's not

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what I was thinking about when I was a kid.

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I was thinking about just playing

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to win games, to win tournaments.

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Um, but yeah, it

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Is, you know,

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and there's a term,

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that the colonists used in the Philippines called benevolent

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assimilation, and that was a kinder, gentler way

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of colonizing the Philippines and, and Filipinos.

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Um, so when you ask about assimilation, it,

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it also makes me think about that term

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that while it is a kind of a way in which

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to think benevolently about sports

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and the relationship to us colonialism,

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it was really violent and colonialism was violent.

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Um, and so

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while people might say it is a way for, for like people

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of color to assimilate, it's not as easy as saying yes

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because they played sports that are, they're assimilating

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to America because sports is also rife

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with contradiction, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia.

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Um, but I think, yeah, it was a way for me to claim

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that I'm an American, even though, let's say my peers

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and coaches probably didn't see me as athletic enough.

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I did an experiential ethnography.

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So an experiential ethnography is,

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is a way in which I implicated myself playing,

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playing basketball, practicing and playing flag football.

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Um, the book starts each chapter with a story.

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So the first chapter is me attending, manny pa

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Manny Pacman quiel bible study.

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So I go to a Bible study and I'm making these observations.

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Um, I'm taking field notes.

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Um, I travel to places like Arlington, Texas,

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Las Vegas, Nevada, Southern California to kind of make sense

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of how PAO is, made meaningful for

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diasporic Filipino Americans.

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I also played in everyday sporting spaces

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like basketball leagues.

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So, I would play in these basketball leagues,

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I would talk to players, I would talk to fans,

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I would take notes when I could.

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Um, I had formal and informal interviews,

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and these are the different ways I kind of did the research,

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all while making these observations

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and asking questions.

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So I would also, conduct interviews.

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I would book an appointment with let's say somebody

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that was interested in talking about what sports mean

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to them, what pacquiao means to them, what basketball

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or flag football mean to them.

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And I would conduct maybe,

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I think I conducted over 75 interviews.

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Um, and so

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I think I, I answered your question.

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I'm not sure if you wanted me to expand more,

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but definitely a, a wide range of,

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conducting the research.

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As I was doing this research, I found that

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sports are also a site of race making.

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And so while people may think

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that sports are like these just neutral, apolitical arenas,

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there are actually really important sites to understand how

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race operates, how meanings

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of gender are imposed upon bodies,

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and how they challenge and or resist, these meanings.

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So I'll give you an example.

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There's a, there's a chapter where I write about

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Filipino Americans playing flag football.

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So when we think about like, let's say a sport like football

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or flag football in the us, flag football is like,

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it's another way to think about, a national sport.

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So we think about football, right?

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And I'm not tackle football, American football,

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not soccer, right?

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Uh, we think about men playing sports,

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we think about masculinity and physicality

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and violence and toughness.

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But in my ethnography, on these Filipino Americans

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and Asian American women playing flag football,

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they're playing against white women.

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And so these white women racialize, these Filipino

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and Asian American flag football players

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as not being athletic enough, not being good enough,

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and mapping meanings to them as

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model minority figures as petite, as fragile, as small.

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But these flag, these Filipino Americans

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are actually really good.

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And they, they resent the fact

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that these white women underestimate their athletic talent.

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So because of that, Filipino Americans start

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to perform and they start to play against these white women,

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and they start to dominate

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and they start to beat them year after year after year.

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Um, and in that process, they're challenging the stereotypes

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of the Asian American woman as a lotus blossom, as fragile,

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as weak, and rather embodying a certain kind

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of toughness and physicality.

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They're not, we don't typically associate

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with Asian American, female bodies, right?

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Um, and so their identity becomes part

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of their flag football performance

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because they're making claims to, the,

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what is perceived to be an American national sport sport

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by playing against and defeating

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and dominating these white women.

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And I argue that these white women racialize,

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these Filipino American

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and Asian American women, Asian American women become,

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they're, they're mindful of the fact

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that they are the quote unquote only Asian team out there,

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in part because white women did not think

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that they could hang with them on the flag football field.

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Manny Pacquiao, he is perceived to be the symbol

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of the Philippine nation.

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He's masculine, right?

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He's Christian, he's respectable,

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he's celebrated for his philanthropic

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Acts he gives to the poor.

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His life story is one

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where he quote unquote pulls himself out,

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pulls himself out of poverty,

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pulls himself up from his bootstraps and makes it,

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and so because there aren't many Filipino

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figures that have made it in,

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especially in popular culture generally,

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in particular in sports,

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he then becomes a way in which Filipino Americans

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claim him as one of their own.

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Um, and so he in many ways reminds,

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research participants of, let's say an uncle,

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but somebody that has a certain kind of way

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of being in the world that enables them to claim him.

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And so they celebrate him, not only

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because he is a great boxer, but also because he's Filipino.

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And so if we ha if,

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because there are limited options in terms of, you know,

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excellent Filipino athletes, he, he becomes a way for them

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to, to latch on to, excellence,

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athletic excellence, success.

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And his story is a story about making it.

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Um, and so because of that,

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they appreciate the fact that he is philanthropic,

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that he's Christian, that he's heterosexual,

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and that maybe just maybe if they,

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work hard enough like him,

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that they too can maybe like, have success.

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Um, so Pacquiao is like, he's the,

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he looms large

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and he cast such a large shadow for Filipino Americans

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that I actually start with him.

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Um, in the book, sports are, are, are sites of possibility,

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but also contradiction.

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So sports can be racist, it can be sexist,

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homophobic and transphobic.

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Um, but within these sites, there are also possibilities.

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And so what I'm, what I'm seeing,

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what I've observed in these spaces is that, folks

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like Manny Pao can challenge, stereotypes

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of Asian American ma Asian masculinity, right?

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He's tough. He's, he can be physical.

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Um, he can challenge the way that,

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Asian men have been seen as emasculated, right?

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Um, people also can kind of think of him as

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somebody that they claim a certain kind of, belonging

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to the Philippines through his, his iconicity.

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Um, you know, everyday athletes like flag football players

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or basketball players, engage in a certain kind

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of politics of pleasure in leisure that,

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Maybe have been denied them, historically.

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And so they challenge, again, stereotypes of,

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Asian Americans not being seen as American enough.

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And so in many ways, sports are a way for them to claim

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a certain kind of American belonging, perform a certain kind

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of Americanness, and to create

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spaces of community for themselves and perhaps for others.

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Um, and so that's what I mean when I say

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that sports are sites of possibility and contradiction.

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It's not easy to just say that sports, are all

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of these negative things or all these bad things,

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but to nuance that

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and to make sense of, it being

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possible and contradictory.

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My book is the only ethnography on

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Filipino Americans in sports, which tells us that there are

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so many other ways in which we can think about

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what sports means to Filipino Americans.

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It would, it'd be great to see, Filipino Americans

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who are queer, right?

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And I, and I've come across, folks have told me

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and asked me questions about like spaces where it's queer,

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Filipino Americans engaging in things like rollerblading.

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Um, and so I think future research needs to look

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beyond somebody like Pacquiao

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and to look at maybe everyday sporting spaces like

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volleyball, not just basketball or flag football,

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but other sports where Filipino Americans can play,

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and participate in that is not, that are kind of

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obscured in like these communities.

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Um, it would be great to see more diasporic spaces,

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beyond the us right?

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What are Filipinos in Canada doing?

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Um, how is their experience different

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from Filipino Americans?

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What about in a places like the uk right?

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Or where, and

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because Filipinos are, I think the largest, one

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of the largest diasporic populations, how do working class,

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poor working class diasporic Filipinos make sense of sports?

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How do they play it?

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Um, what are they involved

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with in places like the Middle East?

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And so I think there's possibilities in terms

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of thinking about sports beyond the US

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because it's, it's so US-centric

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that we can find different

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diasporic Filipino populations, participating in sports

14:31.765 --> 14:33.905
either as fans or as athletes.

"Exploring Identity and Belonging: A Journey through Filipino American Sports and Ethnic Studies"

00:00:00 - Grew up in the Bay area of California, and I had played sports all of my life. but I was also like wondering for myself, like what it meant to be a Filipino. And so I was, I went to the local library. I, I had, was wondering about the Philippines. And so I pull out an encyclopedia and I look up the Philippines and I remember reading, and this is probably when I was like in middle school, and the encyclopedia was like a paragraph of the Philippines. and so didn't really have a lot of information
00:00:43 - I go to college, I play sports in college, amateur sports. I'm not a professional. I wasn't a division one athlete. but I play intramural basketball, flag football. I go to these tournaments and, and then I take my first ethnic studies class. And I remember the ethnic studies class was about Filipino Americans. And so that really intrigued me. And I, the professor, encouraged me to go to grad school and she was like, Hey, have you ever thought of a PhD? And I was like, I don't know what a PhD is. But, apparently she believed in my ideas and thought my ideas were fresh. And, so I go to grad school
00:01:27 - and so part of it was 'cause people of color were not allowed in academia in the US until like the 1960s. So people weren't really writing about, Filipino Americans. Asian Americans have been in the US for a long time and they have played sports, but it hasn't really been talked about, hasn't been, in scholarly conversations. and so when I got to grad school, I was really interested in thinking about sports in a really critical way, right? in terms of race making and class
00:02:06 - and I learned that sports were part of the US colonial process in the Philippines. And so that led me down to wanting to do research, and that the risk research, that I uncovered was for Filipino Americans, a way in which to belong to claim an Americanness. It's been a part of their everyday lives. there have been tournaments, basketball tournaments, hardcore boxing fans. and so it was really not my story to tell, but my story is kind of embedded into the book.
00:02:48 - to the American national fabric. It was, and that's not what I was thinking about when I was a kid. I was thinking about just playing to win games, to win tournaments. but yeah, it Is, you know, and there's a term, that the colonists used in the Philippines called benevolent assimilation, and that was a kinder, gentler way of colonizing the Philippines and, and Filipinos. so when you ask about assimilation, it, it also makes me think about that term that while it is a kind of a way in which to think benevolently about sports and the relationship to us colonialism, it was really violent and colonialism was violent.
00:03:29 - while people might say it is a way for, for like people of color to assimilate, it's not as easy as saying yes because they played sports that are, they're assimilating to America because sports is also rife with contradiction, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia. but I think, yeah, it was a way for me to claim that I'm an American, even though, let's say my peers and coaches probably didn't see me as athletic enough. I did an experiential ethnography. So an experiential ethnography is, is a way in which I implicated myself playing,

"Exploring Identity and Race Through Sports: A Study of Filipino American Experiences in Flag Football"

00:04:13 - the book starts each chapter with a story. So the first chapter is me attending, manny pa Manny Pacman quiel bible study. So I go to a Bible study and I'm making these observations. I'm taking field notes. I travel to places like Arlington, Texas, Las Vegas, Nevada, Southern California to kind of make sense of how PAO is, made meaningful for diasporic Filipino Americans. I also played in everyday sporting spaces like basketball leagues.
00:04:54 - I would talk to players, I would talk to fans, I would take notes when I could. I had formal and informal interviews, and these are the different ways I kind of did the research, all while making these observations and asking questions. So I would also, conduct interviews. I would book an appointment with let's say somebody that was interested in talking about what sports mean to them, what pacquiao means to them, what basketball or flag football mean to them. And I would conduct maybe, I think I conducted over 75 interviews.
00:05:36 - I think I, I answered your question. I'm not sure if you wanted me to expand more, but definitely a, a wide range of, conducting the research. As I was doing this research, I found that sports are also a site of race making. And so while people may think that sports are like these just neutral, apolitical arenas, there are actually really important sites to understand how race operates, how meanings of gender are imposed upon bodies, and how they challenge and or resist, these meanings.
00:06:15 - There's a, there's a chapter where I write about Filipino Americans playing flag football. So when we think about like, let's say a sport like football or flag football in the us, flag football is like, it's another way to think about, a national sport. So we think about football, right? And I'm not tackle football, American football, not soccer, right? we think about men playing sports, we think about masculinity and physicality and violence and toughness. But in my ethnography, on these Filipino Americans and Asian American women playing flag football,
00:06:58 - And so these white women racialize, these Filipino and Asian American flag football players as not being athletic enough, not being good enough, and mapping meanings to them as model minority figures as petite, as fragile, as small. But these flag, these Filipino Americans are actually really good. And they, they resent the fact that these white women underestimate their athletic talent. So because of that, Filipino Americans start to perform and they start to play against these white women, and they start to dominate
00:07:41 - and in that process, they're challenging the stereotypes of the Asian American woman as a lotus blossom, as fragile, as weak, and rather embodying a certain kind of toughness and physicality. They're not, we don't typically associate with Asian American, female bodies, right? and so their identity becomes part of their flag football performance because they're making claims to, the, what is perceived to be an American national sport sport by playing against and defeating and dominating these white women. And I argue that these white women racialize,

"Manny Pacquiao and the Complexity of Cultural Identity in Sports: A Filipino American Perspective"

00:08:22 - and Asian American women, Asian American women become, they're, they're mindful of the fact that they are the quote unquote only Asian team out there, in part because white women did not think that they could hang with them on the flag football field. Manny Pacquiao, he is perceived to be the symbol of the Philippine nation. He's masculine, right? He's Christian, he's respectable, he's celebrated for his philanthropic Acts he gives to the poor. His life story is one where he quote unquote pulls himself out,
00:09:03 - pulls himself up from his bootstraps and makes it, and so because there aren't many Filipino figures that have made it in, especially in popular culture generally, in particular in sports, he then becomes a way in which Filipino Americans claim him as one of their own. and so he in many ways reminds, research participants of, let's say an uncle, but somebody that has a certain kind of way of being in the world that enables them to claim him. And so they celebrate him, not only
00:09:47 - And so if we ha if, because there are limited options in terms of, you know, excellent Filipino athletes, he, he becomes a way for them to, to latch on to, excellence, athletic excellence, success. And his story is a story about making it. and so because of that, they appreciate the fact that he is philanthropic, that he's Christian, that he's heterosexual, and that maybe just maybe if they,
00:10:27 - that they too can maybe like, have success. so Pacquiao is like, he's the, he looms large and he cast such a large shadow for Filipino Americans that I actually start with him. in the book, sports are, are, are sites of possibility, but also contradiction. So sports can be racist, it can be sexist, homophobic and transphobic. but within these sites, there are also possibilities. And so what I'm, what I'm seeing, what I've observed in these spaces is that, folks
00:11:15 - of Asian American ma Asian masculinity, right? He's tough. He's, he can be physical. he can challenge the way that, Asian men have been seen as emasculated, right? people also can kind of think of him as somebody that they claim a certain kind of, belonging to the Philippines through his, his iconicity. you know, everyday athletes like flag football players or basketball players, engage in a certain kind of politics of pleasure in leisure that,
00:11:56 - And so they challenge, again, stereotypes of, Asian Americans not being seen as American enough. And so in many ways, sports are a way for them to claim a certain kind of American belonging, perform a certain kind of Americanness, and to create spaces of community for themselves and perhaps for others. and so that's what I mean when I say that sports are sites of possibility and contradiction. It's not easy to just say that sports, are all of these negative things or all these bad things, but to nuance that

"Expanding Horizons: Exploring Diverse Perspectives on Filipino Americans in Sports"

00:12:38 - possible and contradictory. My book is the only ethnography on Filipino Americans in sports, which tells us that there are so many other ways in which we can think about what sports means to Filipino Americans. It would, it'd be great to see, Filipino Americans who are queer, right? And I, and I've come across, folks have told me and asked me questions about like spaces where it's queer, Filipino Americans engaging in things like rollerblading. and so I think future research needs to look
00:13:18 - and to look at maybe everyday sporting spaces like volleyball, not just basketball or flag football, but other sports where Filipino Americans can play, and participate in that is not, that are kind of obscured in like these communities. it would be great to see more diasporic spaces, beyond the us right? What are Filipinos in Canada doing? how is their experience different from Filipino Americans? What about in a places like the uk right?
00:14:31 - because Filipinos are, I think the largest, one of the largest diasporic populations, how do working class, poor working class diasporic Filipinos make sense of sports? How do they play it? what are they involved with in places like the Middle East? And so I think there's possibilities in terms of thinking about sports beyond the US because it's, it's so US-centric that we can find different diasporic Filipino populations, participating in sports either as fans or as athletes.

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