What is 'Lannang'?
July 21, 2024
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What does 'Lannang' mean? We try to show you how the term 'Lannang' is used, and how members of the Lannang community define it, based on the most recent version of the Lannang Manifesto.
The definitions herein are derived from a diverse array of sources encompassing both qualitative and quantitative data. The terminologies have been extensively gathered and vetted through methods including, but not limited to, community engagement forums such as The Lannang Archives (TLA) community chats conducted in the year 2024, and empirical evidence collected through structured survey methodologies, notably the pre-survey (n = 223 participants) and post-survey (n = 29 participants) administered in conjunction with the 2024 Lannang Symposium.Â
Further depth and richness of data have been obtained through semi-structured interviews executed during the said symposium. Additionally, a longitudinal ethnographic investigation undertaken by Prof. Dr. Wilkinson Daniel Wong Gonzales, spanning from the year 2017 through to the year 2024, contributes significantly to the foundational understanding herein presented. Complementing these primary sources are peer-reviewed academic resources, specifically those articulated in scholarly contributions by Tan (2021) and Chu (2021), which provide a critical, analytical framework and theoretical underpinning to the definitions employed in this document.
WHERE DID IT COME FROM?
The term “Lannang” has origins from the Hokkien phrase lân-láng “our people.”
WHAT DOES ‘LANNANG’ REFER TO?
Individuals in the Philippines who are descendants of immigrants from Southern China—specifically, those of Hokkien, Cantonese, or Taishanese origin. It applies to those who trace their lineage to the major immigration waves of the early to mid-20th century, and possibly even to those who arrived in the late 19th and late 20th centuries.
VS.
WHOM?
A term that has historically been mostly, if not uniquely, used by this group – and not other ‘Chinese-heritage’ groups (e.g., Southeast Asian Hokkien-heritage diaspora communities) – to refer to themselves vis-à-vis an “other” people who do not share the same heritage or experiences as them (e.g., notably, the huan-nâ or the natives, and more recently, ethnic Chinese migrants beginning the 1990s that identify as “Chinese” and not “Lannang”). At present, the term still has vestiges of its original function: it can be used to mark the social group’s identity as distinct from what the group has historically referred to as the huan-nâ or the “natives” (i.e., non-Lannang Filipinos), but now it can also be used as a term to distinguish themselves from Chinese migrant groups that they perceive to be “out-group” such as the POGOs (i.e., Chinese gambling operators in the Philippines), recent Hokkien-speaking migrants, and other ethnic Chinese in the Philippines that do not share the same heritage as them.
BEYOND JUST ‘CHINESE’: ‘LANNANG’
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A multifaceted Philippine heritage and a mixed or hybrid sociocultural and ethnolinguistic identity that primarily reflects the diasporic heritage mentioned earlier yet is capable of dynamically shifting depending on the context. This (seemingly paradoxical) identity encompasses four main facets: being Filipino, being a specific type of Southern Chinese, being neither, and being both, all contingent on the sociocultural circumstances.
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A sociocultural, ethnolinguistic identity that is necessarily entangled with the Philippine social fabric, and – by definition – a Filipino identity, as the notion of “Lannang” emerged in a Filipino/Philippine context.
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A hybrid socio-cultural identity comparable to the Peranakans in Malaysia and Singapore, the Macanese in Macau, and the Kristang in Singapore.
SCOPE
The term refers to someone who self-identifies or positions themselves as “Lannang” and engages in at least some Lannang heritage (e.g., going to Lannang schools, engages with other Lannang speakers, speaks Lánnang-uè, believes in or had been socialized into “Lannang values” like bìn ‘face,’ hiyâ ‘shame’)
WHAT TO USE LANNANG FOR?
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The culture and heritage (e.g. Lannang heritage)
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The people (e.g. the Lannangs)
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The language (although, most refer to it as Lánnang-uè)
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How to cite:
Gonzales, Wilkinson Daniel Wong. 2024. What is 'Lannang'? The Lannang Archives. Retrieved from: www.lannangarchives.org
Inspiration
This poster series was inspired by the Jolo Lannangs, brought to light by @The Sulu Cultural and Historical Society.
https://www.facebook.com/suluhx/photos/a.2346452985681127/2691046054555150/?type=3&theater
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