Title:
“Karampátan ñg Tao”: Tracing the Rise of Tagalog Human Rights Discourse Using a Textual Corpus

Speaker:
Professor Ramon Guillermo
Director of the Center for International Studies, University of the Philippines-Diliman

Abstract:
This talk presents a preliminary study of the rise of human rights discourse in the Tagalog language from the late nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth using a carefully designed textual corpus. The corpus will be made up of original Tagalog texts as well as translations of political treatises from European languages into Tagalog. While it has been found that “karapatan” (rights) is indeed a central notion in the development of a specifically Tagalog revolutionary discourse, the matter of its “inherence” in the “tao” (human being) has followed a particularly convoluted path due to the existence of alternative interpretations revolving around the moral “worthiness” of individuals and classes.

About the Speaker:
Ramon Guillermo is a noted Filipino novelist, translator, poet, activist, and academic. He is Professor at the Center for International Studies of the University of the Philippines-Diliman, where he also serves as Director. He obtained his PhD in Southeast Asian Studies (Austronesistik) from the University of Hamburg, Germany. His works include Translation and Revolution: A Study of Jose Rizal’s Guillermo Tell; Isabelo de los Reyes’ Ang Diablo sa Filipinas: ayon sa nasasabi sa mga casulatan luma sa Kastila, with Benedict Anderson and Carlos Sardiña Galache; and 3 Baybayin Studies, with Myfel Joseph Paluga, Maricor Soriano and Vernon Totanes. His current research projects are on the textual transmission, dissemination, reception, and translation of ideas and ideologies in Southeast Asia using techniques and approaches from translation studies and digital humanities. He is a proponent of the development of Philippine Studies as an autonomous academic communication community. He has served as a Faculty Regent of the University of the Philippines and is one of the initiators of the Network in Defense of Historical Truth and Academic Freedom.