Boac, Marinduque – The Marinduque Council for Environmental Concerns (MACEC) have convened 44 out of 61 Boac village members to look back on March 24, 1996 when the Marcopper mine tailings left the Boac River dead.

 

Mam Beth Manggol of Macec updated the Boac section of a province-wide non-governmental organization dealing with ecology and longterm effects of mining with government participation from the barangay to the municipal upto provincial and even the regional levels.

 

MACEC and Island Innovation Academic Council Representative also participated during the declaration of Rights of Nature PH about Climate Change Emergency. Given the recent Mindoro oil spill In the center of the center of marine biodiversity in the Verde Island Passage which shares municipal waters with Marinduque, Romblon and Palawan.

 

The MACEC members headed to the Our Lady of Biglang Awa Shrine to hear a mass dedicated to the more than 25 years disaster. Meanwhile, Island Innovation Ambassador from Marinduque, Dr. Randy Nobleza gave a message for the occasion almost three decades ago. The Island Innovation Ambassador also read an excerpt from the poetry suit by a Marinduque native May Morales-Dolis, “Ayon kay Kid Talaba.”

 

According to the solidarity message of the island innovation academic council representative and concurrent ambassador, “Guided by circular, ecocentric, horizontal, likas-kaya and kapwa  mind and heartset, identifying today’s pressing challenges, coming up with alternatives has never been inspiring, relevant and timely. I don’t think we’d be able to cross the gap between now and what’s coming without declaring climate emergency now. there’s a sense of urgency, we’ve relied long enough from the nourishment of the earth, it’s time to return the favor so the earth can recover and revitalize anew.”

 

Next week, March 29 there would be a gathering about concrete actions about Rights of Nature and firming up the Marinduque’s Environment Code in coordination with Marinduque State College, Office of the Vice Governor and Provincial Environment and Natural Resource Office to be hosted at the Boac Cathedral social center.

 

Randy T. Nobleza

Island Innovation

Marinduque island

 

I’m Randy Nobleza from the heart-shaped island of Marinduque, the geodetic center of the Philippine archipelago. Marinduque is part of the Verde Island Passage threatened by the oil spill in Mindoro along with Palawan and Romblon. 27 years ago, the mine tailings left Boac River dead. Despite of this, the Diocese of Boac Social Action Commission along with the formation of Marinduque Council Environmental Concerns sought justice and gained a 50 year moratorium which closed down the operations of a transnational mining company. Fast forward, we are still coping with the ill effects of mining, health, economic, socio-cultural and environmental impacts. Given the pandemic, we are moving to the next normal with the ongoing litigation process of making accountable the Australian, Canadian and American extractive corporation. We continue to hope and pray, for the next 50 years Marinduque would be an exemplary case of grassroots mobilization, creative resistance and self-sustaining island for the whole archipelago with shared borders of the Pacific, Atlantic and Caribbean. Island Innovation Ambassador program enables islanders like me to connect with changemakers, creatives and innovators. Guided by circular, ecocentric, horizontal, likas-kaya and kapwa  mind and heartset, identifying today’s pressing challenges, coming up with alternatives has never been inspiring, relevant and timely. I don’t think we’d be able to cross the gap between now and what’s coming without declaring climate emergency now. there’s a sense of urgency, we’ve relied long enough from the nourishment of the earth, it’s time to return the favor so the earth can recover and revitalize anew. I’m randy from Island Innovation of the Philippine archipelago, please declare climate emergency now so we can take action right away to save our islands so it can recuperate and sustain us in the long run. Ipaglaban ang karapatang pangkalikasan, karapatang pang-isla at kapuluan!

The recently concluded Philippine Creative Industries Development Act (PCIDA) event honors and provide homage to Filipino creatives. Since the first Creative Industries Summit last year, the follow-up is nothing short of content and opportunities to the country’s creatives. The Department of Trade and Industry Undersecretary for Competitiveness and Innovation Dr. Rafaelita Aldaba gave the opening remarks.

 

The highlight of the two-day summit is the launch of the “Malikhaing Pinoy” Program  or Creative Philippines Program which the said department would spearhead and implement. The DTI Secretary Alfredo Pascual remarked, “Malikhaing Pinoy is our holistic approach to addressing the constraints and barriers of the creative industries. It is a flagship initiative well-informed by various sector-specific industry studies and roadmaps carried out by the DTI with support from our champions in Congress.”

 

There were several panels with speaker from the Philippines and abroad was convened to inspire and give inspiration, there were four sessions, two in the morning and another two in the afternoon, eight in total during the course of the March 7 and 8 Creative Industries Summit. The first day had panels on creative cities network from Cebu, Dundee and Baguio. Then the National Commission for Culture and the Arts shared about harnessing culture as source of creativity. The second day featured a panel on advancing technological applications, creativity and innovation. Session 6 is about pursuing opportunities for education and upskilling of creative talents. The second to the last session is on creative ecosystem of the region featuring speakers from the Philippines, Korea and Indonesia. The last panel ties up the theme, unifying creative agenda, elevating Filipino creativity with sharing of British Council, Development Academy of the Philippines among others to talk about strengthening structure, institutions and governance for the creatives.

 

Senator Loren Legarda and Senator Koko Pimentel graced the occasion along with Cong. Toff De Venezia with Sen. Imee Marcos and no less than the president of the Philippine Republic himself. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr joining virtually. Presidential Adviser on Creative Communications Secretary Paul Soriano emphasized belonging to the creatives himself various collaborative projects for Malikhaing Pinoy consistent and aligned with PCIDA and the mantra that the Future is Creative.

 

With Marinduque Council for Environmental Concerns (MACEC) about disaster contingency and risk management plan and enabling legislation (september 2011)

at Provincial Science and Technology Center about GRIND (Grassroots Innovation for Inclusive Development) bringing science and technology (S&T) closer to the margins

https://diyaryomilenyonews.com/2023/02/27/island-innovation-welcomes-ambassadors-during-the-first-meet-up/

https://www.dailyguardian.com.ph/island-innovation-welcomes-ambassadors-during-the-first-meet-up/

Two years ago, UGAT joined various sectors in calling for the cessation and revocation of the destructive Kaliwa Dam Project, pointing out its ecological, economic, and socio-cultural damage, particularly to the indigenous Dumagat and Remontado communities living in the Sierra Madre. Aside from voicing concerns specifically about the harms of Kailwa Dam, we took issue with an overall paradigm of development that favors infrastructure, resource-extractive  projects at the expense of the environment and the people.

 

Today, we lament that despite the numerous objections to this project on scientific, economic, environment, and human rights grounds, this project has been allowed to proceed, alongside other projects that follow the same misguided approach to development.

 

Underscoring what’s at stake in this project, members of the Dumagat and Remontado communities who are being directly affected by the Kaliwa Dam project, as well as their partners, are now marching to Malacañang to demonstrate their objections and to remonstrate against the loss of livelihood that they face as a consequence of this project.

 

Their cry must not go unheeded, neither by the government nor by our society.

 

To reiterate what we stated in our earlier statement, we do not oppose efforts to secure water for our cities and communities. However, we join the insistence of our indigenous communities  that this be done in a way that respects their rights and protects the environment. As they themselves eloquently put it in an open letter to President Marcos Jr:

 

Naiintindihan naming kailangang may mapagkukunan ng tubig-inumin ang 14 na milyong mga naninirahan sa Kamaynilaan. Wala pong problemang gamitin ang tubig ng Kaliwa River. Huwag lang pong sirain ang aming pamayanan, kabuhayan, sakahan, pangisdaan, kabundukan, sagradong lugar, at kultura. Huwag din pong ilagay sa panganib ang libu-libong pamilya sa ibaba, ang samu’t saring buhay sa kabundukan at ilog at ibaon ang bansa sa utang.

 

As anthropologists of the Filipino people, we reaffirm our solidarity with the indigenous Dumagat and Remontado communities and echo their call to discontinue and revoke the Kaliwa Dam Project.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Philippine Association for the Study of  Culture, History, and Religion (PASCHR), Inc.

SEC REG NO. CN 201317495

 

In collaboration with the

 

Catanduanes State University

 

Invites you to the 9^th PASCHR International Conference

 

on

 

“Narratives and Practices of meaning-making: histories, cultures and religions in the Philippines in their Indo-Pacific contexts”

May 18-20, 2023

At the Catanduanes State University

(Hybrid modality: onsite and online)

Virac, Catanduanes, Philippines

 

PASCHR is officially recognized as the Philippines’ national association of the International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR) which has affiliations with UNESCO. As such, it operates under the policies and principles of said parent body, which seeks to promote critical, analytical and cross‐cultural study of religion, past and present. The IAHR is committed to the highest standards of social science scholarship and is not a forum for confessional, apologetical, or other similar orientations.

The PASCHR broadly aims to contribute to the formulation of Filipino national identity through interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research and scholarship on the Philippines’ indigenous and folk traditions, as well as their colonial, postcolonial, and contemporary developments and links with Asia and beyond, from the perspectives of culture, history, and religion.

The Catanduanes State University (CatSU) is the premiere institution of higher learning in Catanduanes, an island-province in the Bicol region in the Philippines. Integral to its goal of excellence in instruction, research and extension is the aim of significantly contributing to the greater understanding of the human condition through research in the social sciences that highlights the local but in the context of the national and global. Catanduanes is a picturesque island paradise nestled on the eastern flank of the Bicol peninsula and is the official “Abaca Capital of the Philippines.”

 

 

CALL FOR PAPERS

 

In its 9^th International Conference of 2023, the Philippine Association of the Study of Culture, History and Religion or PASCHR continues to underscore the points of convergence of scholarships in history, culture and religion, this time in the purview of “meaning-making.”  The human enterprise then as now is one of a “making sense” of the lived and created reality, the dynamics of which the disciplines of the Humanities and Social Sciences have taken up as their subject of critical understanding.

 

In this current pluralist, post-modernist, post-truth world engendered and endangered by unabashed fakery (of news, of narratives, of truth), serious and critical scholarship on meaning-making offers the more plausible and fruitful alternative to the massive manufacture of counterfeit understanding. The meaning-making lens embraces both the big picture and the particularities of accounts up-close, but with more attention to the latter. There is now a moving away from grand narratives and a premium for the “small tradition” so as to take account of the full range of richness, diversity and complexity of the world.

 

The Philippines has long been characterized as the “marriage of the East and West.” But the Philippine experience is not about the unproblematic East-West mix-up. It is steeped in complexity. For example, its Western influences came in historically from its geographic East (Spain via Mexico, the United States), while it took Eastern cultural inputs in pre-colonial times from its Western side (China, India and indeed from as far as the Arab world).  On top of that, it assumes strong cultural and political affinities with the Southeast. In this year’s conference theme, this context is reckoned as “Indo-Pacific” in order to capture such a sprawl and complexity that has so shaped the making sense of Filipino-ness.

 

The 9^th International Conference of the PASCHR will accept paper presentations reflective of the whole gamut of the meaning-making enterprise of Filipino communities, distilled into a variety of narrative and practice strategies, such as but not limited to:

 

• Historical accounts, ethnographic descriptions, linguistic/literary studies that represent assertions and/or contestations of collective identities

 

• Accounts of patently or marginally religious narratives and practices (e.g the ritualist and ritual-like) that embody worldviews, ideologies, ontologies

 

NOTE:

• Papers may cover any of the historical periods namely the pre-colonial, colonial and contemporary, or their dynamic interfaces
• Contextualization within the Indo-Pacific sphere is preferred
• Presentations may be of completed data-based researches, works-in-progress, literature reviews, or of mainly analytical/theoretical expositions.
• Preference however will be for data-based studies, whether completed or a work-in-progress.
• Proposals for panel presentation are welcome
• Papers by graduate and undergraduate college students will be accepted

 

 

Submission of Abstracts:

 

1. The abstract is a direct and succinct description of the paper. It must include the broad objective/s addressed, the methodology and the findings and/or basic assertions. Please limit according to the following:

• A title of up to 12 words
• Up to five key words or phrases
• Main body of not more than 200 words
• Use of Arial 11 font

 

2. It must be accompanied by a short bionote of the proponent/s, not beyond 70 words each

 

3. Please send in MS Word as an attachment with the subject “2023PASCHR Conf” to paschr2014@gmail.com.

 

4. Paper presentors must be members of the PASCHR or the PASR (Philippine Association for the Study of Religion). Membership fee must be paid after acceptance note is received.

 

5. Important dates:

Deadline for submission of abstract:        March 31, 2023

Sending of acceptance note:                    April 5-10, 2023

Deadline for submission of full paper:      May 10, 2023

 

Registration and membership fees

 

1. On-site participants:

Registration fee for the conference:

         Professionals         PhP3,500. (with lunch, snacks, conference kit)

Graduate students

(Filipinos)               2,000. (with lunch, snacks, conference kit)

College students              500. (with snacks)

Foreigners                   US$80. (with lunch, snacks, conference 2 kit)

Foreign graduate

Students                 UD$70. (with lunch, snacks, conference kit)

 

2. Online participants:

Professionals              PhP2,500.

Graduate students

(Filipinos)               1,000.

College students                   500.

Foreigners                        US$60.

Foreign graduate

Students                UD$50.

 

3. Membership fees for PASCHR:

PhP1,000. for one year

PhP2,800. for two years

 

Payment must be deposited to:

Banco de Oro account name: Philippine Association for the Study of Culture, History & Religion, with account number: 0072-8003-5776

 

Once payment is made, please send scanned copy of receipt to paschr2014@gmail.com.

 

For more information, please visit PASCHR’s website at https://paschr.ph