Talk:Sangley

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This is quite inaccurate. History books say that Sangley is the generic term for the Chinese immigrants during the Spanish era. Here's an article with regards to the term Sangley [[1]]

I corrected the stale hyperlink above and also the inaccuracies reported. I added a more thorough explanation of the terms used by the Spanish authorities to classify the inhabitants of the islands. It would be useful to compare those terms with those used in Latin America. What do you think? Anti beast (talk) 16:38, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Sangley? Never heard of this word. In Latin America, we use the word chino to describe someone from China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Philippines and other Asian countries. Mestizo de Sangley? Never heard of this weird term. Please see Mestizo. 75.62.104.9 (talk) 06:51, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Sangley literally means business in a Chinese dialect called Hokkien. Although the term mestizo de sangley literally translates to mixed-race business person, the Spaniards used the term to refer specifically to mixed-race people of Chinese descent living in Binondo, Manila during the Spanish Colonial Period. Anyway, the term mestizo is used differently in Latin America than in the Philippines. Here's a summary of the terms commonly used in Latin America: Anti beast (talk) 06:21, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Term	Description
Indio	indigenous person
Mestizo	mixed-race person of Spanish or European and Indio ancestry
Mulatto	mixed-race person of Spanish or European and African ancestry
Zambo	mixed-race person of African and Indio ancestry
Criollo	pure-blooded Spaniard born in the Americas
Chino	person of East Asian origin

Here in Venezuela, we use mestizo to refer to people with European and Indio blood. Hugo Chavez who is half-mestizo and half-zambo is waging a Bolivarian Revolution against the criollos or whites. Are there criollos and mestizos in the Philippines? 75.62.104.199 (talk) 04:00, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

There are several criollos or whites who are quite prominent in the Philippines, i.e., pure-blooded Spanish Filipinos such as the Ayala, Soriano and Ortigas families. However, unlike Latin America, most of the people who emigrated to the Philippines were neither Spanish nor European, they were Chinese immigrants. But the Spanish authorities didn't know what to call these people, so they used the word "sangley" which means business in the Chinese Hokkien dialect. Most of these Chinese immigrants intermarried with the indios and sired a new race called mestizo de sangley. Of course, mestizo de sangley does not exist in Latin America. Instead, the word chino is used to describe people of East Asian ancestry. Barrio Chino, for example, means China Town. I have friends from Peru who refer to Alberto Fujimori as chino because he is a Latin American of Japanese descent who speaks fluent Spanish. Anti beast (talk) 06:22, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Hugo Chavez is not popular with the criollos or whites who comprise the upper class in Venezuela. They make fun of his physical features such as his big lips and call him all sorts of names, for example, el indio putumayo, which is extremely derogatory in Venezuela. Being mostly indio with negro blood, Chavez calls himself the first Zambo President of Venezuela. By the way, Venezuela is famous for its beauty queens most of whom are criollos or white. Are the mestizos de sangley prominent in the Philippines? 75.62.104.199 (talk) 05:37, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Chavez who is a Zambo with African blood reminds me of Marcos who is an Ilocano with Sangley blood. Both are outsiders who went after the white establishment after taking power. However, unlike Latin America where most of the upper class are criollo or white, in the Philippines today, most of the upper and middle classes are mestizo de sangley. This is because many of the whites who settled the islands after 1850 left the country after WWII and during the Marcos regime. Not being white, the mestizo de sangley upper class have the wealth and power but not the status of the whites. The few criollos or whites left like the Zobel de Ayala family who are descended from Spanish Aristocracy enjoy the highest status in Philippine Society. Anti beast (talk) 12:14, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] True Sons of Spain?

How can the mestizos de sangley call themselves True Sons of Spain when they don't have Spanish blood? 58.69.97.194 (talk) 08:58, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, of course, the mestizos de sangley were never really considered True Sons of Spain; they merely styled themselves as such. Only the Spanish-born peninsulares and not even the criollos (native-born whites of pure-blooded Spanish ancestry) were considered True Sons of Spain; the former held the most important positions in the ecclesiastical, civil and military authorities governing the Spanish-ruled colonies in the Americas and in the Philippines. That's why the criollos led the wars of independence against Spain which liberated much of the Americas. In contrast, the self-styled illustrados, many of whom were mestizos de sangley including Jose Rizal, campaigned for the Philippines to be made a province of Spain, believing themselves to be True Sons of Spain. Based on the racial doctrine called limpieza de sangre or purity of Spanish blood, Jose Rizal would never have qualified to be a True Son of Spain. That's true even for the conversos, the Spanish-born Moors and Jews who had converted to Catholicism but was institutionally suspect of religious infidelity and were thus barred from settling in the Spanish-ruled colonies in the Americas and in the Philippines. The criollos, on the other hand, could maintain their limpieza de sangre provided they have less than one-eight indio ancestry. From this standpoint, Jose Rizal and his fellow mestizos de sangley do not even qualify as criollo or white, much less True Sons of Spain. Anti beast (talk) 14:47, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

If the illustrados are not criollos or whites, why did they call themselves Filipinos? 121.15.22.187 (talk) 13:17, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Even though most of the illustrados were not filipinos by ethnicity, they were defining themselves as Filipinos by nationality. From a legal standpoint, the juridical term filipino applied only to criollos or whites native-born in the island colony (also called insulares) as distinct from those born in the peninsula (also called peninsulares). As pure-blooded Spaniards from Spain, the peninsulares held all the high positions in the island colony to the detriment of the local-born insulares. That's why the Gomburza priests (two of whom were filipinos or native-born whites) sought equal treatment for those native-born in the island colony. The illustrados went one step further: they wanted legal equality for native-born Filipinos with the European-born peninsulares. To this end, they sought the incorporation of the island colony as a province of Spain with those native-born Filipinos treated as citizens of Spain. Anti beast (talk) 16:38, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

If the illustrados were anti-Spain, why they did seek Spanish Citizenship for Filipinos? 218.253.164.44 (talk) 17:15, 9 June 2008 (UTC)