Decolonizing the Filipino Psyche: Impetus for the Development of Psychology in the Philippines

Abstract

The Republic of the Philippines comprises 7,107 islands located on the western edge of the Pacific Ocean, east of Vietnam, south of Taiwan and north of Sabah. There are approximately fifty million multi-ethnic and multilingual Filipinos who are primarily Malayo-Polynesian. From the point of view of tourist promotion, the Philippines is the "third largest English speaking country in the world." The historian Agoncillo explains: Like the Philippine Independent Church, the Iglesia is by the masses. The Catholics form a majority in the Philippine islands of Luzon and Visayas. Islam is dominant in the Southern Philippines as it is dominant in neighbouring Malaysia and Indonesia. Philippine colonial education fosters the belief that scientific psychology in the country is an American creation, a process which supposedly started soon after Commodore George Dewey won the mock battle of Manila Bay. The early influence of American education and the colonial culture on Philippine psychology took concrete form in the person of Agustin Alonzo.

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