Alay dangal, “to offer dignity” as an alternative to shame

March 20, 2013 at 9:50 am · Filed under consciousness, cultural, healing, Philippines and tagged: dangal, existential crisis, Filipino culture, hiya, honor, shame, Tagalog

I’m in a cultural bind. Namely, I was born in America, raised by Filipino parents to be of both worlds (Fil-Am), went through the public school system, and don’t speak my parents’ native language. What’s the problem here? There are values I have, cultural ways, for which I have no words for. At least, not in my native tongue, which is English.

Of course, one’s value system is pretty much unconscious until it gets challenged and you have to defend yourself in some kind of struggle that you fail to win. Because you can’t explain yourself and a cultural way that sits at your core, to someone who has absolutely no experience nor context for it. A much greater problem than the cliche “East meets West”.

So I happened upon these two articles:

http://reyadel.wordpress.com/2009/09/02/the-filipino-hiya/ ~ counters the notion that “hiya” translates to “shame,” therefore implying that Filipino culture was ever simply shame-based; and,

http://mettacenter.org/definitions/gloss-concepts/alay-dangal/ ~ provides a definition and example of how the honoring of self and others, rather than shame, is what motivates empathic action.

I don’t speak my parents’ native language very well, nor the national language of the PI (that is, Tagalog). So I have always been at a loss for words for what is simply so natural for me to do: to protect the honor of others, and in that way, also honor myself.

The notion that we can be “comfortable in one’s own skin” is complex for me, because this nation (U.S.) allows its people to try on so many different skins. A blessing and curse. I’m a chameleon. Time to shed a skin and be born anew.

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