Sunday, May 22, 2016

UST Varsitarian Article re Cecilia Manguerra Brainard - #philippines


I just discovered an article about me in The Varsitarian, the official student publication of the University of Santo Tomas (UST).


The text of the article by Cedric Allen P. Sta. Cruz follows. Thank you for the writeup.

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Fil-Am Author Traces Inspiration to Childhood in Cebu
by Cedric Allen P. Sta. Cruz

“It was a time after the war, and when I looked back at it was magical. Maybe in a lot of ways my imagination was my companion,” Brainard said during her lecture last Feb. 9 at the Tanghalang
Teresita Quirino of the Benavides Building.
She said the culture of story-telling in Cebu helped cultivate the material she uses in her work, from stories of kapres in their jackfruit tree to tales of their Santo Nino wandering at night. 
“Within our household, there was a lot of story-telling going on. So here you are as a child listening to these fantastic stories. It was a lot of material really that kind of just sat in there,” she said.
Such themes continue to be the predominant motif in her writings, such as in the story “Woman With Horns” which was anthologized in Philippine Literatures: Texts, Themes and Approaches, a textbook for undergraduate students and co-authored by professors Augusto Antonio Aguila, John Jack Wigley and Joyce Arriola, chairwoman of the UST Department of Literature.
In her introduction of Brainard, Arriola noted how such stories move beyond the themes of womanhood and go on to discuss more complex subjects.
“Woman, Filipino, Filipino-American, exile, homeland, myth, folklore, native historiography, hybrid identities? these are only a few of the positionalities that one can summon in taking stock of her work,” Arriola said.
Cristina Pantoja-Hidalgo, director of the UST Center for Creative Writing and Literary Studies, said Brainard and other Filipino writers around the globe help elevate Filipino culture to an international setting.
“We, their sisters here in the Philippines, share in their triumphs, which have helped to make our history, our culture and our values more visible to the people of different creeds and of different races from all over the world,” Hidalgo said in her opening remarks.
Brainard has authored nine books, including When the Rainbow Goddess Wept, Magdalena, Vigan and Other Stories, Acapulco at Sunset and Other Stories, Philippine Woman in America, and Woman with Horns and Other Stories.
She has received the Filipinas Magazine Award and a California Magazine Arts Award.
The event was part of the International Writers and Scholars Series presented by the center, the UST Publishing House and the UST Department of Literature. 
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