Biala, Christine Joyce G.

PI 100

08 March 2016

Slavery in Pre-Hispanic and Hispanized Philippines

How is slavery in the 16th century Philippines different from European slavery? Do you
see similar conditions still occurring in the 21st century Philippines?

My father used to tell me not to

get myself involved with any debt, which
is pretty inevitable during desperate
times and are usually micro-scale
liabilities only requiring tete-a-tete
financial settlement of obligations with
friends, which is not a big deal at
present. If I happened to be indebted
within the sixteenth-century context, I
might have become an oripun by now.
16th century Philippine societies were
divided into social classes as previously
discussed with oripun and alipin as the
third class. Aside from the unfortunate
birthright and debt bondage, known for
rendering servitude, should they be
considered slaves?
While primary education easily
associates alipin with slavery, it wasnt
necessarily the case. Slavery involves
declaration of labor force as property,
which were owned, bought and sold,
whose productivity wasnt compensated.
In the Philippine context during the 16 th
century, the third class were usually in
the condition of servitude due to debt
bondage, which means their servitude
was
temporary
and
included
remuneration. Meanwhile, those who
were assigned as such according to
birthright may be treated as one of the
masters own children and may be freed.
16th century European slaves were
unable to withdraw unilaterally from the
arrangement, thus, their servitude were
predetermined to a sole purpose and
were non-transferable, such as serfdom
whose slaves were bound to the soil.
Oripun and alipin were completely
different, as they may be freed from
their state of servitude and not bound to
just one master.

Slavery in both geographical

contexts gained labor workforce through
capture, purchase and birthright. In
contrast
to
various
concepts
of
sixteenth-century slavery, in spite of
aiming for eradication, contemporary
slavery is prevalent, especially in the
form of human trafficking, for the
purposes of personal slavery, forced
labor, forced marriage, extraction of
tissues and organs, surrogacy, etc. an
abusive relationship can also lead the
inferior partner to be enslaved by his or
her other half through domestication and
sexual slavery.
A population increase is an asset
of a socioeconomic group as manpower
also increases. Sociopolitical ideologies
of different time and eras were crafted
with social classes with the provision of a
service class with naturally subconscious
role integration and performance. Oripun
and alipin of the 16th century were the
commoners of the societies within their
respective language areas, which I
personally dubbed as servitude class,
whose servitude were to settle personal
liabilities. Also, it should be noted that
like the timawas, transfer of properties of
oripun and alipin were determined by
the datus. Among the contemporary
Filipinos,
the
masses
are
the
commoners, in which their servitude is
more of a gain of short-term assets
rather than settling liabilities. In addition,
I also personally dubbed them as
servitude class as they involve
themselves in bondages of contractual
employment with predetermined, or
worse, graveyard time slots. Servitude of
commoners is not as easy as having to
wash dishes when a person is left with a

very expensive restaurant bill. Like the

datus, the ruling class has a way of
taking unconsented authority over the
properties of the commoners. One is
when
they
exploit
the
natural
environment of communities, in which
the disruption of the ecosystems
incurred losses of livelihood and assets.
Another is when huge corporations
demand groups of dwellers to move out
of their houses as the land will be

cleared and developed. The depletion of

properties lead commoners to take
dreaded contractual jobs and be
exploited with less compensation sans
benefits, not in the condition of
reclaiming their properties, but for
survival in their daily lives. With this
condition, commoners have become
enslaved by the socioeconomic state
disrupted by the ruling class.