Filipinos: Asians or Pacific Islanders?
Would you believe that in times such as the one that we are in right now that there are still arguments regarding Filipinos being labeled as Asians or as Pacific Islanders? I’ve never really heard about the term Pacific Islander, until I joined MySpace in 2004. That was when I first started wondering.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’ve never really doubted my being Asian. I just never really knew what being a Pacific Islander is all about. If you look at it in a nonsensical way, a Filipino might think that he/she is a Pacific Islander, since the Philippines is located basically just around the Pacific Ocean and the it’s composed of islands. Therefore, Filipinos are dubbed as Pacific Islanders.
Simple, right? Yup, simple for the simple-minded. Unless you’ve listened to History class or even read about it. You would know that there are 7 continents in the world. Asia, North America, South America, Antarctica, Africa, Europe, and Australia. The Philippines is part of Asia, therefore Filipinos are Asian.
If you think about it deeper, what about the Pacific Islanders? Where do they belong? If you take a look at a World Map, and of course read up more, you would find out that those who are classified under being a Pacific Islander are those who live/were born/raised in the 20,000 to 30,000 islands found on the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Islands are grouped into 3 divisions, namely Micronesia, Melanesia and Polynesia. Although the Philippines may be within the boundaries of the Pacific Ocean, it was never considered to be part of Oceania, or the Pacific Islands.
In the US, a lot of Filipinos consider themselves to be Pacific Islanders because, well, to a lot of them, it just sounds cool to be a Pacific Islander. In the Philippines, you wouldn’t even think of being a Pacific Islander, because you probably haven’t even heard of the term. 
Anyway, I’m a firm believer that Filipinos are Asian. But what do you think? 
ate will…i consider myself asian but most filipinos act as pacific islanders why? because they don’t act asian..how to be asian? be a filipino…be proud of your skin (nganu mag glutha? isn’t that weird), of your country’s natural resources (Most of us want to go and tour/migrate abroad – we are tourists in our own land), Help other filipinos (This is where our crab mentality comes in…we must change this) – how do we expect our country if we don’t help each other, but rather doing our own thing and not helping other filipinos? How can we call ourselves filipino if we don’t even care where we came from and always patronize and be starstrcuk with everything foreign? Those are just a few reasons why most filipinos are pacific islanders…
Hmm, it’s just that a lot of Filipinos nowadays want to be something that they are not. There’s nothing wrong with being Filipino, but then again, it’s the Western culture’s influence that’s gotten a lot of us this way.
I would still prefer Asian… because soon we’ll became dominant in this entire planet. High-tech paminawon lols. Pacific Islanders, it’s like hearing people living in a remote islands where technology means aren’t yet well developed??? Because technology in Asia means business….
When I search it on Wiki, contrary to some people ideas, Philippines is not part of the Pacific Islanders. I’m not sure thought if that is a reliable source of info.
We are Asians! We brought civilization to the world. I mean Asians, not just Filipinos. But we are proudly Asians!
hmm… 1st time I heard this.
ahehheh! dOnt have Much iDea about it. ill Just stiCk oF being Asian! aha!
In the first place what the h*ll is pacific islanders…? and would it make an image of degradation to us Filipino. I would say no! Simply because, adapting change in oneself or culture i may say is never the reason of changing the culture itself. Adapting is totally different to changing. Never the less if you despise your own culture (which unknowingly despising yourself).
ambot na basta ako Pinoy-chinese
ako, i am a cebuano, filipino, asian, pacific islander, citizen of the world, earthling or a universal creature. cebu, an island in the pacific. sound’s cool di ba? a marketing ploy in the past that made foreigners think that cebu is not part of the philippines, but a paradise somewhere in the pacific.
everyone is makin a good point, myself i see the phillipines being a island in the pacific, people can say filipinos are asian but it is clearly a island on a map, it may not be a part of the main group of islands but it still a island, so to me i would say im a filipino(pacific) islander, nothin against asians but i cant stand being called asian it feels degrading!
@Brian
I guess in other parts of the world, a lot of Asian people will feel bad being called Asian, but nonetheless, being Asian does not mean you’re below those who were born with Caucasian ancestry.
In the past, those with Caucasian ancestry may have been deemed as superior among those who had Asian/African or any other race, but that was just physically. If people would read up on recent studies pertaining to the intelligence of those in the Americas and in Asia, majority of the Asian people studied have been discovered as being more intelligent than the others.
I don’t believe that being Asian means that we are not Pacific Islanders. We are all austronesian. Our languages are more similar to the Pacific Islanders. Mata in tonga means eye as does ours as Lima means five. I do think the western definitions of us in geography does a diservice to our diversity. We have bloodlines that are Micronesian and ancestors who were also have cultural ties to India. I say to the Pinoy who says he’s Asian, I agree. I also say to the Pinoy who identifies as Pacific Islander, I too agree. Personally I believe that we can be both. I do believe that we are both. The colonial mentality still seems to impact our spirits as a diverse but still pinoy people. Let’s embrace our folk traditions and lore, cut from the same fabric of our other brother islanders, and the reverence and honor of asia. As a mixed malay people we have a great deal to be proud of. Personally I check all that apply if filipino is not specified.
I am a filipino and I also consider myself pacific islander. For the obvious reason, the Philippines consists of 7000 islands. We are not part of mainland China folks and our tagalog language has no similairty to the oriental languages. Also, after doing extensive research online, I found out that our ancestors, the AETAS are the same ancestors as the hawaiians. If you examine the hawaiian language and tagalog language carefully, you will see a repetition or emphasis on their word/usage. We have similar ancestors/descendants. The other oriental nations don’t even consider filipinos as being asians folks. Check out the asian american magazines ou there. They would include chinese/japanese/koreans. Filipinos are not included in there at all. If the filipinos from the philippines consider themselves as asians, its understandable why. Its because they don’t know who they really are. However, since the term “pacific islander” came to existence here in the states, many of us reexamined ourselves and concluded that we are more islanders rather than oriental. I am filipino. I am from an nation that consists of 7000 islands. I consider myself islander. When I speak tagalog, I do not hear an oriental language. All this stuff about geography is bogus. People need to examine their native language and our native language is closer to the hawaiians. We are NOT oriental people.
Not all Asians are Chinese, Japanese, or Korean. What about Russians (Eastern)? Indians? Thais? Persians? Et cetera? Does the Russian language sound anything like the Chinese language? Does the Arabic language sound anything like the Vietnamese language? Asia is a very diverse continent. I consider myself to be Asian (half) because I am Filipino (half), but if you wish to consider yourself to be a Pacific Islander, I have absolutely nothing against that. I just wanted to make that point clear.
I need to make a correction to my comment above. Instead of aetas, I meant to say Austronesian. The filipinos, indonesian, hawaiians, & other paicific islander nations are descendants of the Austronesian. I agree with a previous reviewer above that our ancestors are the austronesians, same as the polynesian. Do a research on austronesians and compare thetagalog language with other pacific islander nations….the number 5 & 8 is the same in tagalog & hawaiian which is “lima & walu”. It was the earlier explorers who made a mistake because they did not know then the austornesian. the phillippines has so many indigenous people in the islands. We are descendants of them. Its just that we also got a lot of immigrants from China & Spain which lightened SOME of our skin color.s But we are islanders. Although we may have borrowed words in our language, our tagalog language is the key in defining who we really are. The explorers or geographers out there made a mistake in defining the correct boundaries of their continents. There really should be an austronesian area. A lot of people used to think the world was flat until they were proven wrong. People who deny their islander tribal history just want to insists that they are chinese. They prefer that they be typecasted as being lighter skin rather than appreciating their darker brown skin. Yes we got a lot of immigrants from other asian nations but it doesn’t mean we are orientals folks. Our tagalog language has no similarity with them. We speak an Austornesian dialect.
@Jessie
I agree with you, reviewing your comments, I do realize that you have very good points there, mix history with some in depth research and also some very good common sense and one can come up with some good enough logical explanation. I agree with you about the dialect being Austronesian as well and it is definitely true that the Filipino language does not even sound anything Oriental.
If the people of the past have made a mistake about the world being flat, there’s also a big chance that even the modern people, like you said have made a mistake in defining the continent boundaries.
Therefore Filipinos were deemed as Asians because of the continent boundaries and not because of the heritage itself.
But I don’t think the Tagalog dialect is the basis in this argument. I don’t remember what the original Filipino ancestors’ dialect is, but it definitely was not Tagalog.
I wish I weren’t lazy enough to do more research
The central Philippine languages including both Tagalog (Filipino) and Cebuano (Bisaya) are rooted in old Malay. Our languages has long evolve via colonization. There is validity to the original post, our languages are rooted in Austronesian base. We do linguistically have more in common with the Pacific. So do we culturally and our history and tradition. We also are the same blood as the Cham of Vietnam before they list their homeland, Malaysia and Indonesia. It is a point that their Asian identities are never challenged. Also so much if Polynesia is now inclusive of Chinese and Indians, and the 1/4 blood islander who is 3/4 Asian will proudly tout his Uslander status. Being Asian and Pacific Islander is not mutually exclusive.
Asian is a census designated term that applies to anyone who comes from the greater East(China, Japan, Koreas) and Southeast Asian(Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos) region of the continent of Asia. Pacific Islander is also the same, simply a Census designated term, but it is restricted to anyone who comes from greater Oceania not including Australia.
Under this strict definition, Filipinos are Asians.
There are two justifications for saying otherwise. Linguistically, culturally and genetically, most Filipinos(and Indonesians and Malaysian malays) are more closely related to the Oceanic Pacific Islanders.
It is believed by contemporary anthropologists that Austronesian speakers from Taiwan came to the Philippines and spread to greater archepleagic Southeast Asia to the west and to many of the Pacific islands to the east.
The other justification is simple geography: The Philippines is a group of island just on the edge of the Pacific Ocean.
Either case is wrong, however, if you go by the official US Census designation of these population groups.
I’m not gonna comment on why some Filipinos want to claim otherwise…
@jessie
Jessie, there are other languages out there in the Philippines other than Tagalog. how can you base part of your argument that we shouldnt consider ourselves asian because other asians dont consider us asian? you must have been talking to alot of close minded asians. Geographically, the Japanese, Chinese, Koreans consider themselves East Asian. We are South East Asian without a doubt. I lived in both the Philippines and in America, and I can tell you with 1st hand experience, that the reason other asians dont consider us asians here in the US is because there is a racial undertone to it. They dont want to be associated with people with darker skin. However, if you look back at the history you will see that we were once VERY closely tied with other asian nations and our old writing system (refer to the laguna copperplate) was somewhat similar to Indian and Thai to an extent. Yes we do share Austronesian features with the Pacific islanders, but with centuries of trade and migration with Malays,Chinese, Japanese, and Western nations, we can no longer identify with them. We are part of ASEAN now. A filipino has more in common with a Cambodian or Thai than with someone from Tonga.
Asians are yelllow filopinos are black, I don’t wana be asian don’t look shouldn’t have to say im asian because that’s sad, im a australian filipino
I’m 100 percent filipino and i say we are not asians
I think we are more of ASIAN…and because of that..MAGATATAGALOG AKO…sabihin na ting nasa Pacific tayo banda…eh ano ngayon???kung iisipin magkakamukha nga tayong mga pilipino sa mga thais, malaysians, at indonesians eh…
We Filipinos belong to the Pacific area…but I would prefer of being an Asian…
I do understand when people say we are Malay like Malaysians and Indonesians, our sibling nations. So we are Asian, like our other brothers who lost their homeland, the Cham people of Vietnam. Yes we emerged from the same trunk of the family tree. Yes we are as Asian as is India, China and Japan. However, like in Indonesia we are unique that we too are Melanesian and Micronesian. These people are if our original ancestors who settled while others continued to migrate to the great beyond of the Pacific. I still hold that we are both Asian and Pacific Islander. Guam was once a part of our domain and Pinoy influence is pronounced. Indonesia and the Philippines are the launching islands into the Pacific and our cultural and ethnic ties can be seen in our languages and traditions, our dances and our ancestral beliefs. I say we are both, and are free to designate our selves as either or both.
Filipinos are Asian.
1. The Philippines is a member of the Association of South East Asian Nations.
2. We also participate in the South East Asian games.
Need more reason?
to each there own! filipinos and filipinas will fall either way u are what u wanna be islander or asian, either way you decide what u are and just stick with what u wanna be! Thats what i do, everybody wants to be different so this will never end! i claim islander but im not gonna argue with anybody who says asian its all on opinions!
Filipinos are ‘Filipinos’ we are a motley of cultures and languages – It’s what separates us from the usual ‘Asian’ suspects.
The biggest factor that makes us unique is that Pinoys can SING and DANCE!!!!
Have ever seen the Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Thais, etc.
sing and dance – yeah it’s a joke cus our people got moves!!
Be proud of our mixed heritage.