The Star-Entangled Banner: One Hundred Years of America in the Philippines

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"The history of U.S. imperialism, so often advanced under the banner of freedom and democracy, is one fraught with irony and contradiction, and Delmendo traces with understatement and shrewd analysis the distortions and historical amnesia that has been required to conceal the colonial ambitions that underlay the conquest of the Phillipines."-David Lloyd, co-editor of The Politics of Culture in the Shadow of Capital

"This is a tightly argued and sobering work. It displays the power of the interdisciplinary approach to history, while demonstrating how the effects of U.S. empire in the Philippines continue to resonate in U.S. foreign policy in the post Cold War era."-Enrique de la Cruz, California State University, Northridge

During a ceremony held in 1996 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of formal Philippine independence, the U.S. flag was being lowered while the Philippine flag was being raised, and the two became entangled. In The Star-Entangled Banner, Sharon Delmendo demonstrates that this incident is indicative of the longstanding problematic relationship between the two countries. When faced with a national crisis or a compelling need to reestablish its autonomy, each nation paradoxically turns to its history with the other to define its place in the world.

Each chapter of the book examines a separate issue in this linked history: the influence of Buffalo Bill's show on the proto-nationalism of Jose? Rizal, who is often described as the "First Filipino"; the portrayal of the Philippines in an early colonial era American children's book; Back to Bataan, a World War II movie starring John Wayne; a contemporary novel by F. Sionil Jose?; and the U.S. military's retentionof the Balangiga Bells, which were taken as war booty during the Philippine-American War. Ultimately, Delmendo demonstrates how the effects of U.S. imperialism in the Philippines continue to resonate in U.S. foreign policy in the post Cold War era and the war on terrorism.