ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a significant reflection on the Spanish approach to contemporary official representations of the Philippines. It examines the various exhibitions as sites where a range of identities are forged, based on Spanish perceptions. Filipino identities were constructed following an ambivalent colonial discourse, ranging from the representations of a mestizo identity which links Spain and the Philippines through ties of blood and kinship, to images of exoticism and otherness. Spaniards, on the contrary, were represented as explorers and evangelisers who left an important legacy for Filipinos. Spanish identity is, therefore, constructed and serving a contemporary function, that of Spain’s promotion in the Philippines as a leader. This is a feature of official Spanish discourse of contemporary Spain, which is linked to a vision (and revision) of a past imperial self in the Philippines. This aspect can be understood as a way for Spain to render intelligible a country that was relatively unknown and forgotten in the first decade of the twenty-first century.
