ABSTRACT
Using the work of Dr. Leny Mendoza Strobel as a focal point, this chapter illuminates healing work transpiring in non-theatrical Filipinx spaces using the framework of ethnoautobiography, an interdisciplinary practice that seeks to engage with the wisdom of the past in order to heal lineages broken by settler colonialist capitalism. Originally developed for White students, ethnoautobiography involves mapping out lineage in pursuit of unlearning whiteness and reconstructing ancestral identity inside the collective. In Filipinx healing circles, the practice goes one step further to become a tool for uncovering the Indigenous underneath assimilated identities. Playwright Luz Lorenzana Twigg posits this practice may be useful toward two ends. Most immediately relevant is in bolstering the Filipinx-American theatre, which still struggles to find a collective voice and aesthetic rooted in decolonized practices. Second, this chapter supports the healing and excavation for individual playwrights of all ethnicities by leaning away from Sontag’s playwright-as-sociological-journalist and instead engaging playwrights in personal introspection, genealogical imagination, and spiritual release.
