Coastal Bodies and Childhood Memories: Exploring Baby Boomers' Gendered Memories of the Waterfront in Virac, Catanduanes

Abstract

This work examines childhood memories of baby boomers in the municipality of Virac, Catanduanes Island (Philippines) to examine gender dynamics in Virac’s seascapes. Through drawing together Donna Haraway’s (1988) notion of partial perspectives and Frigga Haug’s (1987) memory-work, this article shows the entanglement between the fragmented memories of boomers and the gendered waterfront of Virac. Employing unstructured interviews, this work presents the meanings and imaginations of the waterfront beyond being economic and industrial spaces. Three relevant discussions emerged from this interest: first, the boomers’ narratives demonstrate how coastal femininities and masculinities are constructed in relation to bodies; second, in contrast to the masculine dismissal of emotions and desires, women’s emotion-bound memories show potentials in navigating the symbolic meanings of bodies in relation to Virac’s waterfront spaces; and third, memories recognise the past as a plurality of subjective meanings, with the waterfront as a relational space. These observations suggest that the waterfront and its contours work together to create remembered narratives that animate and shape Virac’s waterscapes. This work is an invitation to provoke further thoughts and engage in alternative methods in making visible hidden gendered processes in hidden spaces.

Author Biography

Aireen Grace T. Andal, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia; Ural Federal University, Yekaterinburg, Russia

Aireen Grace T. Andal is a doctoral researcher under a double-PhD track in Social Sciences (Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia) and Social Philosophy (Ural Federal University, Yekaterinburg, Russia). Her research focuses on children’s geographies and children as co-creators of spatial and geographical knowledge. Majority of her engagements involve children’s urban spaces with emphasis on slum-dwelling communities in the global South. She is a scholar for and with children and their spaces. Her academic life is devoted to making children’s voices heard, their insights acknowledged, and their lives seen—matters that are hitherto often dismissed.

References


  • Alderman, D. H. (2010). Surrogation and the politics of remembering slavery in Savannah, Georgia. Journal of Historical Geography, 36(1), 90–101. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhg.2009.08.001

  • Azaryahu, M. (2005). The beach at the end of the world: Eilat in Israeli popular culture. Social and Cultural Geography, 6(1), 117–133. https://doi.org/10.1080/1464936052000335008

  • Baerenholdt, J., Haldrup, M., Larsen, J., & Urry, J. (2004). Performing tourist places. Ashgate Publishing.

  • Baños, M. (2021, January 8). Freight & supply ships at the 1945 Macajalar Bay landing. Metro Cagayan de Oro. https://www.metrocdo.com/2021/01/08/freight-supply-ships-at-the-1945-macajalar-bay-landing/

  • Blair, E. H., & Robertson, J. (Eds.). (1973). The Philippine Islands, 1493–1898. Mandaluyong, Manila: Cacho Hermanos. (Originally published 1906)

  • Bornat, J., & Diamond, H. (2007). Women’s history and oral history: Developments and debates. Women’s History Review, 16(1), 19–39. https://doi.org/10.1080/09612020601049652

  • Boyer, K. (2004). Feminist geography in the archive: Practice and method. In Women and Geography Study Group (Eds.), Geography and gender reconsidered (pp. 169–174). https://gfgrg.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Boyer.pdf

  • Bryant, L., & Livholts, M. (2015). Memory work and reflexive gendered bodies: Examining rural landscapes in the making. In B. Pini, B. Berit, & J. Little (Eds.), Feminisms and ruralities (pp. 181–194). Lexington.

  • Crawford, J. M., Kippax, S. C., Onyx, J., Gault, U., & Benton, P. (1992). Emotion and gender: Constructing meaning from memory. Sage.

  • Davidson, J., Bondi, L., & Smith, M. (Eds). (2005). Emotional geographies. Ashgate.

  • Davidson, J., & Milligan, C. (2004). Embodying emotion sensing space: Introducing emotional geographies. Social and Cultural Geography, 5(4), 523–532. https://doi.org/10.1080/1464936042000317677

  • Elborough, T. (2010). Wish you were here: England on sea. Sceptre.

  • Espino, A., Espino, I., Sanchís, N., Caro, P., Lopes, A. P., Jomalinis, E., León, M., & Lanza, M. (2012). Alternatives under construction in Latin America. Development, 55(3), 338–351. https://doi.org/10.1057/dev.2012.39

  • Farrar, P. (2001). Too painful to remember: Memory-work as a method to explore sensitive research topics. In J. Small & J. Onyx, (Eds.), Memory-work: A critique (Working paper Series 20/01). School of Management, University of Technology, Sydney.

  • Finlay, J., Franke, T., McKay, H., & Sims-Gould, J. (2015). Therapeutic landscapes and wellbeing in later life: Impacts of blue and green spaces for older adults. Health & Place, 34, 97–106. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.healthplace.2015.05.001

  • France, A., Roberts, S., & Wood, B. (2018). Youth, social class and privilege in the antipodes. Journal of Sociology, 54(3), 362–380. https://doi.org/10.1177/1440783318786580

  • Gayton, D. (1996). Landscapes of the interior: Re-explorations of nature and human spirit. New Society Publishers.

  • Gumba, L. (2015). Background research report on Northern Catanduanes Bicolano. SIL Electronic Survey Report 2015-002. https://www.sil.org/system/files/reapdata/86/28/87/86288732141261005400029828732756711060/silesr2015_002.pdf

  • Haraway, D. (1988). Situated knowledges: The science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies, 14(3), 575–599. https://doi.org/10.2307/3178066

  • Hayden, D. (1995). The power of place: Urban landscapes as public history. MIT Press.

  • Haug, F. (1987). Female sexualisation: A collective work of memory. Verso.

  • Haug, F. (1992). Beyond female masochism: Memory-work and politics. Verso.

  • Hein, C. (2016). Port cities and urban waterfronts: How localized planning ignores water as a connector. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Water, 3(3), 419–438. https://doi.org/10.1002/wat2.1141

  • Hetherington, K. (1997). In place of geometry: The materiality of place. In K. Hetherington & R. Munro (Eds.), Ideas of difference: Social spaces and the labour of division (pp. 183–199). Blackwell.

  • Hoelscher, S., & Alderman, D. H. (2004). Memory and place: Geographies of a critical relationship. Social and Cultural Geography, 5(3), 347–355. https://doi.org/10.1080/1464936042000252769

  • hooks, b. (2004). The will to change: Men, masculinity, and love. Washington Square Press.

  • Hoskins, G. (2007). Materialising memory at Angel Island immigration station, San Francisco. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 39(2), 437–455. https://doi.org/10.1068/a38174

  • Hughes, C., & Lury, C. (2013). Re-turning feminist methodologies: From a social to an ecological epistemology. Gender and Education, 25(6), 786–799. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2013.829910

  • Johnson, N. C. (2012). The contours of memory in post-conflict societies: Enacting public remembrance of the bomb in Omagh, Northern Ireland. Cultural Geographies, 19, 237–258. https://doi.org/10.1177/1474474011422026

  • Kumagai, K. (2020). Shifting multiple masculinities: alternative views from Japan and Papua New Guinea. In A. Datta, P. Hopkins, L. Johnston, E. Olson, & J. M. Silva (Eds.), Routledge handbook of gender and feminist geographies (pp. 48–60). Routledge.

  • Legg, S. (2007). Reviewing geographies of memory/forgetting. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 39(2), 456–466. https://doi.org/10.1068/a38170

  • Longhurst, R. (2001). Geography and gender: Looking back, looking forward. Progress in Human Geography, 25(1), 641–648. https://doi.org/10.1191/030913201682688995

  • Mallari, F. (1986). The maritime response, 1793–1818. Philippine Studies, 34(4), 462–492.

  • Mallari, F. (1989). Camarines towns: Defences against Moro pirates. Philippine Quarterly of Culture and Society, 17(1), 41–66.

  • McDowell, L. (1992). Doing gender: Feminists and research methods in human geography. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 17(4), 399–416. https://doi.org/10.2307/622707

  • McDowell, L. (1999). Gender, identity and place. Polity Press.

  • Measham, T. G. (2006). Learning about environments: The significance of primal landscapes. Environmental Management, 38(3), 426–434. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00267-005-0205-3

  • Mintz, M. (2019). Bikol dictionary. University of Hawaii Press. (Originally published 1971)

  • Morgan, G., & Nelligan, P. (2018). The creativity hoax: Precarious work and the gig economy. Anthem Press.

  • Neimeyer, G., & Metzler, A. (1994). Personal identity and autobiographical recall. In U. Neisser & R. Fivush (Eds.), The remembering self: Construction and accuracy in the self-narrative (Emory Symposia in Cognition) (pp. 105–135). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511752858.008

  • Non, D. M. (1993). Moro piracy during the Spanish period and its impact. Southeast Asian Studies, 30(4), 401–419. https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/tak/30/4/30_KJ00000131731/_pdf/-char/en

  • Nora, P. (1989). Between memory and history: Les lieux de memoire. Representations, 26, 7–25. https://eclass.uoa.gr/modules/document/file.php/ARCH230/PierreNora.pdf

  • Phillipson, C., Leach, R., Money, A., & Biggs, S. (2008). Social and cultural constructions of ageing: The case of the baby boomers. Sociological Research Online, 13(3), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.5153/sro.1695

  • Pini, B., Mayes, R., & Rodriguez Castro, L. (2020). Rurality and education. Routledge.

  • Preston-Whyte, R. (2004). The beach as a liminal space. In A. Lew, M. Hall, & A. Williams (Eds.), A companion for tourism (pp. 349–359). Blackwell.

  • Randall, W. (2013). The importance of being ironic: Narrative openness and personal resilience in later life. The Gerontologist, 53(1), 9–16. https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/gns048

  • Reinharz, S. (1992). Feminist methods in social research. Oxford University Press.

  • Roces, A. R. (1980). Fiesta. Philippines: Vera-Reyes.

  • San Antonio, J. F. D. (1977). The Philippine chronicles of Fray San Antonio (D. Pedro Picornell, Trans.). Casalinda and Historical Conservation Society.

  • Schacter, D. L. (1996). Searching for memory. Basic Book.

  • Shotter, J. (1984). Social accountability and selfhood. Basil Blackwell.

  • Smith, M., Davidson, J., Cameron, L., & Bondi, L. (Eds.). (2009). Emotion, place and culture. Ashgate.

  • St. Pierre, E. A., & Pillow, W. S. (2000). Working the ruins: Feminist poststructural theory and methods in education. Routledge.

  • Stanley, L., & Wise, S. (1983). Breaking out: Feminist consciousness and feminist research. Routledge.

  • Stephens, J. (2010). Our remembered selves: Oral history and feminist memory. Oral History, 38(1), 8–90. https://vuir.vu.edu.au/id/eprint/15542

  • Tarrant, A. (2020) Contexts of “caring masculinities”: The gendered and intergenerational geographies of men’s care responsibilities in later life. In A. Datta, P. Hopkins, L. Johnston, E. Olson, & J. M. Silva (Eds.), Routledge handbook of gender and feminist geographies (pp. 347–356). Routledge.

  • The trucks and the completion of the South Road sank the passenger-cargo ships to Bicol. (2016, November 8). Philippines Ship Spotters’ Society. https://psssonline.wordpress.com/2016/11/08/the-trucks-and-the-completion-of-the-south-road-sank-the-passenger-cargo-ships-to-bicol/

  • Thien, D. (2005). After or beyond feeling? A consideration of affect and emotion in geography. Area, 37, 450–456. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4762.2005.00643a.x

  • Warren, J. (2007). A tale of two centuries: The globalization of maritime raiding and piracy in Southeast Asia at the end of the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. In P. Boomgaard (Ed.), A world of water: Rain, rivers and seas in Southeast Asian histories (pp. 123–152). Leiden: KItlV Press. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004254015_006

Published
2022-07-11
How to Cite
Andal, A. (2022). Coastal Bodies and Childhood Memories: Exploring Baby Boomers' Gendered Memories of the Waterfront in Virac, Catanduanes. Changing Societies & Personalities, 6(2), 296–314. doi:10.15826/csp.2022.6.2.176
Section
Articles