Cebuano Studies Center

20/07/2026

The Vicente Sotto Lecture Series returns with a lecture from Dr. Zona Hildegarde S. Amper. Her talk, entitled “Primary Health Care in Cebu: History, Current Status, and Challenges,” is based on research co-authored with Marjury E. Dino, Jocelyn C. Cadampog, Delilah R. Labajo, Edith A. Labana, and Devra Rae O. Gelbolingo, and is funded by the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation, Inc.

The talk will be held online via Zoom on July 25, 2026, from 9:00 AM to 11:00 AM.

To participate in the lecture, please fill out the registration form found in the link below. Alternatively, you may scan the provided QR code. The Zoom meeting details will be sent to your email. Registration is free and open to the public.

Register here: https://forms.gle/nnCWbzwTPabFJuzPA
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ABSTRACT OF THE LECTURE:
This study examines the history and current status of primary health care (PHC) in Cebu using a mixed-methods approach combining archival research, oral histories, surveys, focus group discussions, key informant interviews, and field observation in Argao, Badian, Tabogon, Tabuelan, and Bantayan. Findings reveal that PHC developed from the limited, church- and charity-oriented health services of the Spanish colonial period into a more organized public health system under American rule. After independence, government programs expanded through Rural Health Units, maternal and child health services, immunization, and barangay- based care. Subsequent decentralization has transferred greater responsibility to local governments, while recent universal healthcare reforms have sought to improve integration and accessibility. Despite this historical progress, inequalities arising from uneven institutional development remain evident, particularly between central communities and geographically isolated and disadvantaged areas. Residents follow layered pathways of care involving home remedies, barangay health workers, health centers, RHUs, hospitals, private clinics, pharmacies, and traditional healing. Major barriers include distance, cost, personnel shortages, irregular schedules, weak infrastructure, and inadequate medicines and equipment. The study recommends stronger financing, improved frontline facilities, expanded staffing, transport and outreach support, reliable supplies, better local coordination, health education, and culturally sensitive engagement with traditional healing to achieve equitable and community-responsive PHC across Cebu.

28/06/2026

📢 REMINDER | Vicente Sotto Lecture Series 2026 No.6

Join us tomorrow, June 29, 2026 (10:00 AM to 11:30 AM, via Zoom) for “Re-exploring the Jesuit Education Apostolate for the Chinese in Cebu through the History of Sacred Heart School” with Mr. Rhoderick John Abellanosa.

Registration is free and open to the public.
Secure your slot here: https://forms.gle/PWWwufAVDXTEmyGV9
We look forward to seeing you online.

26/06/2026

The Vicente Sotto Lecture Series returns with a lecture from Mr. Rhoderick John S. Abellanosa. His talk, entitled “Re-exploring the Jesuit Education Apostolate for the Chinese in Cebu through the History of Sacred Heart School,” will take place on June 29, 2026, from 10:00AM-11:30AM (UTC+08:00) online via Zoom.

To participate in the lecture, please fill out the registration form found in the link below. Alternatively, you may scan the provided QR code. The Zoom meeting details will be sent to your email. Registration is free and open to the public.

Register here: https://forms.gle/PWWwufAVDXTEmyGV9
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ABSTRACT OF THE LECTURE:
In 2025, Sacred Heart School (now Ateneo de Cebu) celebrated its 70th anniversary. Although it opened as a Chinese Academy annexed to then Colegio de San Jose – Recoletos, it obtained its own legal status in 1955. Based on records, it was opened through the initiative of the Cebu Chinese Catholic Association of the Sacred Heart Parish. In its earliest years (1954-1956), the so-called Boys High and Girls High also formed one school under the Jesuits. Through the years, the institution, as may be the case with other academic institutions, has focused on its niche as a Basic Education School. There ‘seems’ to be a ‘forgetting’ of the ‘what was’ because of the desire for ‘what is’ and ‘what will be.’ This lecture is not about the current identity of the institution nor its brand and what it offers, but the place it occupies in Cebuano history. The first part of the lecture presents the history of Sacred Heart School (now Sacred Heart School – Ateneo de Cebu) based on available writings and materials about the institution. This segment highlights the first ten (10) years of the school, specifically its Chinese roots and its eventual and gradual shift to Filipinization. The second (and shorter) part presents some considerations for future research or academic investigation. The proposal is for interested academics of Cebuano history to look into points, angles, or even probable gaps in SHS’s history, and through which open a new and wider narrative where one may see convergences, intersections, and shared visions among groups, peoples, and institutions.

15/06/2026

For those who are interested and want to participate in this gathering that seeks to bridge cultural preservation and environmental stewardship, kindly register now!
Here is the link: https://forms.gle/ZH1ZC5XzDbwNZaBq6

Echoes of the Earth: Cultural Education for the Environment in the Visayas will be held on June 18–20, 2026, at Rigney Hall, University of San Carlos-Talamban Campus, Cebu City.

Sponsored by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA), the conference is spearheaded by InOtherWords Incorporated (IOW) in partnership with the USC Cebuano Studies Center (CSC), Mamugnaong Anak sa Dagang (MAD), and the USC Department of Communications, Linguistics, and Literature (DCLL).

This gathering convenes educators, researchers, cultural practitioners, and community leaders to address cultural renewal and environmental stewardship. It highlights ecological knowledge embedded in Visayan traditions and languages, promotes research-driven pedagogical innovation, and supports the creation of multilingual, public educational materials. Through research presentations and teaching demonstrations, the event strengthens collaboration among institutions and communities dedicated to culturally grounded environmental education.

Keynote speakers

The conference will feature Cebu City Mayor Nestor D. Archival as keynote speaker on June 18 and John Iremil E. Teodoro, a professor at De La Salle University, as keynote speaker on June 19.

Presenters outside Cebu

The event will gather presenters from academic institutions across the country. From outside Cebu, the conference will welcome Rogelio F. Garcia of Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Technology; Ellen L. Generalao of Tagum National Trade School; Radji A. Macatabon of the University of Southern Mindanao; Ruben Y. Nuevo of Calunangan National High School; Voltaire Q. Oyzon of Leyte Normal University; Jeson V. Viñas of Biliran Province State University; Salvador P. Bacio Jr. and Roberto G. Sagge Jr. of West Visayas State University; Kristoffer Von Pierre Peralta of the University of the Philippines; and John E. Barrios, Jianni Martina M. Provido, Daniel G. Herradura, Lorraine Elijah M. Odango and Ayeisha Shaffiz Pajotagana of UP High School in Iloilo.

Cebu-based delegation

The conference will feature a Cebu-based delegation. USC presenters are Mel Francis B. Amadora, Alyssa Kate A. Angalot, Bhon Glory Jayn P. Cabilete, Hazel Ann Cesa, Lamuel N. Daan, Jose Antonio C. Dasig Jr., Denis M. Judilla, Ron Jeric L. Loquias, Niño Augustine Loyola, Raphael Dean B. Polinar, Mary Louise F. Raboy, Hope Sabanpan-Yu, Joanne Marisse P. Tan and Romeo J. Toring Jr.

Cebu Normal University presenters are Elsie T. Alvarado, Lita A. Bacalla, Marben S. Bascon, Catalina M. Canasa, Dhimna Pacifico-Geganto, Rowena C. Largo, Michael M. Manugas and Kimberly May Oquiana.

The University of the Philippines Cebu will be represented by Therese G. Cuizon, Arvin John L. Lauresta, Marjorie G. Ma-ano and Crina Tañongon. Other Cebu-based presenters are Chezie D. Tormis and Joseph Louis D. Tormis of Talisay City College, Desiree L. Balota of National University Cebu and Ailene A. Ramos of Philippine Science High School-Central Visayas Campus.

By bringing together voices from universities, schools, cultural organizations and local communities, “Echoes of the Earth” affirms that environmental education is a cultural responsibility, not just a scientific or policy concern. The conference points to the role of Visayan languages, stories, oral histories and community practices in shaping ecological awareness and nurturing care for land, water, memory and place.

Registration details

Attendance is free. Interested participants are encouraged to register ahead to secure a certificate of participation through https://forms.gle/ZH1ZC5XzDbwNZaBq6.

For more information, visit the official page of InOtherWords Inc. For inquiries, contact the IOW Secretariat at [email protected] or call (032) 2300-100 loc. 308.

28/05/2026

Warmest congratulations to Dr. Hope Sabanpan-Yu on her reappointment as Director of the USC Cebuano Studies Center!

The Center and its wider community look forward to her continued leadership and dedication in preserving, enriching, and advancing Cebuano cultural heritage and identity.

18/05/2026

The Vicente Sotto Lecture Series returns with a lecture from Dr. Romeo J. Toring Jr. His talk, entitled “The Image of Cebu in the Early 20th Century according to the Henry Otley Beyer Ethnographic Collection,” will take place on May 22, 2026, from 10:00AM-11:30AM (UTC+08:00) online via Zoom.

To participate in the lecture, please fill out the registration form found in the link below. Alternatively, you may scan the provided QR code. The Zoom meeting details will be sent to your email. Registration is free and open to the public.

Register here: https://forms.gle/ZzMe6M5WxCyKBh6SA
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ABSTRACT OF THE LECTURE:
During the American Occupation of the Philippines, Henry Otley Beyer – the father of “Philippine anthropology” – has taught numerous scholars and students around the country who wrote ethnographic and archeological reports, forming the extensive Henry Otley Beyer Ethnographic Collection (HOBEC). This archival research examines the image of Cebu as portrayed in the HOBEC. This research aims to broaden socio-cultural understanding of Cebu during the early 20th century in the Philippines, organized into the following substantive sections: 1) historical and ethnographic landscape; 2) beliefs and superstitions; 3) customary laws, marriage and family traditions; 4) folklore, legends, and myths; and 5) agriculture, livelihood, and cultural expression. In addition, this talk recommends potential research topics and opportunities for scholars and cultural enthusiasts to explore based on the exposed themes and gaps unraveled in this systematic review of Cebu-related manuscripts in the HOBEC of the Philippine National Library digital archives.

23/04/2026

The Vicente Sotto Lecture Series returns with a lecture from Dr. Jose Eleazar “Jobers” R. Bersales. His talk, entitled “Entanglements and Detachments: Chinese Business, Identity and Politics in Early Post-War Cebu, 1945-65,” will take place on April 30, 2026, from 8:30AM-10:30AM (UTC+08:00) online via Zoom.

To participate in the lecture, please fill out the registration form found in the link below. Alternatively, you may scan the provided QR code. The Zoom meeting details will be sent to your email. Registration is free and open to the public.

Register here: https://forms.gle/x5cEfc1ub99bPscKA
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ABSTRACT OF THE LECTURE:
War possesses a ruthless way of leveling the playing field, leaving death, destruction, and economic ruin in its wake. Yet, within a year of it ending, the Chinese or ‘Insik’ business community in Cebu—the Philippines' second-largest city—staged a rapid recovery. This resilience was most visible in the city’s rapid reconstruction, which the local Chinese Chamber of Commerce proudly declared in 1950 as their most significant contribution yet. Within a decade of World War II, Cebu’s commercial district was transformed into an efficient hub of Chinese enterprise, a veritable ethnic enclave that survives to this day. Observers often wonder why Cebu never established a formal ‘Chinatown’ despite this distinctive feature in its economic landscape. Such questions are often playfully dismissed with the quip, “Because Cebu is one big Chinatown!” However, this joke belies a deeper history of local Cebuano resistance to ‘Insik’ business dominance. By tracing both this resistance and the Insik agency to address it, I will examine the political entanglements and attempts at detachment that marked the charged atmosphere of that period. Through an analysis of commercial directories, company histories, legal documents and newspaper reports, I aim to show the extent of postwar Insik business dominance, how this came about and why local resistance to it eventually gave way to the grudging but tacit acceptance that persists today. This has implications for understanding and contrasting this phenomenon with other cities and towns in the Philippines as well as in the rest of Southeast Asia.

24/03/2026

The Vicente Sotto Lecture Series returns with a lecture from Ms. Bejay V. Bolivar. Her talk, entitled “The Dark, the Deep, and the Damned: Women’s Secrets as L'écriture Féminine in Lilia Tio’s Fiction,” will take place on March 30, 2026, from 10:00AM-11:30AM (UTC+08:00) online via Zoom.

To participate in the lecture, please fill out the registration form found in the link below. Alternatively, you may scan the provided QR code. The Zoom meeting details will be sent to your email. Registration is free and open to the public.

Register here: https://forms.gle/aaAYRrTDkQJjNoLZ9
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ABSTRACT OF THE LECTURE:
In this paper, I examine representations of women’s secret transgressions in the works of Cebuano fictionist Lilia Tio as subtle forms of resistance against restrictive social gazes. My reading is grounded on Helene Cixous’s concept of L’écriture Féminine, Luce Irigaray’s critique of the phallocentric discourse, and theoretical formulations of the gaze to analyze how female characters negotiate silence and agency within a cultural community that grapples with prevalent patriarchal frameworks.
In the narratives surfaced from her collection Mga Awit Sa Atabay, the “secret”—encapsulated in the controlling metaphor of the atabay or the well—figures as a transgressive space where women evade the regulatory gaze of family, community, and institutional authority. Rather than merely signifying repression, secrecy in Tio’s fiction is recuperated as a narrative device that enables women characters to articulate counter-subjectivities and disrupt normative expectations surrounding femininity, sexuality, and gendered moral standards.
The reading positions acts commonly framed as transgressions, such as clandestine relationships and silent defiance, as symbolic resistance to surveillance and dominant structures of control. Tio participates in an emancipatory project of destabilizing the phallogocentric system by writing women’s bodies and sexuality into the deep, the dark, and the damned secretive spaces of sexuality and desire.
By situating Tio’s Cebuano fiction within broader feminist discourse, the paper highlights how regional literature participates in defining a culturally grounded female text, a Cebuano L’écriture Feminine.

26/02/2026

📢 REMINDER | Vicente Sotto Lecture Series 2026 No.2

Join us tomorrow, February 27, 2026 (2:00–3:30 PM, via Zoom) for “Reporting Religion: Facets of the Cebuano Experience” with Mr. Jason Abellaneda Baguia.

Registration is free and open to the public.
Secure your slot here: https://forms.gle/3TecexeT1UyDKDh1A

We look forward to seeing you online.

23/02/2026

The Vicente Sotto Lecture Series returns with a lecture from Mr. Jason Abellaneda Baguia. His talk, entitled “Reporting Religion: Facets of the Cebuano Experience,” will take place on February 27, 2026, from 2:00 PM-3:30 PM (UTC+08:00) online via Zoom.

To participate in the lecture, please fill out the registration form found in the link below. Alternatively, you may scan the provided QR code. The Zoom meeting details will be sent to your email. Registration is free and open to the public.

Register here: https://forms.gle/3TecexeT1UyDKDh1A
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ABSTRACT OF THE LECTURE:

A multicultural, multicreedal society with a Christian majority, Cebu is a locus of copious journalism on religion. In the late 20th and early 21st century, journalistic reporting on religion in the locale underwent consolidation as evinced by the formation of loose guilds of reporters who covered religious affairs out of nonsectarian community media organizations. These groups were latent in or overlapped with formal groupings of journalists covering news apart from religion. The subjects of religion or church beat reporting mainly were or had to do with the Catholic Church, particularly the Archdiocese of Cebu, a community that requires considerable journalistic entrepreneurship and specialization to cover and report. Scholarly reflection on religion or church beat reporting in Cebu is at a foundational stage. This paper attempts to draw in broad strokes, using a tentative auto-ethnography, a map of the beat and its main subjects in a time of swift development in the larger domains of communication, media, and religion. This is a preliminary mapping exercise with a view to affecting communicative praxis in both the media and faith communities.