What Can We Learn from ‘Filipino Time?’

“Filipino time” was the term handed down by Americans after they colonized the islands, referring to Filipino folks’ tendency to be late to scheduled events. (It should also be noted that many other countries have a similar stereotype, largely colonizer-given; Odell writes that “Filipino time might fruitfully be considered alongside other non-Western time designations, both in its original connotation of lateness or laziness and in its capacity to be reappropriated as something that resists Western time,” an idea we’ll sidle back up to later.)

The general consensus places the genesis of Filipino time with America’s colonial predecessors, the Spanish. Spanish elites would commonly arrive late, and this, apparently, embedded itself in Filipino culture. This piece in FilipiKnow relays the work of Dr. Augusto De Viana, who explained that the Spaniards’ “‘fashionable tardiness’ validated their worth, a ‘status symbol’ that made the latecomer the center of attention.” The speculation then goes that Filipinos, particularly those in the more powerful class, took on tardiness for similar reasons.

This origin story feels accurate, but perhaps only part of a deeper truth, and deeper questions. How did Filipinos conceive of time prior to colonization? What is Filipino time beyond Filipino time?

An article by Daniel de Guzman in the Aswang Project explores pre-colonial Filipino time, and finds a sense of time that is relational and integrated with the natural world. One significant measure of time is taon, which, paraphrasing Juan Francisco de San Antonio, “does not exactly pertain to a unit of time but refers to a collection of cosmological, environmental, agricultural and religious elements that come together to mark the beginning of a season.” Some different units of time connect to harvest, the moon, and menstrual cycles, the various undulations of actual life as it is materially lived, more immediately and intimately so before the colonial imposition of the clock.

This sense of indigenous time feels like an important missing piece to much of the discourse around Filipino time. If you dare search for public opinions about Filipino time on the Internet, you find folks, Filipino and otherwise, bemoaning the rudeness, laziness, and lost productivity brought on by Filipino time. The aforementioned FilipiKnow article says the nation needs a “serious character overhaul” if the country is going to compete economically. The argument seems to run along a binary of a tepid defense of Filipino time and a disciplining call to punctuality—rarely is there room to consider any other alternatives, including the alternatives in the Philippines’ indigenous past.

The criticisms of Filipino time in its current iteration feel harsh, but also valid. Having someone arrive late to something you’ve planned can feel viscerally bad, and the feeling that lateness is costing people their livelihoods is frightening. And perhaps those feelings may be a testament to just how ingrained and embodied clock-time is in many people, and an example of colonialism at work. Long after the colonizer leaves, internalized colonization remains, as the little voice in your head calling you and your people lazy, blaming your culture for your predicament instead of, say, global capitalism.

But rather than being mired in whether or not Filipino time is good or not, or meting out the exact level of influence that colonialism has had on its birth and continued dominance, I wonder if we may be able to view Filipino time for its possibility.

After all, this “new” Filipino time is, much like the old, pre-colonial version, relational. It relies not just on adherence to a number on a clock, but a shared understanding between the people involved that this number is something of a guideline. As Odell writes, “if, just for a moment, we leave behind historically and culturally specific notions of clock-based punctuality and time as money, then Filipino time actually doesn’t appear to be a problem at all. If you and everyone you know are on it, then it’s just time.”

“If, just for a moment, we leave behind historically and culturally specific notions of clock-based punctuality and time as money, then Filipino time actually doesn’t appear to be a problem at all. If you and everyone you know are on it, then it’s just time.”

The normalization of lateness allows for folks to move with the tide of their daily lives, whether that allows for getting carried away into a conversation, surrendering to traffic, moving at a slower pace, or just arriving when you want, for no reason at all. It is a small drift from the clock towards something more organic, and perhaps offers a small window into greater change.

The conversation around Filipino time brings to mind shades of Kathi Weeks’ discussion in The Problem with Work. Weeks, a feminist economist referenced in Saving Time, writes about the subtly revolutionary practice of daydreaming as first considered by philosopher Ernst Bloch. Weeks writes, “Daydreaming is often treated as an embarrassment, not only for the lack it represents a lapse in concentration, a waste of time, an interruption of productive activity, but for what it reveals of our immoderate desires to be and have more, an excess of social desire.” This criticism sounds similar to the criticisms of Filipino time, and so I wonder if there may be connections in the desire as well.

What social desires may reside in lateness that are waiting to be acknowledged and cultivated? There are, after all, so many wonderful reasons to be late. Lateness can allow one to arrive at a more enjoyable time for a social gathering, take a little detour, or just have a little rest. Perhaps it’s worth interrogating if and how these desires, despite all capital logic, persist.

The word taon is a root word for many Tagalog time words, including pagkakataon, meaning “opportunity,” and nagkataon, meaning “chance.” Perhaps that is the thru line from indigenous Filipino time to contemporary Filipino time. Even in small ways, by keeping time as something dynamic, interdependent, and between the living world, we may find windows open for something new to emerge, something unexpected.