Read, Juan, read today’s Inquirer Briefing

It can be argued that we are a nation of the written word. Whether it’s our lost literature from the precolonial world, or the epic poetry of Balagtas, the manifestos of the Propagandists and Katipuneros, or the novels of Rizal: our sense of nation was cr

Whether it’s our lost precolonial literature or the novels of national hero Jose Rizal, our sense of nation was created as much by the pen as by the sword. But where are we now as readers? Briefing includes program to encourage reading.

Baybayin

The native alphabet or syllabary used by early inhabitants of the Philippine archipelago is known as the

baybayin. The ancient Philippine system of writing is composed of 17 cursive characters which represent either a single consonant, vowel or syllable. Early literary forms such as songs, riddles, proverbs, short poems and portions of epic poems were written using the baybayin.

First books published in the PH

The first books marking the beginning of publishing in the Philippines, the “Doctrina Christiana” and the “Shih-lu,” were published in 1593. The Doctrina Christiana used the pre-Hispanic Tagalog alphabet and contains basic teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, while the Shih-lu is a philosophical book aimed to convince the Chinese to embrace the Christian faith and is written in classical Chinese manner.

Osias textbooks

Camilo Osias wrote the first readers/textbooks in English for Filipino elementary students. Osias’ “The Philippine Readers” also featured illustrations by National Artist Fernando Amorsolo. Osias, an esteemed Filipino educator and senator, laid the groundwork for youth education by promoting books as supplementary educational materials. Post-war literacy levels improved. Literacy in the Philippines was at 20 percent before World War I. In 1935, Filipinos took over education which had previously been headed by Americans. After Filipinos took charge of education, growth in literacy was explosive.

Inquirer Read-Along

Launched in May 2007, the Inquirer Read-Along team has conducted over 330 Read-Along sessions with more than 18,000 children in more than 50 cities nationwide. Close to 400 celebrities and professional storytellers have read over 240 locally published storybooks in the Read-Along, which aims to spread love for reading among children aged 7 to 12. The Read-Along has also conducted more than 10 special events: One simultaneous Read-Along session from Batanes to Tawi-tawi (2010), six festivals (2011-2016) and four Reading for Healing sessions (for survivors of “Ondoy,” “Sendong” and “Yolanda”).