SCHOLARS, academicians, and cultural and community leaders will gather this summer at the Mariano Marcos State University (MMSU) as it will host the 2007 Nakem International Conference on May 22-25 at the university’s main campus in Batac, Ilocos Norte.  This year’s conference will run with the theme: “Panagpanaw ken Panagindeg – Exile and Settling in Ilokano and Amianan History and Culture”.

Rationale of the conference

The said conference aims to bring into focus the various critical practices of the Ilokanos and the people of Amianan and abroad and reflect on these critical practices under the prism of the nexus of global cultures.  Moreover, it intends to reflect on the urgent need to affirm minority cultural and linguistic rights in the face of the hegemonic positioning of dominant cultures, languages, and critical practices; and draw up a dynamic discourse on the need to articulate the silence in the narratives of struggle and survival of the Ilokanos and the people of Amianan.

According to Dr. Raymund Ll. Liongson, assistant professor at the Arts and Humanities Division of the University of Hawai’i (UH)-Leeward Community College, Nakem means mature thinking, critical consciousness, and sensitivity.  It connotes self-knowledge, social awareness, ethical standards, societal expectations, and communal responsibility.  It demands reflection and action.  It is both a state of being and a process of becoming.  “It spells out what makes us human and brings out the humane in us,” he explained.  And this, he said, is the core of Nakem’s vision that will be translated through studies on the power of culture, on the potential for language and literature to move people into action, and on the need for advocacy for the cultural, heritage, and linguistic rights of minorities.

Host and Venue

The Nakem Conference is under the auspices of the Department of Hawaiian and Indo-Pacific Languages and Literature’s Ilokano and Philippine Drama and Film Program (IPDFP) of the UH at Mānoa (UH-M) in Honolulu, Hawaii. It is a collaborative program with other higher learning institutions, organizations, and individuals in the United States, Philippines, and other countries.

It commenced in 2006 at the UH in Mānoa and was participated by hundreds of scholars, cultural workers, creative writers, academics, and civic and political leaders from the
State of Hawai’i, United States Mainland, Philippines, Australia, Japan, Canada, and New Zealand. 

This year’s conference venue was approved and scheduled by the joint technical panel of MMSU headed by President Miriam E. Pascua and UH-M’s IPDFP headed by Dr. Aurelio S. Agcaoili during the MMSU-UH Joint Administrators’ Conference held at UH in November 2006.  It can be recalled that MMSU has a standing Memorandum of Agreement with UH and the joint administrators’ conference was the initial step towards the implementation of the agreement.

The organizers believe that it is proper and fitting that the Nakem Conference will go back to its roots in consciousness, culture, and creative potential with “the Ilocos and Amianan as both territorial and psychic spaces”.  Its going back to the Philippines, they said, is a semiotic gesture demanded by the obligation to remembrance, memory, and memory-making and the power to instill in the cultures’ and communities’ “virtual and physical” to keep the creative collaborative anito alive.

Call for collaborators, partners, volunteers, and sponsors

Various organizations, academic institutions, individuals, and cultural leaders are invited to take part as collaborators, partners, volunteers, and/or sponsors in this historic conference as it is going to be the first time that it will be held in the Philippines after its inauguration in the United States.

Those interested to join as collaborators, partners, volunteers, and/or sponsors in their in their individual or organizational capacity can contact the respective chairs of the joint Philippines and United States panel:  for the Philippine panel:  Dr. Alegria T Visaya at atvisaya@yahoo.com; for United States panel:  Dr. Aurelio S. Agcaoili at aurelioa@hawaii.edu or at nakemconference@yahoo.com.  The Nakem website at philippinesonline.org/nakem can also be visited for postings and updates regarding the conference.

Conference costs

A fee of P2,000 will be collected from each participant at the start of the conference.  This will cover registration, conference kit, meals and snacks, and other incidentals.  The amount does not include lodging costs.  There are, however, lodging facilities inside and outside the campus that charge minimal fees.
Registration

Interested individuals and organizations can pre-register via philippinesonline.org/nakem.  They can also call Dr. Alegria T. Visaya at mobile number (0919) 502 4767 or e-mail her at her mentioned address.  Registration Committee chair, Dr. Ninfa S. Asia, can also be contacted at mobile number (0906) 443 3824 or e-mailed at ninfaasia@yahoo.com. Both can be reached also at landline number (077) 793 3507 loc. 134.