PinoyBuilt — Stories of Filipino America

Filipino-American Diaspora • August 2026. Colonial Mentality Has a Score: The Filipino-American Scholars Who Turned Our Shame Into Evidence. colonial mentality, colonial mentality scale, EJR David, Leny Mendoza Strobel, Kevin Nadal, Yen Le Espiritu, Patricia Espiritu Halagao, Allyson Tintiangco-Cubales, decolonization, Filipino American psychology, kapwa, loob, ethnic studies, AB 101, heritage language loss, Pinayism, Pinoy Teach, Filipino American identity. Decolonization • August 2026 Colonial Mentality Has a Score: The Filipino-American Scholars Who Turned Our Shame Into Evidence Six researchers built the field that explains why a Fil-Am kid stops speaking Tagalog, why the skin-whitening aisle keeps growing, and why a bookcase in Marikina may have been the best decolonizing curriculum I ever had. Filipino-American decolonization has an academic literature — and most of us were never handed the syllabus. (Illustration: PinoyBuilt) In S...

Vallejo, California • August 2026. Your Mother's Tongue: A Letter to My Children, Who Understand More Than They Say. mother tongue Filipino American, kinagisnan meaning, kinagisnang wika, how to learn Filipino as a Fil-Am, second generation Filipino language loss, Tagalog vs Filipino difference, Bisaya Cebuano diaspora, Kapampangan language, Bikol Bicolano language, heritage language third generation, 1987 Constitution national language Filipino, regional languages Philippines, Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino, teaching kids Filipino in America, TFC The Filipino Channel, Taglish, OPM, raising bilingual Filipino kids, Vallejo Filipino community, Marikina, why Fil-Ams lose Tagalog. Learn Filipino • August 2026 Your Mother's Tongue: A Letter to My Children, Who Understand More Than They Say Learn Filipino so you can reach each other. Learn your mother's tongue so you can reach back. Here is the case for both — and the honest objection to the first....

Marikina, Philippines • July 2026. Thou Shalt Not Kill — Part I: The Question I Asked at Six. Isabella Gonzales Jordan, martial law Philippines 1972, Battle of Jolo 1974, Marist School Marikina, chosen people Deuteronomy, 1 Peter 2:9, Alhambra Decree 1492, Filipino Catholicism, decolonization, Moro conflict, Fil-Am identity. Thou Shalt Not Kill • Part I The Question I Asked at Six A 19-year-old private died in Jordan last week, and the reason she died changes depending on who is talking. Fifty-two years ago I sat in front of a black-and-white television in Marikina and learned that this is how it always works. Part I of an open-ended series  •  18 min read A Marikina living room, 1974. The television told one story. The bookcase down the street told another. Isabella Gonzales was nineteen years old. She was from Carrollton, Texas. She graduated from Hebron High School in the spring of 2025, and ...