2. From your reading of the article, what is the meaning of redefinition? Explain.

Redefinition is this article shows how the Spaniards changed the way of living of the
natives or the indios, they changed a lot of policies and traditions in the Philippines
by means of spreading their own culture and belief just like how they implement their
religion in the country. In this redefinition, the Spaniards implement the Reducción
policies which conceptualize the idea of remapping of Philippine settlement patterns
into cabeceras, poblaciónes, barangay and sitios. The main reason for this is to bring
all indios into Christian communities and for the convenience of administration of the
Spanish colony's population and it is a way for the Spanish Military to control more
easily the movements and actions of a large number of the Filipinos. Furthermore,
this was also made to enable Spain to collect taxes from the Christians since they
were forced to pay larger taxes than the natives or the ones who are not Christians.
Reducción also aimed to teach the Filipinos the basic principles of the Roman
Catholicism which became the strategy of the Spaniards to make the Filipinos follow
their rules or policies.

3. How did the two representatives of Spanish state in the Philippines contribute to the
redefinition of the colony? Explain.

The two representatives of the Spanish state in the Philippines are the Friar and the
Encomendero. These two were the most powerful during the Spanish Colonization in
the Philippines mainly because they have the authority to rule the archipelago. During
the Colonization of the Spaniards, the Encomienda System was built or introduced.
The roles of the encomenderos should ensure the safety of the natives, to encourage
the natives to convert into Christianity and lastly to introduce education, nonetheless,
most of the Spanish encomenderos committed abuses to the Filipinos such as
physically abusing them, collecting more tribute than that authorized by law, slaving
the people by forcing the Filipinos to work for them and etc., the encomenderos
became greedy and they wanted the dominate the archipelago to take advantage of its
resources and benefits and because of this improper use of power, the friars punished
some encomenderos that damaged the relationship between the two. These two give a
lot of contributions for they are the ones who lead and guide the archipelago by their
teachings and way of living.

4. What are the social changes imposed and recreated through Spanish colonization?
Explain.

There are many changes with regards to social aspect during the Spanish Colonization
in the Philippines and these are introduction to the western culture, mixing of the
Spanish and Native Filipino culture and a rise of a new dominant culture. Among all
the changes that happened during the Spanish Colonization, the most obvious change
is the conversion into Christianity since the Spaniards introduced us the concept of
religion which results to many changes for the way of living of some of the natives.
Even though it is somewhat similar to the beliefs of the natives because they also
 worship some spiritual beings who guides and protects them in their everyday lives
which is also a lot similar to the concept of Roman Catholicism but the real change
about this is that some of the converted Christians will have to pay for their
colonization since they have to contribute for the mass or pay whenever there is a
matrimony, baptism and etc., another change during the Spanish era, women are
becoming useful and they can already have a position or a role in the society unlike
during the pre-colonial period, the concept of becoming a woman is somehow useless
for them. Furthermore, there are new leaders for each barangay, and it was no longer
the datus, there were alcalde mayor and gobernadorcillo.

5. How did the Spanish colonization redefine the Philippine society? Distinguish your
answer between political and spiritual and explain thoroughly your answer.

The political and spiritual influence of the Spanish colonization is quite connected to
each other and it was indeed inseparable because the Spaniards use their spiritual
influence to get their political and economic intentions in the country. They use this
as a strategy to dominate the political structure in the Philippines so that they can
control and manage the economy of the archipelago, these two are connected mainly
because they wanted to take advantage of the country’s resources and benefits due to
economic reasons. The Philippines’ location is a good transshipment point for the
galleon trade and this trade contributes a lot for the economy of the country and this
can be very beneficial for the Spaniards which is practically the reason why they
wanted to lead the whole archipelago.

6. How did the redefinition contribute to the weakening of Philippine State? Explain.

Because of the redefinition, the Spaniards dominate the country, they are the ones
who lead, guide and make decisions for the archipelago even though the can’t
colonized the Mindanao, they are making strategies to rule the whole archipelago
which resulted to the weakening of the Philippine State. To cut it short, the Philippine
State has been neglected because the Spaniards were powerful, and they make their
religion as the policies and rules to make the Filipinos obey them. One example is the
galleon trade, since that Mexican viceroys controlled the galleons, Manila’s share of
this revenue was supposed to be remitted on the following galleon, but was
chronically late and incomplete which is a huge disadvantage for the Philippine State
government.

7. Connect the variables you have identified in your answer for question number 6 to the
CURRENT weak state of the Philippines. Give a logical analysis of this item.

I can connect or relate the colonization of the Spaniards to the current state of the
country, but to whom we are being colonized? We are being colonized by the greedy
and acquisitive politicians that we have in our generation today and only the
privileged people can be at the top, all in the higher position or those who are in the
position are the ones important in the society, they can have all the good benefits
 while the ones at the middle and the less privileged will suffer. Moreover, one thing
that I can relate to this is how other countries look down on us, Filipinos are being
criticized for what we are since there are many corrupt officials, poverty is the first
problem and until now we are being slaved by the rich countries just like what
happened to the colonization of the Spaniards, we are being slaved in our own
country.

8. What are the reasons for conquest and what are the consequences of conquest?

In order to rule the Philippines, the Spaniards spread their religion which is the
Roman Catholicism in Luzon and some parts of Visayas due to their goal of political
pacification in the country and since that the Spanish did not have much manpower
and only relied on a combination of local alliances and superior firepower,
inducements such as gifts, housing, medical treatment, protection from soldiers, and
lastly rituals and pageantry of Catholic practice are being offered by the datus. Their
main goal is really to escalate the number of Christians in the whole world and in fact
the Spain’s right to the Philippines had been granted by the pope on condition of
Christianizing its inhabitants which is a strategy to target some economic benefits
they are trying to obtain.