My friend, Joseph Lariosa, wrote an interesting piece a couple of weeks ago. At the Philippine Independence Day celebrations in Daly Center in Chicago last June 12, he said, he saw neither interest nor attendance from the Filipino community. Especially noticeable was the absence of the young. The attendees were mostly of the older generation. As were the performers. “Performers of such Philippine folk dances as Singkil and Kapa Malong Malong were mostly young at heart. I did not see any young performers.”

On many occasions, said Joseph, he has asked a number of Fil-Ams if they spoke Filipino (or whatever language their parents spoke), and most everyone said no. They blamed their parents for it. “I tried to study Filipino language in some foreign language schools,” one said, “but I could not pick up the pace because my parents spoke to me in English.” In their efforts to raise their children as Americans, said Joseph, most Filipino parents have refused to talk to their kids in Filipino languages.

He wondered why this was so since as far as he knew kids picked up languages faster than their elders and not-very-betters could say “au revoir.” And since as far as he knew being steeped in the culture of the “old country,” or the country of one’s parents, was a plus and not a minus for immigrants. “I remember that in almost all key cities and towns in the Philippines, where Chinese business thrives, there are Chinese schools.” He wondered why neither the Philippine government nor Philippine private institutions exerted themselves to put up institutions of learning in the United States where Filipinos lived in huge numbers, particularly ones that taught Filipino. He figured the economic benefits, quite apart from the cultural one, would be incalculable.

It’s a good point. I’ve seen it myself from way back, and it seems to have gotten only worse today. A couple of decades ago, someone told me that he learned a smattering of Tagalog only from listening to his parents talk. They spoke to him in English. He barely knew anything about the Philippines, his parents thought it best that he forgot the land of their birth and started fresh with none of the baggage of the past. A philosophy most Filipino immigrants to the United States held. They didn’t go through hoops, hocking everything they owned and enduring the cold weather and even colder treatment from their new society, just so their kids would have to relive their lives.

In fact, he said, the only time he really learned a good deal about the Philippines was when his teacher gave them an assignment to trace their roots. This was in the ’80s, when Alex Haley’s “Roots” took America by storm, aided by a TV series that broke records in viewership. He badgered his parents to tell him all they knew about the Philippines and did research on it in libraries. The result was that he became a big fan of the country, going to the Philippines as often as he could, time and money permitting.

That is not the case with most other children of Filipino immigrants in the United States, and the results are apparent in the event Joseph indicated. The second or third generations have become “Americanized,” a concept that is not without its tricky or problematic elements. Many of the kids of Filipino parents in America have lost their Filipino roots, but they have not exactly gained an American one either. Certainly, the loss of ethnic identity has not put second- or third-generation Filipinos in positions of influence or strength in their communities. Unlike their counterparts from Mexico, China, and even newcomers from Vietnam.

In fact the loss of ethnic identity has not made Filipinos more American, it has simply made them more nondescript. A friend of mine told me about an experience he had many years ago. He owned an advertising firm in the United States and attended an advertising conference. He was astonished to discover something there. Which was that while there was an advertising pitch for Mexicans, another for Chinese, another for Vietnamese, and so on, there wasn’t one for Filipinos. The Filipinos were assumed to be an extension of the American market.

Unfortunately, while the Filipinos were invisible as a distinct ethnic group when it came to being targeted in ads, they remained very visible as a separate ethnic group when it came to looking for jobs, running for public office, and doing pretty much everything else there. The Filipino was still a member of a minority, and not a particularly assertive one at that. The Filipino could be taken for granted when he was being sold things to, but he could also be taken for granted when he was selling himself. The worst of both worlds. Erasing roots or identity or the past hasn’t put the next generations at an advantage, it has put them at a double disadvantage.

What many Filipinos in the United States seem to have forgotten or failed to appreciate is that they’ve moved on to a land of immigrants, one that values diversity amid unity. One where the Italians, the Irish, the Poles, the Greeks, the Mexicans, the Chinese, the Vietnamese take fierce pride in their origins despite being staunch Americans. One where individuality, singularity, uniqueness, difference, innateness mattered as much as taking part in the collectivity. Indeed, one where it was not just possible to be both Filipino and American at the same time but where it was salutary to be both Filipino and American at the same time. Among Italian-Americans, Chinese-Americans and African-Americans, the first is co-equal with the second. Among Filipino-Americans, the first disappears in the second. With disastrous results.

It’s like being in Purgatory, halfway between heaven and hell.