Women, Baybayin and Self-Love

The National Museum of the Philippines – Western Visayas Regional Museum culminated its Women’s Month celebration with a workshop on Baybayin at Iloilo District Jail – Female Dorm at Brgy. Nanga, Pototan, Iloilo, March 29, 2023.

Baybayin is a precolonial writing system that is being revived in the past years, thanks to the growing number of advocates who organize and attend workshops as well as promote it in mainstream media.

The activity introduced the female inmates to their precolonial heritage, nurture their cultural interest, and provided them with artistic and meditative space to express themselves. The activity is part of the museum’s universal access program, which aims to democratize culture and heritage and facilitate the inclusion of socially isolated groups of people in cultural services and opportunities.

Around 30 persons deprived of liberty (PDL) attended the workshop. The PDLs wrote themselves a letter, and translated it in baybayin. Eldemar Sabete and Carl Villa of Youth Empowering Youth, Inc. facilitated the baybayin workshop while Ms Florabel Suarez of Psychological Association of the Philippines provided psycho-social services. (Maricyn A. De los Santos/NMWV)