ABOUT THE BOOK

With a journalist’s keen observations of the times, a screenwriter’s ear for street talk, a poet’s lyrical flair, a translator’s ardor for nuance and idiosyncrasy, and a wit’s mordant humor, this collection decodes Philippine English as a prism, revealing the vibrant spectrum of our living culture. Lacaba, jovial and impish, explores how words shape and are shaped by the historical everyday, one refraction at a time.

—Patrick F. Campos

Film Scholar, Critic, Educator

What seems like a postcolonial linguistic exercise in the meditations on the Filipino/a/x reuse of English, in Pete Lacaba’s tongue and pen, it is an exploration and unraveling of shared wit, humor, literariness, political and social contexts, and Filipino-ness. He engages, dialogues with the coming into terms of the terms that came up with currency, bringing forth the forked and multiple tongues in the conversation, and wonderfully dragging in the dual joy and sorrow in the nation’s humanity and insanity.

—Rolando B. Tolentino

Writer and Professor

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jose F. Lacaba has published five collections of poetry and translations of poetry: Mga Kagila-gilalas na Pakikipagsapalaran, Sa Panahon ng Ligalig, Sa Daigdig ng Kontradiksiyon, Edad Medya, and Kung Baga sa Bigas. He wrote the screenplay of classic Filipino films such as Orapronobis, Sister Stella L., Eskapo, and Rizal sa Dapitan. For his outstanding works as a poet, screenwriter, journalist, and essayist, he received prestigious awards, including the CCP Centennial Honors for the Arts, the Gawad Plaridel, and Gawad CCP Para sa Sining.