Michael C. Hawkins. Making Moros

In the epilogue (especially on pp. 136–137) to Making Moros: Imperial Historicism and American Military Rule in the Philippines' Muslim South, Michael C. Hawkins reveals the questions that prompted him to write this book: Why do so many Muslim Filipinos feel nostalgia for the period of United States military rule now more than one hundred years ago? And why do so many of them profess a wish for U.S. military forces to return, providing at least aid if not also structure and guidance? Postcolonial narratives usually stress resistance to and rejection of the imperial project. Why do the people of Mindanao instead remain nostalgic for and accepting of the U.S. military? Hawkins also waits until the epilogue to offer his critique of Philippine historiography, which he finds trapped by the “inevitable teleology of the nation-state” (p. 144). He wants to tell a historical story, one not deployed for the purpose of explaining (or explaining away) current ethnic conflicts, the precariousness of the Philippine nation, or which groups have the best claim to an authentic Philippine past. To do so, Hawkins explores the fourteen years of direct military rule (1899–1913) by the United States in the majority-Muslim southern islands of the Philippines.

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