The empire of Flor Yntrencherado: A study on anti-colonial resistance

Abstract

Behind the disciplinary mechanisms of the State can be read the haunting memory of contagions, plagues, rebellions, crimes, brigandage, deserters, people who appear and disappear, live and die in disorder. These were the pronounced realities of the Philippine colonial landscape that usually kept the colonial government and its allied class, the principalia, busy. In taking a closer look at the details of these events, however, one can see that all these were the suppressed significant "Others" in an effort of the colonial government to penetrate society, regulate social relationships, extract rewards, and appropriate resources in determined ways. This study presents the life story of Yntrencherado, the self-proclaimed Emperor of the Philippines, in his own light. It is about his exploits, spiritual awakening, missionary activities, theoretical formation and discursive practices, economic enterprise, and networking from the Gigantes all throughout Western Visayas. It also takes into account the formation of the Union (his organization) and eventually its transformation into a full-blown Empire with Yntrencherado Emperor, as its Supreme leader. It also presents the inevitable clash between Yntrencherado and his Empire and the State and its instrumentalities, with the latter being the center of power, bearer of modernity, and an emblem of rationality. Thus, it is imperative to lay bare the perception of the State of the Empire and vice-versa. Moreover, the study explains the specific ways in which the Empire proved subversive to the order supplied and perpetuated by the State. It also determines how the Empire constitutes a form of resistance against the colonial state's drive to rationalize life. The study argues that Yntrencherado, as a historical subject of linear history, is hard to contain. In projecting turn against the dominant historical construct of statehood, one was able to comprehend his life, works, activities, and writings. The state, in its drive towards hegemon,y considered various aspects of Yntrencherado and his Empire as a threat to the former's existence and purpose of governance. On the other hand, Yntrencherado and his Empire felt that some government bureaucratic regulations and instrumentalities were intrusions into their private domains. This eventually led to subversion. The study shows that Yntrencherado and his Empire were subversives to the order supplied and perpetuated by the state in a sense that they had their own center of power. They had their own views as to how everyday life's to be spent and governed, specific religio-political norms and practices to follow, and a leader who was the ultimate source of all knowledge and power in the Empire. The study found out that the Empire constituted a form of resistance against the colonial state's drive to rationalize life in so many ways. On a more pronounced feature, it confronted the infrastructural power of the state violently. Scores of life were lost and properties were damaged in an attempt of the Empire to take over the control of governance from the state. In a more subtle but persisting way, the Empire, Yntrencherado and the Yntencheradistas disregarded many state's rules and regulations or doing nothing at all about the state's official policies. These forms of defiance, however, earned the animosity of the legitimate authority and the military. As the nation-state moves onward, according to Foucault, its coercive power create deviants, Yntrencherado, his Empire and his followers included.