Vina A. Lanzona

Vina A. LanzonaAssociate Professor
Southeast Asia, Philippines, Women and Gender, Colonialism

Office: Sakamaki B208
Phone: (808) 956-6769
Email: vlanzona@hawaii.edu

BA Ateneo de Manila, 1989; MA New School for Social Research, 1994; PhD Wisconsin-Madison, 2000

 


Background

Born and raised in Manila, Philippines, I’m considered a “Martial Law Baby,” having grown up under Martial Law. And then as a student at the Ateneo de Manila University, I was part of our People Power Revolution! After college, I worked briefly for the (post-Martial Law) government under President Aquino, then came to the United States to pursue graduate studies, completing an M.A. in Historical Studies at the New School for Social Research in New York, and a Ph.D. in Southeast Asian History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I spent most of my twenties living in New York, eventually moving to Honolulu to join the History faculty at the University of Hawaiʻi-Mānoa (UHM). From 2011-2015, I served as the Director of the Center for Philippine Studies at the School of Pacific and Asian Studies at UHM.

My first book was inspired by my twin passions for studying revolution and the role of women in political change in the modern Philippines. I recently co-edited a volume expanding this theme to women in Southeast Asia. My current projects re-examine the Philippines’ historical relationship with Spain through studies of the social history of marriage under Spanish colonialism and the role of Filipinos and Filipino-Americans in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939).

Courses Offered

I offer courses in my specialty fields, which include modern Philippine and Southeast Asian history, Women and Revolution, Iberian colonialism in Asia and the Pacific, as well as more general courses in Asian Civilizations and Cultures.

Representative Publications

  • Women Warriors in Southeast Asia (co-edited with Frederik Rettig, Routledge, 2020). Announcement from UHM Asian Studies Program.
  • Amazons of the Huk Rebellion: Gender, Sex, and Revolution in the Philippines (University of Wisconsin Press, 2009).
  • “Capturing the Huk Amazons:representing women warriors in the Philippines, 1940s-1950s,” South East Asia Research 17, no. 2, pp. 133-174 (London: School of Oriental and African Studies).
  • “Women Warriors” (co-edited with Professor Tobias Rettig, Singapore Management University), IIAS (International Institute of Asian Studies) Newsletter Special Issue No. 48 (Summer 2008).
  • “Romancing a Revolutionary: The Life of Celia Mariano-Pomeroy,” in Lives at the Margin: Biographies of Filipinos Obscure, Ordinary, and Heroic, ed. Alfred W. McCoy (Quezon City, 2000).

Amazons of the Huk Rebellion

Women Warriors