Volume 39, Issue 1, Spring/Summer 2019
Christina A. Astorga
Pages 39-56
Interfacing Filipino Lakas Tawa (Power of Laughter) and Lament
Filipino lakas tawa, with examples drawn from the 1986 Filipino revolution, is interfaced with lament based on the Book of Lamentations with parallel examples from W. E. Burghart Du Bois’s “A Litany at Atlanta.” This interfacing is brought to bear on the article’s central thesis: Lakas tawa and lament are two ways of being and doing in the face of suffering and death, but are intrinsically woven into the tapestry of one human reality. They are two paths of resistance, both deeply connected to faith and religion, though in different ways. Where they converge and diverge, they have the power to subvert oppressive systems and the potential of transforming them.