After hearing Mass, Catholic families buy traditional Filipino holiday fare for breakfast outside the church and eat it either within the church precincts or at home. Morning observance of Simbang Gabi this holiday begins as early as 03:00 or as late as 05:30 or 06:00 PST, while in some parishes, some churches and others, anticipated Masses begin the previous evening at 20:00 PST or as early as 17:30 or 19:30 PST in others or as late as 21:00 PST. Attending the Masses is meant to show devotion to God and heightened anticipation for Christ's birth, and folk belief holds that God grants the special wish of a devotee that hears all nine Masses. The Simbang Gabi is practised mainly by Catholic and Aglipayans, with some Evangelical Christian and independent Protestant churches have adopted the practise of having pre-Christmas dawn services. Simbang Gabi ("Night Mass" Spanish: Misa de Gallo, "Rooster's Mass", or Misa de Aguinaldo, "Gift Mass") is a novena of dawn Masses from December 16 to 24 (Christmas Eve). But for the members of the Philippine Independent Church or Aglipayans, Christmas starts on the eve of December 24 and ends on January 1.
Generally, holiday decorations are available as early as the weekend of the National Heroes' Day in August. It is celebrated for almost half a year (4 months or 4 months and 3–4 weeks or 5 months). The Christmas season gradually starts from September 1 to December 25 and either ends in January (the midpoint being the third or fourth week of that month) or February. This countdown, which spans from September to December, otherwise known as the "Ber months", is one of the most important traditions that make the world's earliest and longest timespan of a Christmas season. Įvery year, Filipinos from around the world mark September 1 as the beginning of the countdown to Christmas. The official observance by the Catholic Church in the Philippines is from the first day of Advent until the Feast of the Epiphany on the first Sunday after New Year's Day. The Philippines, one of two predominantly Catholic countries in Asia (the other one being East Timor), celebrates the world's longest Christmas season, with Christmas carols heard as early as September 1 and lasting variously until either Epiphany, the Feast of the Black Nazarene on January 9, or the Feast of the Santo Niño on the third Sunday of January. The parol is one of the most iconic and beloved symbols, of the Filipino holiday observance.Ĭhristmas in the Philippines ( Filipino: Pasko sa Pilipinas) is one of the biggest holidays in the country. I have also been interviewed by journalists and documentary makers.Parol (Christmas lanterns) being sold, during the Christmas season, in the Philippines. Howard Tumber and Sylvio Waisbord, 2017). Gail Dines and Jean Humez, 2011, 2014) and the Routledge Companion to Media and Human Rights (Eds. I have published in journals including Communication, Culture, & Critique, Development and Change, Feminist Media Studies, Feminist Studies, International Journal of Communication, Journal of Film and Video, New Review of Film and Television Studies, Popular Communication, Television and New Media, and Transformative Works and Culture, as well as in Gender, Race and Class in Media (Sage, Eds. My research examines questions of media, culture, and power, falling into three interrelated areas: (1) LGBTQ media production and reception, (2) media and activism, and (3) constructions of national identity, with the common thread being an engagement with gender, sexuality, class, race, and nation as intersecting axes of hierarchy.
Currently, I teach courses on media and globalization, media representations, gender and globalization, feminist studies, and queer theory, and have also taught in the areas of linguistics and language and culture. I’m an associate professor at Ohio University, in the School of Media Arts and Studies and the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program.