Women of Malolos

I have not heard about the women of Malolos before our wonderful professor gave this topic. I found out that Rizal’s ideal girl was not Maria Clara but the reminiscent of women of Malolos.



Most of the time, we see women as wives, mothers, sisters or daughters. Even in these important roles in their everyday lives, the traditional historians have erased the women out of the scene. Regardless of the notion that the women of Malolos were mere instruments of the illustrados active in the reform movement, particularly Marcelo H. del Pilar, the action of the women may be considered unique and radical for their time and class.

Rizal was a humanist, aside from being a rationalist and nationalist. He wanted freedom and dignity for all people, including women. Rizal was perhaps also one of the first Asian leaders to champion women’s liberation and equality with men. He expressed his views on women lengthily in his famous, “Letter to the Women of Malolos”.

The women in Malolos really inspired Rizal by the activism and courage they have shown in defying a ban instituted by the parish priest against the teaching of Spanish to their children. The women protested to the governor-general, a thing unheard of those days, and succeeded in getting what they wanted due to their determination.

Rizal lamented that the Spaniards and friars who came to the Philippines “gossip” about Filipino women as being loose morals. “This is our dream; this is the desire we cherish in our hearts,” say Rizal, “to restore the honor of the woman, who is half our heart, our companion in the joys and tribulations of life”. Rizal then advised the women of Malolos to become like the mothers of ancient Sparta who brought up sons who were willing to die for their country and able to defend it against their enemies.

Talking about the (Filipino) women of the earlier time and the women of today, I think today’s women are more commendable than before. They are more competitive and can do what men do. Try to imagine the women of the earlier time, most of them were just housewives and worst was some became slaves of colonialist. Our women nowadays prefer to go to school and have their degrees in college for them to pursue their dreams and survive the financial crisis as well.