Status : Verified
| Personal Name | Romano, Jennifer Lyn M. |
|---|---|
| Resource Title | Dalan: mapping the development of cinemagoing in mid-twentieth-century Naga City |
| Date Issued | 4 May 2025 |
| Abstract | This thesis examines the emergence of stand-alone movie houses in the “pilgrim city” of Naga by analyzing cinemagoing as a spatial and social practice shaped by movement, mediation, and inequality. Framed through the concept of dalan—bikol word meaning to watch and a road—it situates early cinemagoing within the city’s colonial spatial formation, intermediary economies, and classed patterns of mobility. Drawing on archival sources and oral interviews, the study traces how cinema developed in a city historically structured by riverine trade, Hispanic urban planning, Catholic institutions, and unequal access to land, capital, and circulation. At the turn of the twentieth century, Bikol’s incorporation into global trade enabled immigrant intermediaries to introduce cinema technologies to the region. Film exhibition thus emerged not as a cultural novelty but as part of commercial networks shaped by colonial and capitalist systems. Focusing on the Bichara family, the thesis shows how immigrant entrepreneurship, land ownership, and kinship organization consolidated exhibition power while remaining dependent on Manila-based distributors. By the postwar period, cinema theaters became sites where class distinction and mobility were lived and imagined, reproducing older hierarchies while enabling limited aspirations beyond the city. By approaching cinemagoing as a spatial and social practice, this study aims to contribute to ongoing efforts to recover the “lost” histories of regional cinema in the Philippines. |
| Degree Course | MA in Media Studies (Film) |
| Language | English |
| Keyword | Regional Cinema; Regional Historiography; Bikol Cinemagoing |
| Material Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
Preliminary Pages
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Category : F - Regular work, i.e., it has no patentable invention or creation, the author does not wish for personal publication, there is no confidential information.
Access Permission : Open Access