Filipinos

Filipinos (Filipino: Mga Pilipino) are citizens or people identified and related with the country or sovereign state of the Philippines. Filipinos come from various Austronesian peoples, all typically speaking Filipino, English, or other Philippine languages. Despite formerly being subject to Spanish administration, less than 1% of Filipinos are fluent in Spanish. Currently, there are more than 185 ethnolinguistic groups in the Philippines each with its own language, identity, culture, tradition, and history.

Names

The name Filipino, as a demonym, was derived from the term las Islas Filipinas 'the Philippine Islands', the name given to the archipelago in 1543 by the Spanish explorer and Dominican priest Ruy López de Villalobos, in honor of Philip II of Spain. During the Spanish period, natives of the Philippine islands were usually known in the Philippines itself by the generic terms indio ("Indian (native of the East Indies)") or indigena 'indigenous', while the generic term chino ("Chinese"), short for "indio chino" was used in Spanish America to differentiate from the Native American indios of the Spanish territories in the Americas and the West Indies. The term Filipino was sometimes added by Spanish writers to distinguish the indio chino native of the Philippine archipelago from the indio of the Spanish territories in the Americas.

The term Indio Filipino appears as a term of self-identification beginning in the 18th century.

In 1955, Agnes Newton Keith wrote that a 19th century edict prohibited the use of the word "Filipino" to refer to indios. This reflected popular belief, although no such edict has been found.