Filipino immigration to Mexico

Not to be confused with Mexican settlement in the Philippines.

Filipino Mexicans

Mock galleon in Papagayo Park, Acapulco
Total population
(1,202 Filipino nationals in Mexico (2012) est. 200,000 Mexicans of Filipino descent)
Regions with significant populations
Michoacán, Guerrero, and Colima
Languages
Spanish, English, Philippine languages
Religion
Predominantly Roman Catholicism
Related ethnic groups
Other Mexican people and Filipino people, individually.

Filipino Mexicans are Mexican citizens who are descendants of Filipino ancestry. The actual population amount is not known, but some estimate there may be about 200,000 people of mixed Filipino ancestry in Mexico. They may form less than (0.2%) of the population and its communities are found in Michoacán, Guerrero, and Colima.

History

Main articles: History of Mexico and Viceroyalty of New Spain

Most of their Filipino ancestors arrived in Mexico during the Spanish colonial period. For two and a half centuries, between 1565 and 1815, many Filipinos and Mexicans sailed to and from Mexico and the Philippines as sailors, crews, slaves, prisoners, adventurers and soldiers in the Manila-Acapulco Galleon assisting Spain in its trade between Asia and the Americas. Some of these sailors never returned to the Philippines. Most settled in and integrated into the Mexican society. In the late 19th and early 20th century some Filipinos came to Mexico as refugees from Spain during Francisco Franco’s dictatorship. These Filipinos were descendants of Filipino and Filipino mestizo settlers who entered Spain after the Spanish–American War.

Smaller waves of Filipino migration to Mexico took place in the late 19th and 20th centuries after the Philippines was annexed by the U.S. during the Spanish–American War of 1898–1900. About 20,000 Filipino farm laborers and fishermen arrived to work in the Mexican west coast. These areas included the Baja California, Sonora and Sinaloa, while some had awaited to enter the United States to reunite with family members in Filipino American communities in California, and elsewhere. Mexican immigration law continues to grant special status for Filipinos.

Their descendants are found in large communities particularly in the state of Guerrero, and Colima. Most of these individuals are mixed blood peoples, and trace half or a quarter of their ancestry and origin back to the Philippines during the Manila-Acapulco Galleon period.

Today, newly arrived Filipinos are overseas or contract workers who came to Mexico to obtain employment. Most of these individuals speak at least one of the Philippine languages.

Notable Mexicans of Filipino descent

• Isidoro Montes de Oca – Mexican General and Lieutenant commander of Vicente Guerrero
• Francisco Mongoy – Military commander of Vicente Guerrero
• Alejandro Gómez Maganda – Governor of Guerrero (1951–1954)
• Lili Rosales – Representative of Mexico in the Reina Hispanoamericana 2011 beauty contest

See also

• Demographics of Mexico
• Filipinos of Mexican descent
• Mestizo

External links

• Color Q World: Asian-Latino Intermarriage in the Americas
• Filipinos in Mexican History
• Afro-Filipino Mongoys (Photo of General Francisco Mongoy's descendants in the State of Guerrero)