Module Overview

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About this Module

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This module provides an overview of Filipino American community and identity formation in the Pajaro Valley through exploration of the following topics: labor, Filipino American businesses and social organizations, foodways, and music. It includes primary source documents from the Watsonville is in the Heart Digital Archive Links to an external site. including photographs and oral history interviews.

Watsonville is in the Heart (WIITH) is a community-engaged research initiative based at UC Santa Cruz in partnership with The Tobera Project Links to an external site. and descendants of the first Filipino migrants to settle in the Pajaro Valley during the 1920s and 1930s. 

The module was created by WIITH team members, Meleia Simon-Reynolds, Katrina Pagaduan, Janeth Perez-Quirke, and Dr. Kathleen Cruz Gutierrez in collaboration with Michelle Morton and Aloha Sargent. 

WIITH team members Amanda Gamban and Christina Ayson Plank digitizing Liz Tana’s family collection at the 2021 Archive Drive in Watsonville.

WIITH team members Meleia Simon-Reynolds and Ian Hunte Doyle are interviewing Dana Sales about his father’s barbershop which was once located on Main Street in downtown Watsonville.

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Learning Outcomes

Through this module, students will be able to: 

• Explain the history of Filipino migration to the Pajaro Valley during the early twentieth century
• Discuss labor, kinship, businesses, social organizations, foodways, and music as sites of Filipino American community and identity formation 
• Analyze primary source documents from the Watsonville is in the Heart Digital Archive including photographs and oral history interviews
• Relate their own personal and community experiences to Pajaro Valley Filipino American histories

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Overview of Topics and Sources

This module is broken down into 6 topics. Each topic includes an introductory page that provides guiding questions and a list of recommended secondary literature, including poetry by Jeff Tagami and Shirley Ancheta — Filipino American authors from the Pajaro Valley — and additional resources. Each topic includes sets of paired primary sources focused on a single theme. The Primary Source Analysis Worksheets can be utilized to help students analyze sources.

Primary Source Analysis Worksheets

• Primary Source Analysis: Visual Sources
• Primary Source Analysis: Oral Histories

Topics and Source Sets

🧑‍🌾 Labor 🍓	Source Set 1: Labor and Leisure Source Set 2: Children's Labor Source Set 3: Women's Labor Source Set 4: Unionization
👨‍👩‍👦 Kinship 👬	Source Set 5: Beyond the Nuclear Family Source Set 6: Transnational Connections
✂️ Filipino American Businesses 🍳	Source Set 7: Filipino American Barbershops Source Set 8: Philippine Gardens
🌱 Foodways 🍽️	Source Set 9: Home Gardening and Ocean Foraging Source Set 10: Filipino American Cuisine
🇵🇭 Filipino American Social Organizations 🇺🇸	Source Set 11: Gender and the Caballeros de Dimas-Alang Source Set 12: Cultural Education and The Filipino Women's Club of Watsonville Source Set 13: The Filipino Youth Club and Second Generation Filipino Americans
🎷 Music 🎵	Source Set 14: Music, Culture, and Identity Source Set 15: Filipino American Bands

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