Memory, Meaning, and Everyday Life in Little Manila

In this exhibit, I seek to understand the history of Little Manila, Woodside through sense, embodied memory, and affect – looking specifically at how it is remembered, inhabited, and interpreted by Filipino Americans of New York. Through oral histories with New Yorkers who find community and belonging in Woodside, I explore how diasporic Filipinos build homes in the neighborhood, how they move through it in everyday life, what institutions and routines make it “feel Filipino,” and how they grapple with the contradiction of Woodside’s recent public, official recognition as “Little Manila” with continued instability in the neighborhood. 

01 Introduction 02 Home, Inheritance, and Return 03 Everyday Infrastructure and the Neighborhood as Lived Geography 04 Visibility, Recognition, and the Problem of What Counts 05 Fragility, Incompleteness, and Competing Futures 06 Conclusion 07 Bibliography Enter the Exhibit