NatDem Fictions: Revolutionary Experiences in Contemporary Film and Literature in the Philippines

Abstract

Southeast Asia's longest-running communist armed revolution -- the national democratic (NatDem) revolution led by the Marxist-Leninist-Maoist Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) -- is the subject of fiction films and novels produced aboveground decades after the Marcos dictatorship, a period that covers the post-Cold War global ascendancy of neoliberal capitalism, the country's democratic transition, and the crises and recovery of the NatDem movement. These works examine the complex history of, and experiences in, the political struggle, and engage with the question of the relevance of the revolution as a project of national liberation. I refer to these works as NatDem fictions -- ficti..