605 Tracing Origins: Ilustrado Nationalism and the Racial Science of Migration Waves FILOMENO V. AGUILAR JR. If only our ancestors could be resurrected! (Rizal 1890, 90) Racial Science and the Quest for Origins History was the key to identity for the pioneers of Filipino nationhood in the late nineteenth century. John Schumacher has recounted the struggle by which the youth- ful Europeanized originators of Filipino nationhood—the ilustrados, literally “enlight- ened”—reacted to the “chauvinism common to members of governing races” (1973, 191–220). Amid the onslaught of Spanish colonial racism, these educated youths Filomeno V. Aguilar Jr. (fvaguilar@ateneo.edu) is Professor in the Department of History and Director of the Institute of Philippine Culture at Ateneo de Manila University. This article is a revised version of a paper first presented at the Fourth European Philippine Studies Conference, Alcala ´ de Henares, Spain, September 9–12, 2001. I am grateful for a Visiting Research Fellowship at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University, in the second half of 2001, which provided the opportunity to pursue the research project of which this article is a part. I am also indebted to a research leave awarded by James Cook University that enabled research in the Philippines and the United States. In Kyoto I received valuable comments, questions, and encouragement from Caroline Sy Hau, Patricio Abinales, Arthur Terry Rambo, Koji Tanaka, and Yoko Hayami. Carol was extremely kind in giving me liberal access to her copies of La Solidaridad and in being a critical sounding board for this article, while Jojo and Terry very generously shared with me useful materials. Acquiring a copy of the rare 1885 report of J. Montano was incredibly easy because of the generosity of Xavier Huetz de Lemps. I am grateful to Benedict Anderson, Russell McGregor, Lily Mendoza, and Fr. John N. Schumacher, S.J., for reading earlier versions and giving me valuable sugges- tions, corrections, and advice. I am also grateful to my many colleagues in Philippine history who participated in “The Mactan Conversation: A Conference on the ‘Genealogies of Philippine History’” held in Mactan, Cebu, April 4–6, 2003, where a version of this article was presented and critiqued. Thanks are also due to the reviewers commissioned by the Journal of Asian Studies for their constructive comments and suggestions. Most of all, thanks go to my boundlessly patient and understanding wife, Juliet, for prodding me on to work on this article and for sharing with me the thrills and perils of visiting Spain, to-sha. The Journal of Asian Studies 64, no. 3 (August 2005):605–37.  2005 by the Association for Asian Studies, Inc.