Of Ethnoscapes, Gazes and the Struggle of the Split Self: OFW Inter-cultural Encounters in the Middle East

Abstract

This paper interrogates how the OFW phenomenon, as an ethnoscape, provides unique inter-cultural encounters to OFWs as they move from their local cultures to the cultures of their destination countries. The study describes the OFWs’ various expressions of racial discrimination in three cultural milieus including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and United Arab Emirates The paper problematizes how the OFWs deal with realities in these socially constructed inter-cultural spaces using the lenses of Appadurai’s concept of ethnoscape and Urry’s issues of tourist gaze. The paper illustrates that using these frameworks, and connecting them to Jocano’s framework of Filipino values, points to a new identity borne out of a holistic sense of self where the OFW persona is empowered by their cultural energy, an interior dimension of harmony (loob) as a way of suturing the split self.