Lumad

A group of indigenous peoples of the southern Philippines.

The name Lumad grew out of the political awakening among various tribes during the martial law regime of President Marcos. It was advocated and propagated by the members and affiliates of Lumad-Mindanao, a coalition of all-Lumad local and regional organizations which formalized themselves as such in June 1986 but started in 1983 as a multi-sectoral organization. Lumad-Mindanao’s main objective was to achieve self-determination for their member-tribes, or, put more concretely, self-governance within their ancestral domain in accordance with their culture and customary laws. No other Lumad organization had had the express goal in the past.

The name is a Cebuano Bisayan word, meaning indigenous, which has become the collective name for the thirty or more ethnolinguistic groups enumerated earlier. Represenative from fifteen tribes agreed in June 1986 to adopt the name; there were no delegates from the Three major groups of the T’boli, the Teduray and the Subanen. The choice of a Cebuano word – Cebuano is the language of the natives of Cebu in the Visayas – was a bit ironic but they deemed it to be most appropriate considering that the various Lumad tribes do not have any other common language except Cebuano. This is the first time that these tribes have agreed to a common name for themselves, distinct from that of the Moros and different from the migrant majority and their descendants.