The Instituto Cervantes at Intramuros will host the lecture “The British Empire and the Philippine Revolution, 1896–1902” on Thursday, January 27, at 2:00 pm. The event will be delivered by Spanish historian Laura Díaz Esteve and will be conducted in English.
The Philippine Revolution of 1896–1902 and the subsequent transition of the archipelago from Spanish to American rule marked a decisive turning point in global history. This period represented the culmination of Filipino nationalism, the loss of Spain’s Pacific territories, and the emergence of the United States as an imperial power.
This lecture explores these events from a perspective that has received little scholarly attention: that of British communities and officials based across Asia, including territories such as the Chinese treaty ports and Singapore. It will examine how different agents of the British Empire—concerned with maintaining geopolitical dominance in the region and protecting their strategic and commercial interests in the islands—reacted to the Philippine conflict and sought to influence its course.
Laura Díaz Esteve is a Spanish historian specializing in Philippine history, with a research focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Her work addresses political history, media history, and colonial warfare. She has taught at several universities and published in leading academic journals such as Diplomatic History and Hispania Nova. Since September 2025, she has been a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) in Madrid, and she is currently undertaking a research stay at Ateneo de Manila University.
Attendance is free, but advance registration is recommended.
Interested participants may reserve their slot via the following link: https://forms.office.com/e/mP8mcpfUFL
For more information, please visit the Instituto Cervantes de Manila website at https://manila.cervantes.es or follow Instituto Cervantes Facebook page: facebook.com/InstitutoCervantesManila.
