The Compadre System, or the “Extended Family” is the basis of Filipino social structure. When they say “Extended Family” that doesn’t mean that there is a blood relationship, or even a marital relationship. Some “family members” are chosen, rather than being truly related.
The Compadre System, or Extended Family is, as I said, the basis of Filipino social structure. It is a kinship system which extends one’s relationships beyond one’s immediate family to include up to about 400 people. Can you imagine? 400 people! One thing that I often hear from foreigners who marry in the Philippines is that their wife (or husband!) has so much family, and they probably will not even meet all of them, much less remember them all. While it is true, some of these people that are called “cousins” or “uncles or aunts” may not actually be blood relatives at all, but rather “adopted” extended family.
Basically, the way that Filipino society is structured starts out with the individual himself. Remember, through all of our SIR series, it is quite obvious that the individual person is really not the focus, as the group or barkada is much stronger, and the individual is expected to conform to the others, and not really show individualism like we we westerns do.
The next layer of the society, in relation to the individual is the blood relationship. This would include immediate family (parents, brothers, sisters), and extend out to cousins, aunts, uncles, nephews, nieces and such. Anybody who has a blood relationship with that individual would be part of this layer of that person’s kinship system. The blood relationship would usually extend out to around 100 people, although that number would certainly vary.
The next layer of this system is the marital relationship. As one family member marries another person, then the two families join into each other’s kinship system. In the USA, where I come from, the families of two people who marry generally do not form a relationship with each other, unless they are very, very close to the people who marry. Of course, the groom would become close with the bride’s family, and vice versa. Here, though, the ties between families of people who marry become much closer and go much deeper. This layer of the kinship system extends the “family circle” up to around 200 or 300 pepole. That extended family is starting to get kind of big, don’t you think?
OK, we still have one more layer to look at. That layer is the Ritual Kin. This generally consists of people whom you choose to be kin, instead of them being chooses by blood or by others who decide to marry. As an example, if a couple has a baby, when the baby is baptised, the couple chooses “Ninongs” and “Ninangs” for the child. The English equivalent of this would be Godfathers and Godmothers. In my society, though, usually there is one Godfather and one Godmother. Here, there can be many of each. I suppose any number can be chosen, but in general 3 or 4 of each will probably be chosen. Basically, once you have served as a Ninong, you become a relation to each of the other Ninongs, each of the Ninangs, and the family of the child. Recently, I served as Ninong for a child of a friend. The photo you see above in this article was taken at a lunch that we all enjoyed together after the Church service. The friend who’s child was baptised is a very good friend, and a reader of this site. I am not going to identify her, because I don’t know if she wants to be publicly identified. If she wants to, she can do so in the comments. While we were having lunch, one of the other Ninongs came to me and said “we are Kompare now” which means that we are sort of “family” to each other, or at least very close friends. Probably more than just friends, though, it’s a special relationship. Now, this not only includes baptisms, but weddings, and such too. Imagine how the extended family can grow when these relationships are added! The Ritual Kin extends the Kinship system of the individual out to around 400 people, although there is not set rule, and it can be more or less than the number I gave.
Well, after this article, we have only one more aspect of SIR to explore, and it is probably the aspect that is most controversial to foreigners like most people reading this. It is the thing that non-Filipinos rail about most in regards to Filipinos and Philippine society. Can you guess what it is? If you can’t, that’s OK, we will look into that one in the next week or so.