The UP Asian Center and the Historical Treaties of Southeast Asia Project based in Linnaeus University, Sweden, will be holding the online roundtable "Revisiting Philippine Diplomatic Histories: Treaties and Treaty-Making in the Early Modern Period" on 21 May 2026, at 2:00 PM, PHT (GMT+8) or 8:00 AM, CET, via Zoom. The event is free and open to the public, but signing in to a (free) Zoom account is required.
ABOUT THE WEBINAR
Drawing inspiration from the emerging sub-field of New Diplomatic History which challenges Eurocentric narratives of diplomacy and highlights the varied cultures and actors that shaped diplomatic practices and ideas, this online forum showcases innovative case studies of Philippine diplomatic histories in the early modern period from the country’s three main island groups namely, Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. It focuses on treaty-making and diplomatic practices among indigenous groups and the role of indigenous actors in shaping diplomatic and political outcomes. The early modern Philippines (c. 1500-1800) offers a rich milieu to understand multi-layered and multi-faceted diplomacy where indigenous actors negotiated, allied or competed with groups such as the Spanish, Chinese, etc. By showcasing these three presentations, this forum hopes not only to contribute to discussions on Philippine history but also and perhaps more importantly, to global historical conversations that often miss the narratives on and agencies of non-Western diplomatic actors.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
"Prestige and Affection in Interpersonal Negotiations"
MARK ALEXANDER DIZON, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Ateneo de Manila University
Mark Dizon is an Assistant Professor at the Ateneo de Manila University. He is the author of Reciprocal Mobilities: Indigeneity and Imperialism in an Eighteenth-Century Philippine Borderland (published by The University of North Carolina Press, 2023). His research focuses on cross-cultural encounters and borderlands in the early modern Philippines. His scholarly work has been published in Philippine Studies, Itinerario, Colonial Latin American Review and Imago Mundi.
"Writing Early Mindanao-Spanish Relations into Global Diplomatic History"
BIRGIT TREMML-WERNER, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer, Stockholm University
Birgit Tremml-Werner is an Adjunct Professor of the Asian Center, University of the Philippines Diliman, and a Senior Lecturer at Stockholm University in Sweden. A University of Vienna-trained historian, she received her Ph.D. in 2012 with a dissertation on early modern Manila that examined how diplomacy and imperial political economies shaped trans-Pacific trade and local social relations, later published as the book Spain, China and Japan in Manila, 1571–1644: Local Comparisons and Global Connections by Amsterdam University Press in 2015 and translated into Chinese in 2022. Her second book, Negotiating Imperialism: Murakami Naojirō's Archival Diplomacy, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2025. Before joining the history department of Stockholm University, she held research positions at The University of Tokyo, University of Zurich, and Linnaeus University. She is currently involved in the projects Historical Treaties in Southeast Asia and Global Diplomacy: Recentering International Relations, 1400–1850, and have served as invited adjunct professor at the University of the Philippines Asian Center since 2023. She is a recipient of a Philippine Studies Grant from the Office for Cultural Diplomacy in 2025, and also initiated the Philippine History Forum at Stockholm University, co-founded the Global Diplomacy Network, helped develop the open-access platform Global Archives Online, and currently convene both the departmental Early Modern History Seminar and The Global Sounding Board: Stockholm Interdisciplinary History Series.
"Ritual Diplomacy and Alliance Formation among Spanish-Contact Visayan and Mindanao Polities, 1521–1622"
GEORGE EMMANUEL BORRINAGA, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, University of San Carlos, Cebu City
Dr. George Emmanuel R. Borrinaga is an Associate Professor of History in the Department of Anthropology, Sociology, and History at the University of San Carlos in Cebu and editor-in-chief of the Philippine Quarterly of Culture and Society. He earned his Ph.D. in History from the University of Hull, United Kingdom, in 2019, with a dissertation titled Solidarity and Crisis-Derived Identities in Samar and Leyte, Philippines, 1565 to Present. His research examines the religious, sociopolitical, environmental, and everyday histories of Leyte and Samar, with particular interest in community resilience and social identity. He has published on the Pulahan movement, wartime civilian experiences, and popular religion in the Visayas. A lifetime member of the Philippine National Historical Society, he served as secretary of the NCCA National Committee on Historical Research from 2020 to 2025. He received the Young Historian’s Prize in 2015 and the Virginia A. Miralao Excellence in Research Award in 2021.