Igorrote Village at the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition, 1909

• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: English
• Published: 1909
• Subjects: Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition (1909 : Seattle; Wash.); Exhibitions > Washington (State) > Seattle; Igorot (Philippine people); Pay Streak (Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition; 1909; Seattle; Igorrote Village (Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition; Yukon; Pacific; Archipelago; Alaska
• Online Access: http://cdm16118.contentdm.oclc.org/u?/p15015coll4,4398

"Living Exhibits" (also sometimes called "Human Zoos") were a racist trademark of fairs and exhibitions during the 19th and 20th centuries during which people from other countries advertised as "primitive" or "exotic" were brought in by organizers to live on the fair grounds for attendees to observe. These exhibits were used by Western societies to create an "Other" and justify racist and harmful practices of colonialization and discrimination. This racism is on full display in the description of the village which appeared in the exposition's guidebook. From the Official guide to the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition: "Commandingly located at the head of the South Pay Streak, beneath of a roof of trees, is the picturesquely simple village of the barbaric Igorrotes, the interesting primitive and wild people from the remote mountain fastnesses of Luzon in the Philippine Archipelago. Here, in the greatest of all the special attractions, there are fifty of these strange head-hunting, dog-eating people, living as they live at home, in quint grass-thatched huts, with their womenkind and cute little children. A bit of their own characteristic Bontoc country transplanted in Seattle to show exposition visitors the manners, customs, costumes, industries, sports and pastimes of a remarkable people in the childhood of a race, a wild, uncultured people, struggling to break through their environment and emerge from the superstitions which enslave them, and to solve the mysterious play of the forces of nature and rise to higher conceptions of truth of freedom and liberty. Within the great palisaded enclosure there is not one inch of space that does not vibrate with the wild life of the Igorrotes. Everything they make and use at home is made in the Village here, men fashioning keen spears and warlike head axes at a primitive forge, or weaving rattan into peculiar pocket hats which distinguish the Bontoc men from all other Islanders; men carving war shields with crude tools, and quiet turbaned men from Sebangan molding clay and ...