The Filipino Community in Australia
During the 300 years of Spanish rule in the Philippines archipelago, the term Filipino was applied to people of Spanish descent.
The national language is Tagalog, which is spoken widely in the southern region of the island of Luzon, including the capital, Manila.
The archipelago has many other languages, including Cebuano, Samara and Hiligaynon which are spoken in Mindanao. Tagalog was made the official language in 1962. Over the past 20 years or so Filipinos have migrated widely and it's estimated 600,000 have left their homeland.
Arrival
Among the first Filipinos to come to Australia were those who arrived in the 1880s. They were ships' crew, pearl divers, traders and fishing fleet owners. They settled mostly in Western Australia and Queensland. However, the introduction of the White Australia policy severely curtailed their entry.
More recently, it was a small group of students, who arrived in Australia for education under the Colombo Plan and decided to stay, that formed the nucleus of what has now become a sizeable migrant population.
Settlement
With the end of the White Australia policy, in the late 1960s and 1970s, a new generation of Filipino migrants came to Australia. They were professionals and many were already wealthy.
Today, the Filipino community is the second fastest-growing migrant group in Sydney, after the Chinese.
Many Filipinas have come to Australia as so-called mail-order brides. This has led to tragedy for many women who've been mistreated.
According to academic, Jock Collins and journalist, Antonio Castillo, in their book Cosmopolitan Sydney, the recent history of Filipino migration to Australia is largely a female experience.
They quote figures from the early 1990s which show, at the time, there were around 20,000 Filipino women in Sydney, compared with fewer than 14,000 men.
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