Encarnacion Alzona
| Encarnacion A. Alzona | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
March 23, 1895 Biñan, Laguna, Captaincy General of the Philippines |
| Died | March 13, 2001 (aged 105) Manila, Philippines |
| Nationality | Filipino |
| Alma mater | University of the Philippines, Radcliffe College, Columbia University |
| Occupation | Historian |
| Known for | National Scientist of the Philippines |
Encarnacion A. Alzona (March 23, 1895 – March 13, 2001) was a pioneering Filipino historian, educator and suffragist. The first Filipino woman to obtain a Ph.D., she was conferred in 1985 the rank and title of National Scientist of the Philippines.
Encarnation Alzona was born in Biñan, Laguna and grew up in Tayabas. Her father was a trial court judge and a distant relative of Jose Rizal. Both her parents were voracious readers, a circumstance that fostered her academic inclinations. She obtained a degree in history from the University of the Philippines in 1917, and a master's degree the following year from the same university. Her thesis was a historical survey on the school education of women in the Philippines, a theme that proved apt in light of her later activism as a suffragette.
Alzona pursued further studies in the United States as a scholar funded by the American government, as a pensionado. She obtained another master's degree in history from Radcliffe College in 1920, and a Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1923. Alzona was the first Filipino woman to have obtained a Ph.D.
Alzona returned to the Philippines in 1923 and joined the faculty of the Department of History of the University of the Philippines.
Even as American women won the right to vote in 1920, women in the Philippines, then an American colony, were not accorded the same right. As early as 1919, Alzona spoke in favor of conferring the right of suffrage to Filipino women, in an article she published in the Philippine Review. In a newspaper article she wrote in 1926, Alzona lamented the fact that the Philippine legislature, which she described as the "bulwark of conservatism" had yet to consider legislation in favor of women's suffrage.
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