Word Weavers: Kerima Polotan-Tuvera

Kerima Polotan-Tuvera (1925-2011) was a Filipino fictionist, essayist, and journalist who coined the term “mani-pedi.” Her influence is felt in the Philippines as a writer and award-winning author, and worldwide through her work in shaping Philippine English.

For Further Reading: 

• Kerima Polotan Tuvera: 85 Years of a life
• OED: mani-pedi
• Biggest-ever addition of ‘Filipino English’ goes into Oxford dictionary
• OED: Introduction to Philippine English

This month, we’re talking about Word Weavers — people who coined terms, popularized words, and even created entirely new languages. These activists, writers, artists, and scholars used language to shape ideas and give voice to experiences that once had no name. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hello from Wonder Media Network. I'm Jenny Kaplan and this
is Womanica. This month, we're talking about word weavers, people
who coined terms, popularized words, and even created entirely new languages.
These activist writers, artists, and scholars used language to shape
ideas and give voice to experiences that once had no name.

(00:25):
Sometimes authors create their legacies through their published works, or
maybe through the words they introduced to the world, or
perhaps for the lasting impact they made on their contemporaries.
Other times they leave their mark through all of the above.
Today's Womaniquin won awards for her writing, cultivated new talent
in her home country of the Philippines, and helped form

(00:47):
the ever evolving variety of Philippine English. Oh and if
you've ever gone to a nail salon and asked for
a manny petty, you've got her to think for that too.
Let's talk about Korema Pulutan Tuvera Karima was born in Holo,

(01:13):
Sulu in the Philippines on December sixteenth, nineteen twenty five.
Her family moved frequently all over the islands thanks to
her father's army job. After graduating high school, she enrolled
in a nursing program, but eventually she transferred to Ariano University,
where she studied writing. In nineteen fifty two, Kareema published

(01:33):
her short story The Virgin. It tells the story of
a woman who, after dedicating her life to caring for
her family, finds herself a thirty four year old virgin,
until fate traps her and an attractive carpenter together during
a rainstorm. The short story won first prize in the
Philippines Free Press Literary Contest. It was also the first

(01:56):
of her works to win the prestigious Carlos Planka Award.
She'd Wut It Again. In nineteen fifty six, fifty nine,
sixty sixty one, and sixty six, Karima married Juan to Vera,
a speech writer for the then President and Dictator of
the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos. They had ten kids together. Interestingly,

(02:18):
in the nineteen sixties, Kareema herself began writing for The
Philippines Free Press, a weekly English news magazine critical of
the Marcos regime and one of the first publications closed
after he imposed martial law. Karima also published a biography
a first Lady, Immeldo Marcos, just a month after Karrema
married Juan, her father died. His death inspired passages in

(02:42):
her nineteen seventy one book of select works, Author's Choice.
In it, she recalled her trip home after hearing of
her father's death. I broke open a coconut shell into
which I'd been dropping coins and bought a ticket for home.
I told myself that if I prayed NonStop from Manila
to the province, my old man would be alive. When

(03:02):
I got there, I saw my brother's face and knew
my father was dead alright. In the nineteen seventies, Karema
started her own weekly magazine called Focus. She continued to
publish fiction, journalism, and essays. It was in one of
those essays, in a nineteen seventy two article in the
Philippines Daily Express, that she coined a phrase while describing

(03:23):
women's beauty trends summer as driving the ladies into the
beauty shops where they sit being mannied and pettied. Just
like that, Kareema gave a name to the bread and
butter of nail salons. Kareema's many petty became part of
the vocabulary of Philippine or Filipino English, a unique variety
of English developed by native speakers of both English and

(03:44):
Filipino like Kareema. In twenty fifteen, the Oxford English Dictionary
added several words of Filipino English to their newest edition,
among them carnapp, comfort room, balik bayon, and of course,
attributing the first use of many petty to Korea IMA's
nineteen seventy two article. In the later portion of her career,

(04:05):
Kareema became editor publisher of The Evening Post newspaper. She
ran a tight ship, allegedly finding her own paper when
a grammatical or factual error made it to print, but
she didn't seem to relish the shift from writer to publisher.
She wrote of her new post trapped in an office
swamped with paperwork, pinned down by infuriating details, pulled every

(04:26):
which way by the ceaseless importuning of people. I think
there is no sadder death for a writer than to
end up as an executive. Karreema died on August nineteenth,
twenty eleven. She was eighty five years old. She didn't
die known solely as the editor of The Evening Post,
or as the founder of Focus magazine, or as the

(04:48):
award winning author of several books. She made her mark
in many ways, a prolific writer and one of the
many voices shaping language through Philippine literature. In two thousand
and five, a collect of Kareima's vintage essays were published
under the name The True and the Plain, exposing her
work to a new generation of readers. All month, we're

(05:12):
talking about word weavers. For more information, find us on
Facebook and Instagram at Wamanica Podcast special thanks to Liz Kaplan,
my favorite sister and co creator. Talk to you tomorrow.