| Cotabato Province |
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Information AboutCotabato Province |
ECONOMY GEOGRAPHY Political Cotabato is subdivided into 17 Municipalities and 1 City . Cities Municipalities
Physical HISTORY The name "Cotabato" is derived from the Maguindanao words ''kuta wato'', meaning "stone front". The former province of Cotabato was once the largest in the Philippines. In 1966 , South Cotabato was branched off as a separate province. On November 22 , 1973 , a Presidential Decree divided the remaining province into North Cotabato, Maguindanao , and Sultan Kudarat . North Cotabato was renamed Cotabato on December 19 , 1983 . PEOPLE AND CULTURE Cotabato province is home to a fascinating culture that revolves around Kulintang music, a specific type of gong music, found among both Muslim and non-Muslim groups of the Southern Philippines. Kulintang music functions as main community unifier, where all of the community can come to engage in events such as weddings, birthday celebrations and festivals to dignitary engagements and pilgrimages to and from Mecca . At home, such music unifies and solidifies family ties as family members take to playing after dinner. Kulintang music also plays a vital role as the accompaniment to healing dances, as long-distance communication between members (They have the ability to use the Gandingan , also known as the ‘talking gongs,’ to communicate from far away long before the invention of the telephone), and as a social conduit for young people (Interactions between opposite sexes were not allowed except though such instruments). Kulintang ensembles among those of the Southern Philippines are usually composed of five pieces of instrumentation. Among the Maguindanao, this would include: the Kulintang (strung out horizontally on a stand, serving as the main melody instrument of the ensemble), the Agung (the largest gongs of the ensemble providing much of the lower beats, either coming in a pair of two or just one alone), the Gandingan (four large vertical gongs aligned front to back, used as a secondary melodic instrument), the Dabakan (an hour-glass shaped drum covered in goat/lizard skin) and the Babendil (a singular gong used as the timekeeper of the entire ensemble). REFERENCES EXTERNAL LINKS |
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