Grounded in a detailed analysis of the lives and works of Pedro Patern, T.H. Pardo de Tavera, and Isabel de los Reyes, the book is a richly textured portrait of a generation that created the self-consciousness of the Filipino nation. It explores the historical conditions that shaped the emergence of a modern Philippine intelligentsia and the unfinished, strange and wondrous itineraries diverse intellectuals took in engaging Western knowledge and dealing with the local realities of the country from, of, and for which they tried or pretended to speak. Brains of the nation is a groundbreaking work in Philippine intellectual history.
