Girish Mahajan (Editor)

Filipino language

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Pronunciation
  
[ˌfɪl.ɪˈpiː.no]

Official language in
  
Native to
  
Philippines

Filipino language

Native speakers
  
(see Tagalog)L2: 45 million (2013)Total: 70 million

Language family
  
AustronesianMalayo-PolynesianPhilippineCentral PhilippineTagalogFilipino

Filipino /ˌfɪlɪˈpn/ (Filipino [ˌfɪl.ɪˈpiː.no] or Wikang Filipino), in this usage, refers to the national language of the Philippines. Filipino is also designated, along with English, as an official language of the country. It is the standard register of the Tagalog language, an Austronesian, regional language that is widely spoken in the Philippines. As of 2007, Tagalog is the first language of 28 million people, or about one-third of the Philippine population, while 45 million speak Filipino as their second language. Filipino is among the 185 languages of the Philippines identified in the Ethnologue. Officially, Filipino is defined by the Commission on the Filipino Language (Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino in Filipino or simply KWF) as "the native language, spoken and written, in Metro Manila, the National Capital Region, and in other urban centers of the archipelago."

Contents

Map of Philippines

Filipino is ideally a pluricentric language. Indeed, there have been observed "emerging varieties of Filipino which deviate from the grammatical properties of Tagalog" in Cebu, Davao City and Iloilo which together with Metro Manila form the three largest metropolitan areas in the Philippines. In reality, however, Filipino has been variously described as "simply Tagalog in syntax and grammar, with no grammatical element or lexicon coming from ... other major Philippine languages," and as "essentially a formalized version of Tagalog." In most contexts, Filipino is understood to be an alternative name for Tagalog, or the Metro Manila dialect of Tagalog.

History

There was no common language in the Philippine archipelago when the Spanish arrived in the 16th century. The four major trade languages were Visayan, Kapampangan, Pangasinan and Ilocano. As the Philippine languages are all closely related and therefore easy for Filipinos to learn, most speakers of smaller languages spoke two or more of such regional languages.

The first dictionary of Tagalog was written by the Franciscan Pedro de San Buenaventura, and published in 1613 by the "Father of Filipino Printing" Tomas Pinpin in Pila, Laguna. A latter book of the same name was written by Czech Jesuit missionary Paul Klein at the beginning of the 18th century. Klein spoke Tagalog and used it actively in several of his books. He wrote the first dictionary, which he later passed over to Francisco Jansens and José Hernandez. Further compilation of his substantial work was prepared by Juan de Noceda and Pedro de Sanlucar and published as Vocabulario de la Lengua Tagala in Manila in 1754 and then repeatedly re-edited with the last edition being in 2013 in Manila.

On November 13, 1936, Commonwealth act No. 184 created the National Language Institute and tasked it with making a study and survey of each existing native language, hoping to choose which was to be the base for a standardized national language. On November 12, 1937, the First National Assembly of the Philippine Commonwealth approved the law for the establishment of the Surián ng Wikang Pambansâ (National Language Institute; NLI). This institute would be responsible for surveying and researching existing native languages in order to determine among them the basis for an artificial 'national language of the Philippines'. Then-president Manuel L. Quezon later appointed representatives for each major regional language to form NLI. Led by Jaime C. De Veyra, who sat as the chair of the Institute and as the representative of Samar-Leyte-Visayans, the Institute's members were composed of Santiago A. Fonacier (representing the Ilokano-speaking regions), Filemon Sotto (the Cebu-Visayans), Casimiro Perfecto (the Bikolanos), Felix S. Sales Rodriguez (the Panay-Visayans), Hadji Butu (the languages of Filipino Muslims), and Cecilio Lopez (the Tagalogs).

On December 13, 1937, Presisis of the new 'national language,' Quezon issued Executive order No. 134, s. 1937, approving the adoption of Tagalog as the language of the Philippines', and declared and proclaimed the national language so based on the Tagalog dialect as the national language of the Philippines. On December 31 of the same year, Quezon proclaimed Tagalog as the basis of the Wikang Pambansâ (National Language) based on the following factors:

  1. Tagalog is widely spoken and is the most understood in all the Philippine Regions;
  2. It is not divided into smaller daughter languages, as Visayan or Bikol are;
  3. Its literary tradition is the richest of all native Philippine languages, the most developed and extensive (mirroring that of the Tuscan language vis-à-vis Italian). More books are written in Tagalog than in any other autochthonous Philippine language but Spanish, but this is mainly by virtue of law and privilege;
  4. Tagalog has always been the language of Manila, the political and economic center of the Philippines during the Spanish and American eras.
  5. Spanish was the language of the 1896 Revolution and the Katipunan, but the revolution was led by people who also spoke Tagalog.

In 1959, the language became known as Pilipino in an effort to dissociate it from the Tagalog ethnic group.

The 1973 Constitution, in both its original form and as amended in 1976, designated English and Pilipino as official languages and provided for development and formal adoption of a common national language, termed Filipino, to replace Pilipino. However, neither the original nor the amended version specified either Tagalog or Pilipino as the basis for Filipino. Instead they tasked the National Assembly to:

take steps toward the development and formal adoption of a common national language to be known as Filipino.

This move has drawn much criticism from the nation's other ethnic groups.

In 1987, a new constitution designated Filipino as the national language and, along with English, as an official language. That constitution included several provisions related to the Filipino language.

Article XIV, Section 6, omits any mention of Tagalog as the basis for Filipino, and states that:

as Filipino evolves, it shall be further developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine and other languages.

And also states in the article:

Subject to provisions of law and as the Congress may deem appropriate, the Government shall take steps to initiate and sustain the use of Filipino as a medium of official communication and as language of instruction in the educational system.

and:

The regional languages are the auxiliary official languages in the regions and shall serve as auxiliary media of instruction therein.

Republic Act No. 7104, approved on August 14, 1991, created the Commission on the Filipino Language, reporting directly to the President and tasked to undertake, coordinate and promote researches for the development, propagation and preservation of Filipino and other Philippine languages. On May 13, 1992, the commission issued Resolution 92-1, specifying that Filipino is the

indigenous written and spoken language of Metro Manila and other urban centers in the Philippines used as the language of communication of ethnic groups.

However, as with the 1973 and 1987 Constitutions, 92-1 neither went so far as to categorically identify nor dis-identify this language as Tagalog. Definite, absolute, and unambiguous interpretation of 92-1 is the prerogative of the Supreme Court in the absence of directives from the KWF, otherwise the sole legal arbiter of the Filipino language.

Filipino was presented and registered with the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), by Ateneo de Manila University student Martin Gomez, and was added to the ISO registry of languages on September 21, 2004 with it receiving the ISO 639-2 code fil. In June 2007, Ricardo Maria Nolasco, Chair of the Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino (Commission on the Filipino Language), acknowledged that Filipino was simply Tagalog in syntax and grammar, with as yet no grammatical element or lexicon coming from Ilokano, Cebuano, Hiligaynon, or any of the other Philippine languages. He said further that this is contrary to the intention of Republic Act No. 7104 that requires that the national language be developed and enriched by the lexicon of the country's other languages, something that the commission is working towards. On 24 August 2007, Nolasco elaborated further on the relationship between Tagalog and Filipino in a separate article, as follows:

Are "Tagalog," "Pilipino" and "Filipino" different languages? No, they are mutually intelligible varieties, and therefore belong to one language. According to the KWF, Filipino is that speech variety spoken in Metro Manila and other urban centers where different ethnic groups meet. It is the most prestigious variety of Tagalog and the language used by the national mass media.

The other yardstick for distinguishing a language from a dialect is: different grammar, different language. "Filipino", "Pilipino" and "Tagalog" share identical grammar. They have the same determiners (ang, ng and sa); the same personal pronouns (siya, ako, niya, kanila, etc.); the same demonstrative pronouns (ito, iyan, doon, etc.); the same linkers (na, at and ay); the same particles (na and pa); and the same verbal affixes -in, -an, i- and -um-. In short, same grammar, same language.

On 22 August 2007, it was reported that three Malolos City regional trial courts in Bulacan decided to use Filipino, instead of English, in order to promote the national language. Twelve stenographers from Branches 6, 80 and 81, as model courts, had undergone training at Marcelo H. del Pilar College of Law of Bulacan State University following a directive from the Supreme Court of the Philippines. De la Rama said it was the dream of Chief Justice Reynato Puno to implement the program in other areas such as Laguna, Cavite, Quezon, Nueva Ecija, Batangas, Rizal, and Metro Manila.

Filipino vs. Tagalog

In practical terms, Filipino is the official name of Tagalog, or even a synonym of it. Today's Filipino language is best described as "Tagalog-based". Use of term Filipino in this context is a metalepsis which suggests metaphorically that the national language is based on an amalgam of Philippine languages rather than on Tagalog alone. The language is usually called Tagalog within the Philippines and among Filipinos to differentiate it from other Philippine languages, but it has also come to be known as Filipino to differentiate it from the languages of other countries; the former implies a regional origin, the latter a national. This is similar to the use of names given to the Spanish language: Castilian tends to be used within Spain, and Spanish in international settings.

In connection with the use of Filipino, or specifically the promotion of the national language, the related term Tagalista is frequently used. While the word Tagalista literally means "one who specializes in Tagalog language or culture" or a "Tagalog specialist", in the context of the debates on the national language and "Imperial Manila", the word Tagalista is used as a reference to "people who promote or would promote the primacy of Tagalog at the expense of [the] other [Philippine] indigenous tongues".

In academic contexts, Tagalog may be written with diacritics, but this is generally ignored with Filipino. Filipino is constitutionally designated as the national language of the Philippines and, along with English, is one of the two official languages.

References

Filipino language Wikipedia