Today’s blog post will take us to the Philippines and its national language, Tagalog or Filipino (Pilipino). Tagalog is an Austronesian language, the language family that also includes languages such as Malay, Bahasa Indonesia, Malagasy and Hawaiian to name but a few. The name Tagalog itself derives from ‘taga-ilog’, which means river dweller. Filipino, the national languages of the Philippines, was developed as a lingua franca in the 1930s, and Tagalog, a language spoken predominantly in Manila and Central and South Luzon, was chosen as its base, into which words and elements from other Phillipine languages were then incorporated. Tagalog vocabulary includes a wealth of words from Spanish and English, and the words for numbers, days of the week and for months are actually loanwords from Spanish, but spelled in Filipino.
Here are some ‘survival phrases’ in Tagalog 🙂 :
Kumusta                                     Hello
Babay                                        Goodbye
Salamat                                     Thank you
Walang anuman                        You’re welcome
Ako si…..                                  My name is……
Oo                                            Yes
Hindi                                         No
Hindi ko naiintindihan               I don’t understand
Sori                                           Sorry
Eksyus mi                                Excuse me
Kumusta po kayo?                   How are you?
Mabuti po                                I’m fine
Tagalog has also contributed some words to the English language. Some words of Tagalog-origin commonly used in English are:
Ylang-ylang     a tropical tree with yellow flowers from the Phillipines, from which a fragrance is derived
Capiz                 a shiny oyster shell, which is used in the production of crafts
Abaca               a type of hemp fibre made from the Abaca-plant, a plant in the banana family
Cogon              a type of grass used for thatching, from the word kugon (a species of tall grass)
Boondocks      a word meaning ‘rural’ or ‘backcountry’ in English, which is derived from a mispronunciation of the word bundok (“mountain”)
The appropriate word for ‘Sorry’ and ‘Excuse Me’ are ‘Patawad’ and ‘Makikiraan’, respectively. ‘Sori’ and ‘Eksyus Me’ are informal. Hehe. Do you speak Filipino too?
Thank you for the information. Yes, I do speak some basic Tagalog (conversational level), but not that well yet, but I hope to improve my knowledge of it in the future. 🙂
Good luck with that! How many languages do you know so far?
Salamat 🙂 . I have studied more than 40 languages so far, and speak about 15 of them at an advanced level (at least B2 or higher), and another 8 or so at intermediate level (B1-B2), all the others only at basic or conversational level so far, but I want to improve all of them in the future. Tagalog is still one of my “weakest” languages…
Good luck! Conquer the world of linguistics! Hehe.
You might find Filipino very interesting for our language has deep connections with Spanish, Chinese, and English (since you’re focus is on European and Asian languages. Good luck!
Salamat 🙂 I find Filipino indeed very interesting because of these connections with these languages.
Thank you for considering Filipino language (Tagalog)! Salamat! I’m a Filipino.
You can also visit my blog. Most of my posts are written in Tagalog.
I will 🙂 – good reading practise to hone my skills!