Filipino phrasebook Attractions & Activities - The Best Holiday Destinations for 2020
Filipino is the national language of the Philippines. More or less the standard version of Tagalog, based on Tagalog (which in turn is partially based on the Malay language), Spanish, and English, Filipino is spoken by about 90 million people worldwide. Due to European influence in the Philippines, Filipino is one of the few languages in East Asia to use the Latin alphabet, others countries in the region that have languages using the same alphabet include Vietnam, Indonesia, Brunei, Singapore, East Timor, Malaysia as well as the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau in China. Baybayin, the pre-colonial writing system is usually taught in schools but not commonly used in everyday life though the use of the script is growing in popularity and efforts are being made to revive it.
The main difference with its grammar is that it is not word-order transitive like English. For example, the sentence Jill gives the book to Tom in Tagalog can't tell who is giving to whom without the personal markers si and ni. If an actor focus verb is used, Jill becomes si Jill (the subject), and Tom becomes ni Tom (the object). If a non-actor focus verb is used, then si and ni are reversed. This works something like active and passive voice in English, but neither form would seem passive in Tagalog.
People learning Filipino should take note that translations for the to be verbs, such as am, are, is may be confusing. This can be overcome in one of several ways:
- Use "ay" or "ay mga"
- This is may or may not be a verb depending on each person, but means "is equal to" but some Filipinos may consider this as a linking verb. Use "ay" for before singular nouns and use "ay mga" to indicate noun plurality.
- Use "may" or "may mga"
- This is a verb which can mean "there is/are" or "has/have" (beginning of sentence only). Use "may" for before singular nouns and use "may mga" to indicate noun plurality.
- Skip it
- Where not absolutely needed for meaning, it can be omitted--even though this sounds awful in English. Sino siya? literally who he? (or who she?)
The good news regarding word order in Filipino is that you can juggle the words just about any which way and still be understood (assuming the personal markers are attached to the correct person). Also, it's easy to substitute similar words within simple sentences like those found in this phrasebook. However, the bad news is that proper word order has a steep learning curve and can be affected even by the number of syllables. Also, Filipino is notorious for its large number of complicated verb forms which require several words in English.
The Most Frequently Asked Travel Questions about Filipino phrasebook
