Tagalog
History
The word Tagalog derived from tagailog, from tagá- meaning "native of" and ílogmeaning "river". Thus, it means "river dweller". Very little is known about the history of the language. However, according to linguists such as Dr. David Zorc and Dr. Robert Blust, the Tagalogs originated, along with their Central Philippine cousins, from Northeastern Mindanao or Eastern Visayas.[5][6]
The first written record of Tagalog is in the Laguna Copperplate Inscription, written in the year 900, using fragments of the language along with Sanskrit,Malay, and Javanese. Meanwhile, the first known book to be written in Tagalog is the Doctrina Cristiana (Christian Doctrine) of 1593. It was written in Spanish and two transcriptions of Tagalog; one in the Baybayin script and the other inLatin script. Throughout the 333 years of Spanish occupation, there were grammar and dictionaries written by Spanish clergymen such as Vocabulario de la Lengua Tagala by Pedro de San Buenaventura (Pila, Laguna, 1613), Vocabulario de la lengua tagala (1835) and Arte de la lengua tagala y manual tagalog para la administración de los Santos Sacramentos (1850). Poet Francisco Baltazar (1788–1862) is regarded as the foremost Tagalog writer. His most notable work is the early 19th-century Florante at Laura.
[edit]Historical changes
Tagalog differs from its Central Philippine counterparts with its treatment of the Proto-Philippine schwa vowel *ə. In Bikol & Visayan, this sound merged with /u/ and [o]. In Tagalog, it has merged with /i/. For example, Proto-Philippine *dəkət (adhere, stick) is Tagalog dikítand Visayan & Bikol dukot.
Proto-Philippine *r, *j, and *z merged with /d/ but is /l/ between vowels. Proto-Philippine *ŋɡajan (name) and *hajək (kiss) became Tagalog ngalan and halík.
Proto-Philippine *R merged with /ɡ/. *tubiR (water) and *zuRuʔ (blood) became Tagalog tubig and dugô.
[edit]Official status
Main article: Filipino language
Tagalog was declared the official language by the first constitution in the Philippines, the Constitution of Biak-na-Bato in 1897.[7]
In 1935, the Philippine constitution designated English and Spanish as official languages, but mandated the development and adoption of a common national language based on one of the existing native languages.[8] After study and deliberation, the National Language Institute, a committee composed of seven members who represented various regions in the Philippines, chose Tagalog as the basis for the evolution and adoption of the national language of the Philippines.[9][10] President Manuel L. Quezon then, on December 30, 1937, proclaimed the selection of the Tagalog language to be used as the basis for the evolution and adoption of the national language of the Philippines.[9] In 1939 President Quezon renamed the proposed Tagalog-based national language as wikang pambansâ (national language).[10] In 1959, the language was further renamed as "Pilipino".[10]
The 1973 constitution designated the Tagalog-based "Pilipino", along with English, as an official language and mandated the development and formal adoption of a common national language to be known as Filipino.[11] The 1987 constitution designated Filipino as the national language, mandating that as it evolves, it shall be further developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine and other languages.[12] However, in practice, Filipino is simply Tagalog.[13]
Article XIV, Section 7 of the 1987 Constitution of the Philippines specifies, in part:
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.—[12]
The regional languages are the auxiliary official languages in the regions and shall serve as auxiliary media of instruction therein.—[12]
In 2009, the Department of Education promulgated an order institutionalizing a system of mother-tongue based multilingual education ("MLE"), wherein instruction is conducted primarily in a student's mother tongue until at least grade three, with additional languages such as Filipino and English being introduced as separate subjects no earlier than grade two. In secondary school, Filipino and English become the primary languages of instruction, with the learner's first language taking on an auxiliary role.[14]
[edit]Tagalog and Filipino
In 1937, Tagalog was selected as the basis of the national language of the Philippines by the National Language Institute. In 1939, Manuel L. Quezon named the national language "Wikang Pambansâ" ("National Language").[9][15] Twenty years later, in 1959, it was renamed by then Secretary of Education, José Romero, as Pilipino to give it a national rather than ethnic label and connotation. The changing of the name did not, however, result in acceptance among non-Tagalogs, especially Cebuanos who had not accepted the selection.[10]
In 1971, the language issue was revived once more, and a compromise solution was worked out—a "universalist" approach to the national language, to be called Filipino rather than Pilipino. When a new constitution was drawn up in 1987, it named Filipino as the national language.[10] The constitution specified that as the Filipino language evolves, it shall be further developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine and other languages. However, more than two decades after the institution of the "universalist" approach, there seems to be little if any difference between Tagalog and Filipino.
[edit]Classification
Tagalog is a Central Philippine language within the Austronesian language family. Being Malayo-Polynesian, it is related to other Austronesian languages such as Malagasy, Javanese,Indonesian, Malay, Tetum (of Timor), and Tao language (of Taiwan). It is closely related to the languages spoken in the Bicol and Visayas regions such as Bikol and the Visayan group includingHiligaynon and Cebuano.
Languages that have made significant contributions to Tagalog vocabulary are especially Spanish and English.
[edit]Dialects
At present, no comprehensive dialectology has been done in the Tagalog-speaking regions, though there have been descriptions in the form of dictionaries and grammars on various Tagalog dialects. Ethnologue lists Lubang, Manila, Marinduque, Bataan, Batangas, Bulacan, Tanay-Paete, and Tayabas as dialects of Tagalog. However, there appear to be four main dialects of which the aforementioned are a part; Northern (exemplified by the Bulacan dialect), Central (including Manila), Southern (exemplified by Batangas), and Marinduque.
Some example of dialectal differences are:
- Many Tagalog dialects, particularly those in the south, preserve the glottal stop found after consonants and before vowels. This has been lost in standard Tagalog. For example standard Tagalog ngayon (now, today), sinigang (broth stew), gabi (night), matamis (sweet), are pronounced and written ngay-on, sinig-ang, gab-i, and matam-is in other dialects.
- In Teresian-Morong Tagalog, [ɾ] is usually preferred over [d]. For example, bundók, dagat, dingdíng, and isdâ become bunrók, ragat, ringríng, and isrâ, as well as their expression seen in some signages like "sandok sa dingdíng" was changed to "sanrok sa ringríng".
- In many southern dialects, the progressive aspect infix of -um- verbs is na-. For example, standard Tagalog kumakain (eating) is nákáin in Quezon and Batangas Tagalog. This is the butt of some jokes by other Tagalog speakers since a phrase such as nakain ka ba ng pating is interpreted as "did a shark eat you?" by those from Manila, but means "do you eat shark?" in the south.
- Some dialects have interjections which are considered a trademark of their region. For example, the interjection ala e! usually identifies someone from Batangas as does hane?! in Rizal and Quezon provinces.
Perhaps the most divergent Tagalog dialects are those spoken in Marinduque. Linguist Rosa Soberano identifies two dialects, western and eastern, with the former being closer to the Tagalog dialects spoken in the provinces of Batangas and Quezon.
One example is the verb conjugation paradigms. While some of the affixes are different, Marinduque also preserves the imperative affixes, also found in Visayan and Bikol languages, that have mostly disappeared from most Tagalog dialects by the early 20th century; they have since merged with the infinitive.
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