rich in words..
By caramelized
@caramelized (31)
Philippines
September 10, 2009 10:13pm CST
Our language for me is so expressive and full of life. We have a lot of expressions. and One word means another if used in another sentence.
Some words of ours can't even be translated in english. You know what i mean right? I have an american friend who wants to really talk tagalog and i can't really translate or explain to him some tagalog words.
and what about the different dialects in our country? i envy those who know and can talk 2 dialects. i only know and speak a little and not sentences.
it would be really cool for ilocanos to teach aklanons their dialect and vice versa or any other region (i can't look for a better word for this.. HELP?) so that filipinos would be called polyglot conversants (i saw this in wikipedia. thought i could adapt it. ahaha)
2 people like this
5 responses
@aylim14 (501)
• Philippines
11 Sep 09
Yes i do believe that the Philippines has a rich culture, that has evolved in more ways than one because of the series of wars and foreign occupation we encountered in the past. Yes, we are also fast learners especially that of a new language. We are also very adaptable to any situation where we are in.
But, i do not believe that we have a rich vocabulary as you say we have. Well, at least not the Filipino language. Because of one aspect that was brought up to my back when i was in college.
The Filipino language, our national language, has numerous and contain words that are just used twice. Sorry for our non-Filipino members here but here are some examples:
bola-bola : meat balls, or any ball-type foods
kili-kili: armpit
ngala-ngala: palate (am i right here?)
kuko/kuku/koko: nails (depends on how you pronounce it)
and many other parts of the body (private parts) or food or any other things. You see, these is an example of how the Filipinos are complacent with their language and have turned from being a language that is rich, into a language that just borrows from another language, and does not create or come up with words that are their own.
@agv0419 (3022)
• Philippines
11 Sep 09
I also agree that our language is very rich and it is good to listen at than to the other language. Aside from Tagalog we also have many dialects. My parents are both Ilonggos so I can understand Ilonggo and speak little also so whenever I go for vacation to Iloilo or Bacolod understanding the locals there is not difficult for me they can't make fun of me. There's an incident that I understood what the man said about my mother he spoke Cebuano what he said was very offensive in my part. I told it to my mother he thought that I couln't able to understand what he said. We can easily learn new language and some says that we have international tongue. Our language have a mixes of Chinese, Malay, Indian, Spanish and English. Sometimes it is hard to translate Tagalog words that don't have an English translation.
@caramelized (31)
• Philippines
12 Sep 09
Hmmnn.. maybe it is not daily used anymore by youth or filipinos but there are words, our words, that are not repetitive. I use it sometimes though to emphasize my point with friends. Maybe because i read a lot of tagalog books (fiction or not) or i watch soaps in the evening that's why i know some. LOL.
and do you wonder why we have to have a filipino subject in our school? may it be elementary, high school or even college? For me that's how extensive and rich our language is.. we have to study them for a decade or more..
@moneymakingtoday (4061)
• Philippines
11 Sep 09
the philippines is land of varied interests and dialects. it is interesting to note that different groups of islands have different dialects according to where they are located.
a tagalog word may mean differently in cebuano. for example, if u say "langgam" in tagalog, it would mean "ant". but in the cebuano dialect, "langgam" would mean "bird".
to reasons of fun, they would say that the "langgam" in tagalog is crawling while the "langgam" in cebuano, is already flying..
isn't it interesting?
but, it is worth to note that we are one as a nation and we are one in one national language, the filipino (it was named tagalog before, right?)
isn't it interesting?
but, it is worth to note that we are one as a nation and we are one in one national language, the filipino (it was named tagalog before, right?)@moneymakingtoday (4061)
• Philippines
11 Sep 09
erratum... that should read ... "for" (instead of "to") reasons of fun.. (6th sentence pls)
@rsa101 (38166)
• Philippines
11 Sep 09
Yup our language has evolve for some time already. If you would look at our language 50 years ago it has already change already. Since our culture is very close to Americans we have some words that sounded like English already and we have this Taglish(Tagalog-english dialect). If you would hear our forefathers you would indeed see a striking difference between then and now. In Visayas there are many dialects indeed there is the dominant Cebuanos, Ilonggos and many others. That is why we Filipinos are indeed rich in terms of vocabulary since there are many sub dialects besides Tagalog or Filipino language we all know.
@Eisenherz (2908)
• Portugal
12 Sep 09
Yeah, most of other languages, other than english can be really hard to translate into the most spoken language in the world becasue they have such unique details. So I'm proud of my language as well just like you (portuguese) but always looking to improve my enlgish, since it's also such a great language.
@grace12bueno (140)
• Philippines
13 Sep 09
Not only that, because everyday there is a new word being added to our dictionary. And our language is really amazing. We Filipinos are really smart for coining words from different languages.
