This entry is the seventh and last in a series of articles in the first annual Seven-Day Salita Blogathon. For more information, please see this entry.
The third book I bought from SIL was Languages of the Southern Gateway. It is basically a polyglot phrasebook intended for those going to western Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago.
Since this book was first printed in 1979 and reprinted two times in the 1980's, I am not going to review it. Instead, I am just going to publish excerpts so you guys can get an idea on how the languages spoken in this area are like.
The languages are:
Tagalog - we all know this one.
Chabacano - the Philippine Creole Spanish spoken in Zamboanga, in particular.
Sinama (Samal) - A Sama-Bajaw language spoken in parts of Borneo and the Sulu Archipelago. This book focuses on the Siasi (Central) dialect.
Yakan - Another Sama-Bajaw language spoken mainly in Basilan province.
Tausug - A Southern Visayan language; genetically closer to Tagalog than any of the languages in this region but heavily influenced by them.
What I found particularly interesting in this book is that the apostrophe in Sinama has two uses. First, it represents the glottal stop. And second, it represents the "schwa" vowel (actually high back unrounded). It's easy to tell them apart, according to the book. If the apostrophe is between two vowels, then it's the glottal stop. if it's between two consonants, then it's the vowel. I wonder if there are any occasional disambuguities? For example, is there a word that consists of BOTH the glottal stop and this particular vowel consecutively?
Here are some examples of its use in Sinama. It makes clear the schwa vowel is /o/ in northern dialects so it offers that alternative for foreigners who cannot pronounce it.
b'ttong - stomach
d'nda - woman
d'ppa - fathom
l'lla - man
a'a - person
kello' - crooked
magka'at - ruined
ta'u - know
Eng: What place are you from? I live in Malaybalay, in Bukidnon.
Tag: Taga-saan kayo? Nakatira ako sa Malaybalay, Bukidnon.
Cha: De donde lugar tu? De Malaybalay, na Bukidnon.
Sin: Maingga lahatnu? Iya lahatku ma Malaybalay, Bukidnon.
Tau: Dayn diin kaw? In hula' ku ha Malaybalay, Bukidnon.
Yak: Antag lahatnun? Lahatkun la'i si Malaybalay si Bukidnon.
Eng: I do not understand.
Tag: Hindi ko nauunawaan.
Cha: Hende you ta entende.
Sin: Mbal aku makahati.
Tau: Di' aku makahati.
Yak: Ga'i tasabutku.
Eng: Open the door. Close the window.
Tag: Bukisan mo ang pinto. Isara mo ang bintana.
Cha: Abri el puerta. Cerra el ventana.
Sin: Ukabun lawang. Tambolun tandawan.
Tau: Ukaba in lawang. Tambula in tandawan.
Yak: Lukahun ko' gawangin. Dindingun tendewanin.
Eng: Have you just recently arrived? Yes, I came just yesterday from Zamboanga.
Tag: Bago ko lamang dumating? opo, kahapon lamang ako dumating galing sa Zamboanga.
Cha: Ahora lang ba tu ya llega? Si, ayer lang yo llega de Zamboanga.
Sin: Baha'u kat'kkanu? Aho', iyampa aku at'kka di'ilaw min Sambuangan.
Tau: Iyan pa kaw dimatung? Huun. Dimatung aku kahapun dayn ha Zamboanga.
Yak: Ba'ahu du tekkanun? Awe', d'ilew du tekkakun amban Sembuwangan.
Eng: Your child is beautiful. So healthy.
Tag: Maganda ang iyong anak. Malusog.
Cha: Bonito di tuyo anak. Bien gordo. (WHAT??)
Sin: Alingkat anaknu. Al'mmok isab.
Tau: Malingkat in anak mu. Matambuk tuud (this one means fat too)
Yak: Hap anaknun, lemmek.
Eng: May I borrow your pen for a moment?
Tag: Pahiramin nga ang ball pen ninyo sandali?
Cha: Puede yo presta tu bolpen un rato?
Sin: Makajari aku angindam bolpennu dai'dai'?
Tau: Makajari aku mamus sin bulpin mu hangkarai'?
Yak: Indamanun ku ko' bolpen.
Eng: She is upstairs but her mother is downstairs.
Tag: Siya ay nasa itaas, ang nanay niya ay nasa baba.
Cha: Talla le na arriba'y casa, pero su nana taqui abajo.
Sin: Wa'i iya mariyata', bo ina'na wa'i mareo'.
Tau: Yadtu siya ha taas ba sa' in ina' niya yaun ha baba'.
Yak: La'i iye diyata' luma', sa'inen tu'u diyawa'.
Eng: You're late; the ship has gone.
Tag: Huli na kayo! Umalis na ang bapor!
Cha: Atarasao ya tu; ya sale el barco.
Sin: Atrasaw kam. Wa'i na kappal.
Tau: Natarasaw kaw. Timulak na in kappal.
Yak: Tarasaw kew. Patulak ne kappalin.
Eng: Show me the way to the market.
Tag: Ituro mo sa akin ang daan patungo sa palengke.
Cha: Enseña conmigo el camino para na tiangue.
Sin: Panduin aku kono' lan tudu ni tabu'?
Tau: Haunu in dan pa tabu'?
Yak: Panoanun ku ko' lan hap tiyanggihin.
Eng: Where are you going? To the market. I am going to buy fish.
Tag: Saan po kayo pupunta? Sa palengke. Bibili ako ng isda.
Cha: Donde man tu anda? Na tiangue. Ay compra yo pescao.
Sin: Piinga ka ilu? Ni tabu' aku. Am'lli aku daing.
Tau: Pakain kaw? Pa tabu'. Mami aku ista'.
Yak: Tungan kew? Hap tiyanggi ku. Tiya'ku melli kenna.
Eng: You speak English well!
Tag: Mahusay kayo magsalita ng Inggles!
Cha: Ta conversa tu Ingles buenamente!
Sin: Ata'u toongan ka amisala Ingglis!
Tau: Matu'lid kaw magbissara bahasa Anggalis!
Yak: Ta'u kew teed magininglis!
Showing posts with label book reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book reviews. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Saturday, August 06, 2005
Book Review: Central Tagbanwa
This entry is the fourth in a series of articles in the first annual Seven-Day Salita Blogathon. For more information, please see this entry.
The second book I ordered from SIL is Central Tagbanwa: A Philippine Language on the Brink of Extinction by Robert Scebold.
Central Tagbanwa is a language spoken in northern Palawan. It is a member of the Meso-Philippine group of languages. Other branches in this family include the Central Philippine languages, which is a very large group of widespread and well-known languages such as Tagalog, Cebuano, and Bikol. Ethnologue reports that 2,000 people spoke it in 1985. According to Scebold on page 7, he "estimated the total Tagbanwa population to be between 800 and 1000." While the number reduced by 50%. But there are a couple of caveats. The Philippine census counts 16,300 Tagbanwa speakers, however there are different varieties of Tagbanwa. Also, there may be other Tagbanwas outside the area he researched. Despite this, the results are alarming.
I care about language extinction. And I care for their preservation and the rights of their respective speakers to use them in any possible way. In 163 pages this book succeeds in its two missions - to give us a detailed status of the language as well as to describe the languages for those of us language geeks who are interested in such things.
In the first two chapters, he gives important background on Central Tagbanwa's history and present situation. Interestingly enough, he says that two SIL linguists "discovered" the language in the course of their research in 1979. He places the blame on why Central Tagbanwa is a language destined to death. He points to other Filipinos who migrated to Palawan. He also points to the American presence and education system from 1898-1946. He also points to the Japanese occupation during WWII. In chapter two he outlines his methods for getting a rough estimate of Central Tagbanwa speakers. Three Central Tagbanwa are presented as case histories. Also, most of Scebold's research was in Barangay Binga, San Vicente, Palawan.
Scebold did a good job on the third chapter, phonology. Central Tagbanwa posseses four vowels; one of which is a high central vowel. This is surprising, considering that the fourth vowel in other Philippine languages such as Ilokano and Kinaray-a is a high back unrounded vowel. The fourth Central Tagbanwa vowel is similar in pronunciation to the Russian letter ы as in язык (yazihk, meaning "language"). This sound is also found in Romanian, represented by the letters â and î as in the word română (meaning, "Romanian").
Also, there appears to be an extra consonant. He interprets this consonant with the Greek "beta" - β. It is technically called a "voiced bilabial fricative" and a weakened version of it exists as a variant of the Spanish /b/. He admits that there is "trace evidence" for this particular phoneme and points to words such as /bulβol/ which has both sounds. Furthermore, he says that native speakers prefer writing this sound as the letter v. Judging from the examples in which this letter is found, I have reason to believe that it is simply an allophone and that there are certain environments where this is pronounced in. But, I have never heard spoken Central Tagbanwa, so I cannot say for sure. I should note, that [β] exists in Tausug as an allophone and I can hear the sound loud and clear in spoken Tausug.
With 50 pages, chapter 4 is the largest chapter in the book. He deovtes this chapter to a "brief" grammatical sketch of the language. He outlines each grammatical concept with an explanation and some sample sentences. The sample sentences include a phrase in Central Tagbanwa, followed by a breakdown of the morphemes, then a word-for-word translation, and finally a free English translation. Here is an example:
"4.2.1.1. Noun Marking Particles"
"Nominative noun markers are used to mark the participants in focus in verbal clauses, and to mark topics in nonverbal clauses.."
"(49)Ti Andres ay ipagamot niya ka doctor.
ti Andres ay i-=pa-=gamot niya ka doctor
N Andrew COP NB.NAF=CAUS=medicine 3SG O doctor
'He will have Andrew treated by a doctor.'"
"(50)Doon ka Malaya ti Beto.
doon ka Malaya ti Beto
D30 O Malaya N Beto
'Beto is over there in Malaya.'"
"(51)Ka Puerto napadong ya barko.
ka Puerto na-=padong ya barko
O Puerto POT.CMP.AF=dock N ship
'The ship docked in Puerto."
Chapter 5 is a sort of mini-dictionary. It's not intended to be a comprehensive dictionary. It is two-way, English-Central Tagbanwa and vice-versa.
Excerpts:
Central Tagbanwa-English
biring v. to be astonished. Nabiring kanya ing ono ya pogdikal. He was astonished, wondering what shone with such luster.
English-Central Tagbanwa
pig bavoy
And finally, the end of the book features an appendix which contains three stories. They were contributed in February of 2000 by Roberto Lerona. The stories are "The Tagbanwa Man Who Found Gold", "The Boy That Was Gotten by a Crocodile", and "Conservation about the Ashfall from Mt. Pinatubo."
Here is a photo of the book. It was published in 2003 and SIL is selling it for just $5.70
To Robert Scebold and other people who make books about Philippine languages - keep'em comin'!
The second book I ordered from SIL is Central Tagbanwa: A Philippine Language on the Brink of Extinction by Robert Scebold.
Central Tagbanwa is a language spoken in northern Palawan. It is a member of the Meso-Philippine group of languages. Other branches in this family include the Central Philippine languages, which is a very large group of widespread and well-known languages such as Tagalog, Cebuano, and Bikol. Ethnologue reports that 2,000 people spoke it in 1985. According to Scebold on page 7, he "estimated the total Tagbanwa population to be between 800 and 1000." While the number reduced by 50%. But there are a couple of caveats. The Philippine census counts 16,300 Tagbanwa speakers, however there are different varieties of Tagbanwa. Also, there may be other Tagbanwas outside the area he researched. Despite this, the results are alarming.
I care about language extinction. And I care for their preservation and the rights of their respective speakers to use them in any possible way. In 163 pages this book succeeds in its two missions - to give us a detailed status of the language as well as to describe the languages for those of us language geeks who are interested in such things.
In the first two chapters, he gives important background on Central Tagbanwa's history and present situation. Interestingly enough, he says that two SIL linguists "discovered" the language in the course of their research in 1979. He places the blame on why Central Tagbanwa is a language destined to death. He points to other Filipinos who migrated to Palawan. He also points to the American presence and education system from 1898-1946. He also points to the Japanese occupation during WWII. In chapter two he outlines his methods for getting a rough estimate of Central Tagbanwa speakers. Three Central Tagbanwa are presented as case histories. Also, most of Scebold's research was in Barangay Binga, San Vicente, Palawan.
Scebold did a good job on the third chapter, phonology. Central Tagbanwa posseses four vowels; one of which is a high central vowel. This is surprising, considering that the fourth vowel in other Philippine languages such as Ilokano and Kinaray-a is a high back unrounded vowel. The fourth Central Tagbanwa vowel is similar in pronunciation to the Russian letter ы as in язык (yazihk, meaning "language"). This sound is also found in Romanian, represented by the letters â and î as in the word română (meaning, "Romanian").
Also, there appears to be an extra consonant. He interprets this consonant with the Greek "beta" - β. It is technically called a "voiced bilabial fricative" and a weakened version of it exists as a variant of the Spanish /b/. He admits that there is "trace evidence" for this particular phoneme and points to words such as /bulβol/ which has both sounds. Furthermore, he says that native speakers prefer writing this sound as the letter v. Judging from the examples in which this letter is found, I have reason to believe that it is simply an allophone and that there are certain environments where this is pronounced in. But, I have never heard spoken Central Tagbanwa, so I cannot say for sure. I should note, that [β] exists in Tausug as an allophone and I can hear the sound loud and clear in spoken Tausug.
With 50 pages, chapter 4 is the largest chapter in the book. He deovtes this chapter to a "brief" grammatical sketch of the language. He outlines each grammatical concept with an explanation and some sample sentences. The sample sentences include a phrase in Central Tagbanwa, followed by a breakdown of the morphemes, then a word-for-word translation, and finally a free English translation. Here is an example:
"4.2.1.1. Noun Marking Particles"
"Nominative noun markers are used to mark the participants in focus in verbal clauses, and to mark topics in nonverbal clauses.."
"(49)Ti Andres ay ipagamot niya ka doctor.
ti Andres ay i-=pa-=gamot niya ka doctor
N Andrew COP NB.NAF=CAUS=medicine 3SG O doctor
'He will have Andrew treated by a doctor.'"
"(50)Doon ka Malaya ti Beto.
doon ka Malaya ti Beto
D30 O Malaya N Beto
'Beto is over there in Malaya.'"
"(51)Ka Puerto napadong ya barko.
ka Puerto na-=padong ya barko
O Puerto POT.CMP.AF=dock N ship
'The ship docked in Puerto."
Chapter 5 is a sort of mini-dictionary. It's not intended to be a comprehensive dictionary. It is two-way, English-Central Tagbanwa and vice-versa.
Excerpts:
Central Tagbanwa-English
b
English-Central Tagbanwa
pig bavoy
And finally, the end of the book features an appendix which contains three stories. They were contributed in February of 2000 by Roberto Lerona. The stories are "The Tagbanwa Man Who Found Gold", "The Boy That Was Gotten by a Crocodile", and "Conservation about the Ashfall from Mt. Pinatubo."
Here is a photo of the book. It was published in 2003 and SIL is selling it for just $5.70
To Robert Scebold and other people who make books about Philippine languages - keep'em comin'!
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
Book Review: A Masbatenyo-English Dictionary by Elmer Wolfenden
This entry is the first in a series of articles in the first annual Seven-Day Salita Blogathon. For more information, please see this entry.
Back in February I ordered three books from the Summer Institute of Linguistics. I waited until May to find out what was going on, only to find out that they had mailed the books in March and should've arrived in April. I e-mailed again in July, and they sent them to me again. They arrived in a matter of days from the Philippines. So now, I finally have my books.
One of these three books is Elmer P. Wolfenden's A Masbatenyo Dictionary-English Dictionary, published in 2001.
Dr. Wolfenden has been studying Philippine languages for over 50 years. One page mentions that he was a Bible translator for the Isnag language in northern Luzon back in 1954. I first encountered his name in his 1971 Hiligaynon Reference Grammar.
In any case, the Masbatenyo dictionary itself will not disappoint. It is over 736 pages. And is a culmination of work by Dr. Wolfenden from 1972 to 1992.
The first few pages of the book mentions Masbatenyo's known history and genetic classification to other Philippine languages. He considers the language very close to the Bisakol of Sorsogon in Bikol and he considers their grammars to be close to Hiligaynon. Masbatenyo itself has a lot of influence from Bikol, Waray-Waray, Cebuano, Hiligaynon, and Tagalog which is why, he states, that "many semantic concepts in Masbatenyo can be expressed by from two to five alternate and different words for a single concept." Dr. Wolfenden also identifies three major dialects of Masbatenyo.
He does a good job of explaining Masbatenyo phonology, however my complaint is that he uses a modified - and in my humble opinion, rather odd - system of the Tagalog accent marks throughout the book. It is not a major obstacle, but it takes a while to get used to. For example, he writes tàóy when simply taóy will do. Furthermore, he uses a similarly modified version of IPA notation where he puts the accent mark before the vowel rather than before the syllable; i.e., [k'ita`] rather than ['kita`]. Again, not a major obstacle but it is odd.
Although it probably is not necessary, I am extremely grateful that Dr. Wolfenden included a very meaty grammatical sketch of Masbatenyo. He was very thorough; he devoted pages 11 through 82 to give his readers a thorough treatment of Masbatenyo grammar.
He puts the various articles, demonstrative & personal pronouns, and verbs in easy-to-read tables. I myself am a fan of looking at these tables, which are found in articles concerning Philippine languages. He makes it easy to compare the differences between Masbatenyo and other languages.
For good measure, he includes several example sentences outlining the words found in these table. For example, under the table for genitive pronouns he has these examples:
31. Kun igwa sin itlog ginabaligya man gihapon ninda.
If there-are eggs they are-selling them also.
32. An tiya ko an akon maninay.
My aunt-is my godmother.
33. Damo kami na urupod kaya kasurusadya namon.
We-excl had many companions so we-excl were-very-happy.
Another pecularity by Wolfenden, as evidenced by the above three examples are the dashes that connect these words. Again, this is used throughout the dictionary. In a nutshell, these are to show that these phrases are one word in Masbatenyo. Somehow, I think it's unnecessarily distracting, but I guess they are used in aiding the reader.
Dr. Wolfenden certainly covered a lot of ground; his grammatical sketch more than satisfied my curiosity and it also gave me some more insight about the nature of Visayan languages.
As for the actual dictionary itself, it is divided into two sections. Pages 85 - 531 is composed of the Masbatenyo-to-English section. What I like is that he sorts the entries by rootwords. He further includes subentries if the word has a different meaning based on a particular infix - many touristy-targeted dictionaries for Philippine languages do not do this.
Here are two sample entries:
miya [míyà] n. cat. Pakauna an miya. Have the cat eat. Syn: iding 'cat'. magpamiya-míya v [c2]. MAG- act. act cat-like. Nagapamiya-miya si Nino sa sini. Nino acted-like-a-cat in-the movie.
tangkas [tángkas] v [c8]. MAG- ag; -ON pat; -AN goal/ben; I- acc.
tangkasón v. be removed, be extracted, be detached. Nano kay gintangkas mo an mata san manika?. Why did you remove the eye of-the doll. Lit: Why was the ey of-the doll removed by-you? Dili mo pagtangkason an imo habay kay basi magsakit an imo tiyan. Do no tremove your girdle because your stomach might become-painful.
pagtángkas n. detaching, releasing, freeing. Nadugay an pagtangkas san iya matris. The detaching of her uterus took-a-long-time.
paratángkas n. remover. One whose job is to remove something.
pangtángkas n. remover, eradicator. Refers to a tool or solution. Adi an pangtangkas san mantsa. Here is the stain remover.
Pages 533-734 include the English-Masbatenyo portion of the dictionary. The entries themselves are numerous, but carry less information, which seems to be the norm among the English section of a Philippine-language dictionary.
Here is an example.
when adv. san1; conj. kun (1); interr prn. san-o; rel prn. kun sán-o, Cf; san-o.
All in all, this dictionary was well worth the money. At $22.50, it was a great bargain. It is my hope that Masbatenyo literature will grow. The sad thing is that on page 3, Dr. Wolfenden states "... this dictionary is only the second published work on the Masbatenyo language." This book I have is just the second? I am hoping that it will not be the last.
Back in February I ordered three books from the Summer Institute of Linguistics. I waited until May to find out what was going on, only to find out that they had mailed the books in March and should've arrived in April. I e-mailed again in July, and they sent them to me again. They arrived in a matter of days from the Philippines. So now, I finally have my books.
One of these three books is Elmer P. Wolfenden's A Masbatenyo Dictionary-English Dictionary, published in 2001.
Dr. Wolfenden has been studying Philippine languages for over 50 years. One page mentions that he was a Bible translator for the Isnag language in northern Luzon back in 1954. I first encountered his name in his 1971 Hiligaynon Reference Grammar.
In any case, the Masbatenyo dictionary itself will not disappoint. It is over 736 pages. And is a culmination of work by Dr. Wolfenden from 1972 to 1992.
The first few pages of the book mentions Masbatenyo's known history and genetic classification to other Philippine languages. He considers the language very close to the Bisakol of Sorsogon in Bikol and he considers their grammars to be close to Hiligaynon. Masbatenyo itself has a lot of influence from Bikol, Waray-Waray, Cebuano, Hiligaynon, and Tagalog which is why, he states, that "many semantic concepts in Masbatenyo can be expressed by from two to five alternate and different words for a single concept." Dr. Wolfenden also identifies three major dialects of Masbatenyo.
He does a good job of explaining Masbatenyo phonology, however my complaint is that he uses a modified - and in my humble opinion, rather odd - system of the Tagalog accent marks throughout the book. It is not a major obstacle, but it takes a while to get used to. For example, he writes tàóy when simply taóy will do. Furthermore, he uses a similarly modified version of IPA notation where he puts the accent mark before the vowel rather than before the syllable; i.e., [k'ita`] rather than ['kita`]. Again, not a major obstacle but it is odd.
Although it probably is not necessary, I am extremely grateful that Dr. Wolfenden included a very meaty grammatical sketch of Masbatenyo. He was very thorough; he devoted pages 11 through 82 to give his readers a thorough treatment of Masbatenyo grammar.
He puts the various articles, demonstrative & personal pronouns, and verbs in easy-to-read tables. I myself am a fan of looking at these tables, which are found in articles concerning Philippine languages. He makes it easy to compare the differences between Masbatenyo and other languages.
For good measure, he includes several example sentences outlining the words found in these table. For example, under the table for genitive pronouns he has these examples:
31. Kun igwa sin itlog ginabaligya man gihapon ninda.
If there-are eggs they are-selling them also.
32. An tiya ko an akon maninay.
My aunt-is my godmother.
33. Damo kami na urupod kaya kasurusadya namon.
We-excl had many companions so we-excl were-very-happy.
Another pecularity by Wolfenden, as evidenced by the above three examples are the dashes that connect these words. Again, this is used throughout the dictionary. In a nutshell, these are to show that these phrases are one word in Masbatenyo. Somehow, I think it's unnecessarily distracting, but I guess they are used in aiding the reader.
Dr. Wolfenden certainly covered a lot of ground; his grammatical sketch more than satisfied my curiosity and it also gave me some more insight about the nature of Visayan languages.
As for the actual dictionary itself, it is divided into two sections. Pages 85 - 531 is composed of the Masbatenyo-to-English section. What I like is that he sorts the entries by rootwords. He further includes subentries if the word has a different meaning based on a particular infix - many touristy-targeted dictionaries for Philippine languages do not do this.
Here are two sample entries:
miya [míyà] n. cat. Pakauna an miya. Have the cat eat. Syn: iding 'cat'. magpamiya-míya v [c2]. MAG- act. act cat-like. Nagapamiya-miya si Nino sa sini. Nino acted-like-a-cat in-the movie.
tangkas [tángkas] v [c8]. MAG- ag; -ON pat; -AN goal/ben; I- acc.
tangkasón v. be removed, be extracted, be detached. Nano kay gintangkas mo an mata san manika?. Why did you remove the eye of-the doll. Lit: Why was the ey of-the doll removed by-you? Dili mo pagtangkason an imo habay kay basi magsakit an imo tiyan. Do no tremove your girdle because your stomach might become-painful.
pagtángkas n. detaching, releasing, freeing. Nadugay an pagtangkas san iya matris. The detaching of her uterus took-a-long-time.
paratángkas n. remover. One whose job is to remove something.
pangtángkas n. remover, eradicator. Refers to a tool or solution. Adi an pangtangkas san mantsa. Here is the stain remover.
Pages 533-734 include the English-Masbatenyo portion of the dictionary. The entries themselves are numerous, but carry less information, which seems to be the norm among the English section of a Philippine-language dictionary.
Here is an example.
when adv. san1; conj. kun (1); interr prn. san-o; rel prn. kun sán-o, Cf; san-o.
All in all, this dictionary was well worth the money. At $22.50, it was a great bargain. It is my hope that Masbatenyo literature will grow. The sad thing is that on page 3, Dr. Wolfenden states "... this dictionary is only the second published work on the Masbatenyo language." This book I have is just the second? I am hoping that it will not be the last.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
MUTDA: Mga Tulang Asi
I apologize again for the length of time between posts. I attribute this to being busy with school and work (and partly to laziness, but don't tell anyone. Ok?). I am off from work for the next six weeks, and there are a bunch of projects that I'd love to get finished during this summer.
I am in school again and am currently taking French, statistics, and political science for the summer quarter. My spring quarter grades surprised me. They were much better than my winter quarter grades; I got a 4.0! So, I was extremely happy. Usually there's that one cursed B that ruins the whole streak. Hopefully I can pull this off again, but statistics, which involves math, really isn't my forté.
Moving on... During my hiatus from this blog, I purchased a copy of a poetry anthology in the Asi language of Romblon province. The title is Mutda: Mga Tulang ASI (Pearl: Asi poems). It was compiled by Ishmael Fabicon, a native of Banton Island whom I first met over 5 years ago in a Bikol mailing list. Lyndon Fadri and Abner Famiano also edited the anthology.
Asi is really a minority language; a little over 70,000 people speak it. So it's a real treat to have a publication in a minority language such as this since they are really hard to come by.
Here's a song that was included in the anthology. It's Kita Ay Magsadya by Quirino Ferranco.
Kita ay magsadya ag magkanta
Sa tunog, sonata't gitara
Kasubo'y war-on sa hunahuna
Maglibang kita sa kasadya
Masri kali'k damot, Oh palangga
Ag puso nakong nagyuyuha
Pag ako pinisil, kaling imo damot
Di ka mahangit it kaling pakipot
Maasran ka ak yuha
It ako mga mata
Ka naging dahilan, buksi ka ak rughan
Nak ka ak paghigugma ay gikan
Cool, huh?
What I love about Asi is its historical phonology as far as its consonants are concerned; I think this is why it is tentatively considered a separate branch in the Visayan language family.
Linguist Jason Lobel explained Asi's consonants in his Sanrokan paper, but I'll give a brief run-down here.
Many of the words that normally start with /d/ in other Philippine languages like Tagalog, are rendered as /r/. So rather than dagat, isda, and sunod there is ragat, isra, and sunor.
Where other Philippine languages have /l/, Asi has /y/. So there is yamig, yang, suyat, mahay, and wayo for lamig, lang, sulat, mahal, and walo.
Medial /y/ in most Philippine languages is /d/ in Asi. Examples: hadop (hayop), maado (maayo), nidog (niyog), and sida (siya).
And then there are a lot of familiar words that have undergone at least two of these changes: badar (bayad), raya (dala), layo (yado), and yud-a (luy-a).
What a beautiful language - I hope there will be more Asi books in the future.
I am in school again and am currently taking French, statistics, and political science for the summer quarter. My spring quarter grades surprised me. They were much better than my winter quarter grades; I got a 4.0! So, I was extremely happy. Usually there's that one cursed B that ruins the whole streak. Hopefully I can pull this off again, but statistics, which involves math, really isn't my forté.
Moving on... During my hiatus from this blog, I purchased a copy of a poetry anthology in the Asi language of Romblon province. The title is Mutda: Mga Tulang ASI (Pearl: Asi poems). It was compiled by Ishmael Fabicon, a native of Banton Island whom I first met over 5 years ago in a Bikol mailing list. Lyndon Fadri and Abner Famiano also edited the anthology.
Asi is really a minority language; a little over 70,000 people speak it. So it's a real treat to have a publication in a minority language such as this since they are really hard to come by.
Here's a song that was included in the anthology. It's Kita Ay Magsadya by Quirino Ferranco.
Sa tunog, sonata't gitara
Kasubo'y war-on sa hunahuna
Maglibang kita sa kasadya
Masri kali'k damot, Oh palangga
Ag puso nakong nagyuyuha
Pag ako pinisil, kaling imo damot
Di ka mahangit it kaling pakipot
Maasran ka ak yuha
It ako mga mata
Ka naging dahilan, buksi ka ak rughan
Nak ka ak paghigugma ay gikan
Cool, huh?
What I love about Asi is its historical phonology as far as its consonants are concerned; I think this is why it is tentatively considered a separate branch in the Visayan language family.
Linguist Jason Lobel explained Asi's consonants in his Sanrokan paper, but I'll give a brief run-down here.
Many of the words that normally start with /d/ in other Philippine languages like Tagalog, are rendered as /r/. So rather than dagat, isda, and sunod there is ragat, isra, and sunor.
Where other Philippine languages have /l/, Asi has /y/. So there is yamig, yang, suyat, mahay, and wayo for lamig, lang, sulat, mahal, and walo.
Medial /y/ in most Philippine languages is /d/ in Asi. Examples: hadop (hayop), maado (maayo), nidog (niyog), and sida (siya).
And then there are a lot of familiar words that have undergone at least two of these changes: badar (bayad), raya (dala), layo (yado), and yud-a (luy-a).
What a beautiful language - I hope there will be more Asi books in the future.
Sunday, June 27, 2004
Book Review: Intermediate Ilokano by Precy Espiritu
Twenty years ago, the University of Hawai'i Press published Let's Speak Ilokano. It was authored by Precy Espiritu, then a Ph.D. student studying applied linguistics at UCLA. At almost 300 pages, this book does a rather decent job in teaching the basics of the Ilokano language, so I recommend her book highly.
For the past year, I've been impatiently anticipating the arrival of Intermediate Ilokano; the sequel of the book published in 1984. In finally received it a couple of weeks ago and have been reading it ever since. What can I say? Dr. Espiritu has really outdone herself.
The book is much larger; there are over 400 pages and it's about an inch wider than its predecessor. Not to mention that there's also an eye-catching cover. Espiritu has employed illustrator Junix Jimenez to breathe life into the book with his delightful illustrations depicting life in the Ilocos Region.
As for the content of the book itself, Espiritu discards the use of dialogs in favor of short stories. Each of the stories has a morale illustrating Philippine or Ilokano values. They are further explained in the cultural notes section at the end of each of the twelve lessons. There are also activities based on the new vocabulary and grammatical concepts introduced in the short stories. What I like is that the grammatical concepts are easily accessible via their own table of contents, right after the main table of contents in the beginning of the book.
Although there are many activities geared toward Ilokano learners in a classroom setting (Ilokano is taught as a class at the post-secondary level in Hawai'i, something not done in the Philippines!), a person learning via self-study can still benefit from the exercises.
There are some minor things which concerns me somewhat. In written Ilokano, pronouns are usually attached to the preceding work to make one new word. For example, in Tagalog there is the phrase nag-aral ako 'I studied'. The Ilokano equivalent would not be written as nagadal ak but nagadalak.
Perhaps it's this way since the pronouns ko 'my' & mo 'your' are reduced to k and m if the preceding words ends in a vowel. For example asawa ko 'my spouse' and libro mo 'your book' become asawak and librom. You gotta admit that asawa k and libro m look pretty darn silly.
[Addendum: July 25, 2004]: Carl Rubino chimed in saying that another reason for this is that ak is pronounced as part of the word; [na.ga.da.lak] rather than Tagalog's [nag.?a.ral.?a.ko].
This can make things rather confusing for an Ilokano learner since it's sometimes difficult identifying a pronoun in a word. Espiritu is evidently aware of this and to combat this she italicizes the pronouns.
The following is from the first two paragraphs of the first story in the book on page 2:
Maysa nga aldaw, inayaban ti maysa a baket dagiti lima a kaarrubana, ket sinaludsodna, "Sinno ti mayat nga agdalus iti lugartayo?"
"Ay, dispensarem, Ina. Saan a siak, ta adu ti trabahok," kinuna ti umuna a simmungbat.
One day, an old lady called her five neighbors, and she asked, "Who wants to clean up our place?"
"Oh, (you) forgive me, Ma'am. I can't, because my work is many," said the first one who answered.
I wonder, though, if it has a place in a book for intermediate learners. It would have been definitely useful in Espiritu's first book. I also wish she would have included diacritic markers indicating stress like she did in the first one, too. However, they are marked in the glossary section but in bold. Even something of greater use would have been an audio CD to practice aural comprehension.
But like I said, these are minor and do not in any manner affect the quality of this book. All in all this is a great book in building up proficiency in Ilokano. All the grammatical concepts are explained in a straightforward manner with accompanying examples. Though, I admit that perhaps the calls for cultural discussions are somewhat unnecessary.
Serious learners of Ilokano should not be without Espiritu's two books as well as Dr. Carl Rubino's masterpiece, his indispensable Ilocano Dictionary and Grammar which is also available from the University of Hawai'i Press. My review for Dr. Rubino's book is on that Amazon.Com page, too.
Now, if only other Philippine languages had quality learning materials such as those I mentioned above.
External link: Dr. Precy Espiritu's Home Page
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