Fun Friday – F is for “Filipino”

It’s Fun Friday once again! First off, I apologize to my fellow members of our Blogging for Fun group if I missed participating in this activity for two consecutive weeks. Anyway, we are making an A-Z meme and we are now at letter F. Since I have long decided that I will blog about something Filipino for this activity, why not make letter “F” is for Filipino?

As you probably know, Filipino refers to citizens of the Philippines or even to a person having Filipino ancestry. The name was derived from Spain’s King Phillip II, when it was the name given to the country in the 16th century by Spanish explorer Ruy Lopez de Villalobos. If you hear Filipinos colloquially referring to themselves as Pinoy or Pinay (the feminine version) these came from the term Filipino formed by taking the last four letters of "Filipino" and adding the diminutive suffix "-y".

Filipino also refers to the national language of the Philippines. The 1987 Philippine Constitution designated Filipino and English as the official languages of the country. The language is based on various existing native languages in the country with a significant number of loanwords from Spanish or other foreign languages. There are about 180 languages spoken in the Philippines. Other major and minor languages include Cebuano, Ilokano, Hiligaynon, Waray, Kapampangan, Bikol, Pangasinan, Tausug, Maguindanao, Maranao, Kinaray-a, Chavacano and Spanish.

The basis for the Philippine national language is Tagalog, which had primarily been spoken only in Manila and the surrounding provinces which is why some would refer to Tagalog as the national language. When the constitution provided for a national language, Tagalog has been the predominant candidate for this is the lingua Franca of those who lived in the government capital but because of objections from people living in other regions of the country where Tagalog is not their first language, it was decided to refer to Filipino as the national language.

Now you may ask, what is the difference between Tagalog and Filipino? "Filipino" incorporates more words borrowed from other major native languages including Visayan, Ilocano, Bicolano, Ilongo, Waray, Kapampangan, Pangasinense, Maranao, and also from foreign languages. Filipino also prefers to use more hyphenated Tagalog-English combinations realizing that Filipinos usually combine English and Tagalog in their conversation most of the time anyway. Filipino also accepts transliteration which just spells the words according to how it was spoken by native speakers. Transliterations in Tagalog are done only when there is no exact equivalent or if the nuance of the word combinations demands it.

For non-Filipinos who want to learn a couple of Filipino words, you can watch the video below from YouTube.