Tagalog verbs

I've been wanting to do a post about Tagalog verbs for a while now. I've brought my notes together to give you all this entry. Currently, modern Tagalog verb conjugation is as outlined in the following chart.

	Infinitive	Contemplative (future actions)	Progressive (past and present actions)	Completed (past actions)
Actor Focus 1	-um- (gumawa)	CV- (gagawa)	CumV- (gumagawa)	-um- (gumawa)
Actor Focus 2	mag- (magbigay)	magCV- (magbibigay)	nagCV- (nagbibigay)	nag- (nagbigay)
Object Focus 1	-in (kainin)	CV-...-in (kakainin)	CinV- (kinakain)	-in- (kinain)
Object Focus 2	i- (isulat)	iCV- (isusulat)	iCinV- (isinusulat)	i- -in- (isinulat)
Object Focus 3	-an (tawagan)	CV-...-an (tatawagan)	CinV- ... -an (tinatawagan)	-in- ... -an (tinawagan)

I hope you all will find this chart easy to understand, but I think it's simple enough. The dashes represent the position of the affix in relation to the rootword. CV stands for consonant and vowel and represents the first consonant and the first vowel of the rootword, hence reduplication. For those who are learning Tagalog, the root words used are gawa (do), bigay (give), kain (eat), sulat (write), and tawag (call). So if you look at the proper column, you can tell that if you add the infix -um- to the rootword gawa you'll get gumawa (did). And if you attach the infix -in- with the suffix -an to tawag, you'll get tinawagan (called [someone]). Got it? Please also keep in mind that these are the basic affixes, so none of the potentive, causative, reason, etc. affixes are included. However, Tagalog verbal conjugation was not quite as it was as early as a century ago. I have consulted two Tagalog grammar books from the Spanish era; Francisco Blancas de San José's 1610 Arte y Reglas de la lengua tagala and Fr. Sebastián de Totanes's 1745 Arte de la lengua tagala. During those times, Tagalog's verbal affixes looked more like the following.

	Infinitive	Contemplative (future actions)	Progressive (past and present actions)	Completed (past actions)	Imperative
Actor Focus 1	-um- (gumawa)	CV- (gagawa)	CungmV- (gungmagawa)	-ungm- (gungmawa)
Actor Focus 2	mag- (magbigay)	magCV- (magbibigay)	nagCV- (nagbibigay)	nag- (nagbigay)	pag- (pagbigay)
Object Focus 1	-in (kainin)	CV-...-in (kakainin)	CinV- (kinakain)	-in- (kinain)	0 (kain)
Object Focus 2	i- (isulat)	iCV- (isusulat)	iCinV- (isinusulat)	i- -in- (isinulat)	-an (sulatan)
Object Focus 3	-an (tawagan)	CV-...-an (tatawagan)	CinV- ... -an (tinatawagan)	-in- ... -an (tinawagan)	-i (tawagi)

Imperative affixes

One major difference is that the Tagalog spoken over two centuries ago had an additional verb category, the imperative which is used for commands and requests (i.e., Matulog ka na - Go to sleep). Even then, the imperative and the infinitive were used side by side in expressing commands, but apparently the infinitive became used exclusively in standard Tagalog. Now, I emphasize standard because in certain dialects of Tagalog, it still exists. In certain dialects of Batangas Tagalog, it has been said that one says buksi mo instead of buksan mo for "open it." And in the Eastern Marinduque dialect, the imperative affixes are very much alive. Since Tagalog is a Central Philippine language, does this mean that other Central Philippine languages have imperative affixes too? The answer is yes and they are widely used in the languages spoken in Bicol and in the Visayas. Though, in the "Actor Focus 1" category, all these languages have the suffix "-a" for the imperative. The languages of the Northern Philippines like Pangasinan, Kapampangan, and Ilokano do not have imperative affixes. In light of this fact, my guess is that Tagalog lost the affixes due to speakers of Northern Philippine languages who migrated to Manila and imposed their respective native languages' grammatical rules onto Tagalog. This caught on when their children, assimilated Tagalog speakers, began to use the language. So this could explain why the dialects that tend to be further from Ilokano and Kapampangan speaking regions tend to preserve the affixes. Though because of the influence and prestige of Manila Tagalog, they are also disappearing.

The infix -um- and its derivatives

Another noticeable difference is the infix -um- which has also undergone a process of simplification since the Spanish era. The infix -ungm- which has disappeared from virtually all contemporary Tagalog dialects. In modern Tagalog, -um- serves as the infinitive, imperative, and completed (past) forms. So what distinguishes the phrase kumain ka (either "eat" or "you ate") is context and tone). This infix is cognate with similar infixes in other Philippine languages. They, too, also make a distinction between the infinitive the past forms:

Language	Infinitive affix	Completed/Past affix
Old Tagalog	-um-	-ungm-
Modern Tagalog	-um-
Ilokano	-um-	-inn
Kapampangan	-um-	-in-
Pangasinan	on-	-inm-
Waray-Waray	-um-	-inm-, -in-, -um-
Tausug	-um-	-im-
Old Bikol	-um-	-umin-

Apparently the infinitive form comes from Proto-Philippine *-um- and the past one from Proto-Philippine *-umin-. Furthermore, there were variants of -um- that had to do with phonetic environment. For example, if the first vowel of a rootword was /i/, then -um- would optionally change to -im-. This is called vowel harmony. For comparison's sake, I'll use the rootword tingin as an example:

English	Modern Tagalog	Old Tagalog
to look	tumingin	timingin
I looked	tumingin ako	tingmingin ako
I am/was looking	tumitingin ako	tingmitingin ako
I will look	titingin ako

Now when did this conjugation cease to exist? I am guessing sometime in the middle of the last century. I was able to find a mention of the -ungm- infix in the Pedro Serrano Laktaw's 1929 Estudios gramaticales sobre la lengua Tagálog. He remarks on page 83:

"... que el um del imperativo tenga ng intercalada entre sus dos letras componentes, de modo que resulte ungm para el pretérito y presente, a fin de distinguir el pretérito perfecto del imperativo, como se nota en las antiguas gramáticas, y tal como aún pronuncian la mayor parte de los tagalogs puros, si bien se ve igualmente en muchos libros impresos, como también se oye en Manila a los tagálogs pronunciar el pretérito y el presente con solo el um." (... that the um of the imperative has a "ng" inserted between its two component letters, in a way that it results in ungm for the preterite and the present, in order to distinguish the preterite perfect from the imperative, as is noted in the older grammars. And it is pronoounced such by the majority of pure Tagalogs, it's also seen in many printed books. The Tagalogs in Manila also pronounce the preterite and the present with just um.)

It makes me wonder if there are still older Tagalog speakers - people in their 90s and 100s - who speak this way. Another phonological change was that verbs beginning with certain sounds took on different affixes. This would usually happen to verbs beginning with /b/ and /p/. The infix -um- would assimilate with those consonants. There were some exceptions to the /p/ and /b/ rule as in the verbs kuha (get), uwi (return home), inom (drink), ihi (urinate), and others. According to the grammars, verbs fitting in this category may also be conjugated the regular way (i.e., unassimilated). Below is a comparison outlining the modern Tagalog forms and the two ways of conjugating the verb in old Tagalog. I use the rootword pasok (enter) as an example.

English	Modern Tagalog	Old Tagalog (unassimilated conjugation)	Old Tagalog (assimilated conjugation)
to enter	pumasok		masok
I entered	pumasok ako	pungmasok ako	nasok ako
I am/was entering	pumapasok ako	pungmapasok ako	nanasok ako
I will enter	papasok ako

It's also worth nothing that a similar process of assimilation happens in Tausug and Kapampangan languages.

Verbal affixes in other Tagalog dialects

One thing I heard growing up was that Tagalog speakers from southern Luzon (Batangas, Quezon, etc.) would say "nakain ka ba ng pating?" To a Manileño, this means "were you eaten by a shark?" But in those regions, it means "are you eating shark?" - nakain is the equivalent of kumakain. The Tagalog dialects of Marinduque are the most divergent, especially the Eastern Marinduque dialect - perhaps due to the relative isolation from the Tagalogs of Luzon and also perhaps due to the influence of the Visayan and Bikol migrants. Linguist Rosa Soberano's 1980 The Dialects of Marinduque Tagalog goes into great depth concerning the dialects spoken there. The following is a verb chart which outlines the conjugation of the Eastern Marindique dialect of Tagalog:

	Infinitive	Contemplative (future actions)	Progressive (past and present actions)	Completed (past actions)	Imperative
Actor Focus 1	-um- (gumawa)	má- (mágawâ)	ná- (nágawâ)	-um- (gumawa)	0 (gawa)
Actor Focus 2	mag- (magbigay)	(ma)ga- ([ma]gabigay)	naga- (nagabigay)	nag- (nagbigay)	pag- (pagbigay)
Object Focus 1	-in (kainin)	a- (akainin)	ina- (inakain)	-in- (kinain)	-a (kaina)
Object Focus 2	i- (isulat)	a- (asulat)	ina- (inasulat)	i- -in- (isinulat)	-an (sulatan)
Object Focus 3	-an (tawagan)	a-...-an (atawagan)	ina- ... -an (inatawagan)	-in- ... -an (tinawagan)	-i (tawagi)

What I find interesting is that some of these affixes, particularly "a-" and "ina-," are affixes used in Asi (Bantoanon), a Visaya language spoken in Romblon, just south of Marinduque.

Some final thoughts

I hope you found this informative. It's fun sometimes for me to use the Old Tagalog or Eastern Marinduque Tagalog verbal affixes in my conversations with other Filipinos. Some have not noticed them at all (particularly when I use -ungm-) while others will think I'm weird and attempt to correct me. In some ways, I think it would have been wonderful for Tagalog to have preserved them - to have preserved the richness. But I guess these things happen for a reason.

Ilokano & Waray Wikipedias / Tayabas Tagalog / Why?

[insert apology for justifying my neglect of this blog]

There are two items of interest that I would like to get out there. On Wikipedia, there were two proposals to get Wikipedias for two Philippine languages, namely Waray-Waray and Ilokano.

The proposal was approved; there are now 5 Philippine-language Wikis (Tagalog, Cebuano, and Kapampangan in addition to the aforementioned two). I was quite surprised and quite puzzled about Ilokano - there is a huge Ilokano presence on the internet as well as being the 2nd-most spoken Philippine language in the United States (with university courses to boot). But yet, it's last one.

In any case, both Wikipedias have been very active; the Waray one has 482 articles and the Ilokano one has 105 (the owner of Mannurat.Com, Roy Aragon, being very active). Very impressive!

The URL's for the encyclopedias are:

Ilokano Wikipedia - http://ilo.wikipedia.org
Waray Wikipedia - http://war.wikipedia.org

So, congratulations.

In other news, I have borrowed a book called A Lexicographic Study of Tayabas Tagalog written in 1971 by E. Arsenio Manuel of the University of the Philippines.

The author relies on dozens of informants from all over Lucena City - he elicited information starting in the 1940's until 1953. The author mentions some sociolinguistic factors as to when the non-standard dialect is used - and the reactions (i.e., laughter and ridicule) it gets.

He considers the dialect to be "Central Tagalog" (what about south?) which is based on geography. He also makes mention of what appears to be subdialect areas such as Tayabas-Pagbilao-Sariaya, Unisan-Gumaka-Pitogo, and San Narciso-Katan-awan.

He also briefly mentions some phonological features particularly the preservation of the glottal stop when it occurs between a consonant and a vowel (called malaw-aw) - tam-is, ngay-on, dinug-an, but-o, and big-at. There is also the tendency to pronounce oo as uu and noo as nuu.

The rest of the book is basically a one-way dictionary from Tayabas Tagalog to Manila Tagalog and English. It wasn't quite as I expected, but I guess it's useful in a way.

Here are some sample entries:

gá. (Kat[an-awan].) Ba, baga. Ano ga. Kumusta!
An interrogative postpositional article

náay. 1. Naiyon, naayon, ayon. HIndi mo ba makita? Naay! Naay mandin sa sahig!2. Naay pa (gin. sa pagsusumbong ng mga bata sa magulang kung inuulitan o inaatig ng iba, at nagpapatuloy ng pag-uulit pagkatpos sawayin o pagsabihan).
1. There it is. Same as náiyon, náayon, ayón. 2. Náay pa, to call attention to the fact that someone is still bothering him after the other boy has been told not to (an expression often used by children addressing their plaint to their parents).

sabád. Sagot ng di kausap, ng di tinatanong. Sumabad, magsalita nang di kinakausap. Sa dalawang magkapulong, ang humalo sa usapan nang di inaanyayahan ay sumasabad sa usapan. Pasabadsabad, pásalitsalit o pasangit-sangit sa usapan. Sabát, o abát, din.
Reply of a person not asked or spoken to. Sumabád, to take part in a conversation without being invited; to speak or talk without being called to participate; to intercept the talk of two or more persons. Pasabád-sábad, to interrupt the conversation frequently. Sábat or abat also.

suwís (from Spanish. juez, judge). Magsusuwis, dadalaw ang pinunong-bayan sa bukid, linang, o nayon; ang pinunong-lalawigan sa bayon o nayon. Suwisan, ang ganiyang pagdalaw o pagsisiyasat na tinutugunan ng piging at kasayahn ng mga tagalinang o tagabayan. Wika ng isang makata:

Sa mga soisan, ibang pagtatao
kasalan, binyagan, ....
pag walang achara'y pati taga Centro
di lubhang ganahan sa piging na ito.
- Aurelio Obispo, "Tulang Paligsahan" (1929)

Term derived from juez (de ganado), judge of pastures, who during the Spanish regime inspected livestock of the farm and outlying barriors for the purpose of taking a census of animals, etc. Suwís has now a political significance, being an official visit or inspection of the barrio, by a municipal authority, or the town by the provincial governor or other high officials. Suwisan, the official visitand the popular reception combined used to be the biggest event in the lives of barrio folks.

Perhaps the most interesting entry was this:

tanó (at and + ano what). Bakit?
Why? What for? And so why? And so what?

The reason why I find this interesting is that in Naga Bikol, they use taano or ta-no for "why." In Legazpi, it is ngata - other Bikol dialects have hadaw, nata and ta-daw.

I also learned that in Tagalog, bakit is composed of bakin at. I wondered, then, if there was such a phrase as bakin at ano. I looked at the University Michigan's site, and found no such phrase.

However, I did find both of them mentioned side by side. In Joaquín de Coria's 1872 Nueva gramática tagalog, teórico-práctica, I found that, curiously, bakin meant because and at ano meant why.

On another page, it defined bakin to mean "why, and it is also an unusual verb. It is used in the negative. Examples. Forgive the enemies, don't you guys see that God forgives sinners, his enemies? Patauaring ninyo ang manga caauay, ¿di baquin ang panginoong Dios ay nagpapatauar sa manga macasalanang tauong caauay niya? You reprimand me for my sins, but why do you do the same? Aco,i inaauyang mo nang casalanan co ay, baquin icao ay gayon naman ang gaua mo? -- And why you too? Baquin icao? Why you all? Baquin cayo?

In Constantino Lendoyro's 1902 Tagalog language, bakin, bakit, and at ano are listed as words for "why."

So, very interesting stuff. I wish I could find the answer to all this, but so far, it's still a mystery. Why were there two why's?

Changes to Ethnologue

SIL has recently made some changes to its Ethnologue. It's now in its 15th edition.

I was curious to see if there were any changes to its page on the languages of the Philippines. The first I noticed is that where were no longer 169 living languages as stated in the 14th edition, but instead there were now 171. And instead of three extinct languages, there were now *gasp* four.

Unfortunately, there appears to be no way of automatically seeing what the changes are, so I had to manually make a comparison between the two versions.

So, here are my findings. Please direct any corrections to me.

Reclassifications

Seven of the existing languages were renamed.

Bontoc, South is now Finallig
Sama, Abaknon is now Inabaknon
Adasen is now Itneg, Adasen
Kalanguya, Keley-i is now Kallahan, Keley-i
Magindanaon is now Maguindanao
Sama, Balangigi is now Balangigi

Extinctions

One language was removed from the living languages portion and moved down to the extinct language. This language is Agta, Villa Viciosa formerly spoken in Abra Province.

Additions

There were three additions.

Itneg, Banao
Itneg, Moyadan
Filipino

Filipino?! I was surprised to see Filipino. If you've been reading my posts for a while, you know that I consider Filipino a dialect of Tagalog. But upon further investigation of the language tree, Filipino has been grouped as a dialect of Tagalog along with the current Tagalog dialects. I don't think that's an accurate way of putting it. Neither do I think Filipino merits its own entry.

On related news, I've ordered some books from SIL-Philippines. One of them is a Masbatenyo dictionary. But it's taking so long for them to arrive. SIL told me they sent it via airmail on March 7th, but it's already May. I hope they didn't get lost or anything. I had to pay extra for airmail shipping so they'd get here quickly instead of 2-6 months.

Until next time...

Rinconada Bikol

Just a little note before I begin. Today I obtained via Interlibrary Loan Tagalog Texts with Grammatical Analysis written in 1917 by linguist Leonard Bloomfield (1887-1949). Interesting book. You can expect to read my comments about this book sometime after I'm done reading it.

Anyway, there are a total of four main languages spoken in the Bicol region. The region is rich in linguistic diversity. They are, according to Jason Lobel:

1. North Coastal Standard Bikol - three main dialect groups spoken from: Daet, Camarines Norte; much of Camarines Sur including Naga and excluding the southern coast region; eastern Albay including Legazpi; northern Sorsogon; and the southern end of Catanduanes Island. The dialects of Naga & Legazpi are considered the standard.


2. Southern Coastal & Inland Bikol - Rinconada Bikol, which is spoken in the southern part of Camarines Sur which includes the cities of Buhi, Iriga, Nabua, and Balatan; Libon; and eastern & western Miraya (from southern Camarines Sur, western Legazpi, and part of Northern Sorsogon.


3. Northern Catanduanes - The (surprise!) northern end of Catanduanes island.


4. Bisakol - Comprised of the words Bisaya and Bikol. This includes Central & Southern Sorsogon, Masbate island, and Ticao island.

Anyway, this entry is about Rinconada Bikol. A couple of months ago, I wrote a message in a mailing list showing the differences between the Naga standard dialect of Bikol, Rinconada Bikol, and Tagalog. I formulated the sentences from Jason Lobel's Rinconada Phrasebook and a draft copy of his Rinconada textbook.

RNC - Rinconada Bikol. NAG - Naga Bikol. TAG - Tagalog. ENG - English.

-UM- verbs
note 1: Naga Bikol doesn't make use of the -UM- prefix.
note 2: -UM- and MAG- prefixes are interchangeable and thus don't
affect meaning in Rinconada Bikol unlike in Tagalog.

RNC: Kumaon
NAG: Magkakan
TAG: Kumain
ENG: To eat (infinitive)

RNC: Kinnaon ya.
NAG: Nagkakan siya.
TAG: Kumain siya.
ENG: He ate.

RNC: Kinnakaon ya.
NAG: Nagkakakan siya.
TAG: Kumakain siya.
ENG: He is eating.

RNC: Kumkaon ya OR Kumakaon ya. (Note loss of vowel after -UM-)
NAG: Mákakan siya.
TAG: Kakain siya.
ENG: He will eat.

MAG- verbs

RNC: Magtutturo
NAG: Magtukdo
TAG: Magturo
Eng: To teach.

RNC: Nagtutturo sira.
NAG: Nagtukdo sinda.
TAG: Nagturo sila.
ENG: They taught.

RNC: Nagtututturo sira.
NAG: Nagtutukdo sinda.
TAG: Nagtuturo sila.
ENG: They are teaching.

RNC: Migtutturo sira.
NAG: Mátukdo sinda.
TAG: Magtuturo sila.
ENG: They will teach.

And some miscellany...

RNC: Isadto ya sa baloy namo.
NAG: Yaon siya duman sa harong mi.
TAG: Nandoon siya sa bahay namin.
ENG: He's there at our house.

RNC: Ono 'di?
NAG: Ano ini?
TAG: Ano ito?
ENG: What's this?

RNC: Agko ka igin?
NAG: Igwa kang aki?
TAG: Mayroon ka bang anak?
ENG: Do you have any kids?

RNC: Migtrabawo a agom ko sa Maynila udma.
NAG: Mátrabaho an agom ko sa Maynila saaga.
TAG: Magtatrabaho ang asawa ko sa Maynila bukas.
ENG: My husband will work in Manila tomorrow.