Language and Development in Philippine Setting

Consider these common circumstances: the more adroit a Filipino is in English tongue, the more he or she is regarded intelligent; Filipino folks are more proud of their children the earlier they know how to speak coherent English; salespersons are more attentive to their English speaking customers than those who they could have understood better in native dialect; speaking in native tongue is considered “baduy” specially in formal events; we laugh at mispronunciations equating it with overall ignorance of the speaker and are overcritical over grammatical errors of Filipinos than those of foreigners; and a whole lot more. I could go on and on but I hope you get the general idea. Again as I said there are exceptions. There are instances, where Filipinos are proud enough to speak in his Tagalog in front of a “highly academic” audience; others refuse to speak other than Filipino language or use it medium of instruct

Looking at Filipino language in national level brings a more fuzzy picture on its effects on development. Has “Filipino” been a unifying language? What exactly is “Filipino”? It seems like a lame attempt to defuse biases but in reality we all know its just another name for “Tagalog”. As mandated in the 1935 Philippine Constitution, a national language was to be adopted and by 1937, the Institute of National Language (INL) which was created to direct the selection, propagation and development of the national language, recommended that Tagalog be the basis for the adoption of the national language of the country. In the same year, then President Manuel Quezon signed Executive Order No. 134 declaring Tagalog as basis of the national language. It was later changed to “Pilipino” in 1959 but was only recently renamed to “Filipino” in the ratified 1987 Constitution. The change was purely in the “name” of the national language. The basis is still “Tagalog”. Tagalog is not even a majority language. In fact a survey showed that “Cebuano” ranks first. It is spoken by nearly first (24.39%) of the people. Tagalog ranks second (23.82%); followed by Ilocano (11.14%); Hiligaynon or Ilongo (9.99%); Bicolano (6.96%); Waray-waray (4.62%); Kapampangan (3.43%) and Pangasinan (2.26%). Aside from these 8 principal native languages, there are 45 more native languages and 142 dialects.

Languages in local area do not differ much from the one captured in national level. This is because local languages are vastly influenced by the national language long imposed by the Philippine Constitution. If you think about it, this was a great achievement in the education system since fifty years ago, the national language existed only in theory. At present, people such as house help, drivers, security guards and even the better educated who come to Manila from the provinces now speak Filipino, not English, as the language of national identity in the sense that they are no longer "provincianos." It was a feat for the Philippine government in terms of introduction of a language that can be considered common. However, “common” does not necessarily mean “unified”. Attitude on regional differences between cultures and our corresponding attitude toward English versus Filipino barely changed. It did not help that the bilingual education program (BEP) was reinforced in 1987 further alienating vernacular languages. Furthermore, Filipino was only developed in terms of the spread of the language but not in its intellectualization. Side by side English in the BEP, it seemed to buttress even more any misconceptions about the inferiority of the language. It also failed to reach out to young professionals since the DECS (now DepEd) didn’t include tertiary level in their provisions of BEP.

We can examine the effects of our language use in three different levels: international, national, and local.

While its is not entirely wrong to be more adept with foreign language, what causes grave concern is that we have somehow been loosening pride on our own. One way or another there wasn’t much reinforcement to carry on an equal fascination towards the language we have grown up with.

Some topics in this essay:
Filipino English, Dabaw” Festivities, Hiligaynon Ilongo, English Filipino, Approaches Taking, Filipino Workers, Social Studies, Effects Development, Manuel Quezon, Strengthening” Actually, national language, filipino english, education system, bilingual education, own prejudices, applied simultaneously, social studies, language strengthening, pride own, one’s own,