Tagalog Grammar (works in progress…)by Eduardo MarescaA

ITALIAN HUSBAND OF A FILIPINA marito italiano di una filippina

Tagalog Grammar (works in progress…)by Eduardo MarescaA Tagalog course in Italian based on the book “Conversational Tagalog” by Teresita RamosMy journey with the Tagalog language started with this course…. the only material available here back in 2001In this post I am putting together my first 3 post of the series “The Basic Structure of the Tagalog Language”.I think it is more practical to delete my previous small-chunk size posts about Tagalog and replace them with a single post which I will update from time to time.The reason why I am doing this is because from time to time I need to brush up my knowledge of the Tagalog grammar and, in so doing, also share it with anyone who may be interested in learning this language, like some Western guy married to a Filipina for example.I must give credit to a couple of sources that have greatly helped me to grasp the grammar of my wife’s native language: “Conversational Tagalog” by Teresita Ramos and the website http://www.seasite.niu.edu/tagalog/tagalog_mainpage.htmHOW WORDS ARE FORMED IN TAGALOGLearning Tagalog is almost like playing with Lego blocks, as the seemingly long words are, in reality, the result of the combination of a root word and one or more affixes: English speakers are already familiar with this concept because in English a number of words are formed by adding an affix to a root word. For example the root word beauty can be combined with ful to form the adjective beautiful. Take for example the Tagalog root word ganda (that conveys the idea of beauty): if you combine it with the affix ma– you form the adjective maganda or beautiful; if you combine it with –um– (between the first consonant and the first vowel) you form the verb gumanda and if you put the prefix ka– before the root word and the suffix –an after it you form the noun kagandahan. As I said, it is almost like playing with Legos and putting the pieces together: depending on the affix that you stick to the root word you can form an adjective, a verb or a noun A root word is simply a basic, core word that can be used to make other words. This is the starting point to understand the structure of the Tagalog language and what I can say is that I’ve found out that the structure of Tagalog is much easier than that of most Western languages, especially when you are learning verbs, speaking of which….VERBAL ASPECT VS TENSESAnother aspect that made it relatively easy, at least for me, to learn Tagalog is that there is only one kind of past tense, present tense or future tense not many like in Italian for example. Technically those are not even called “tenses” but rather “verbal aspects” because they only convey the idea that a certain action has been accomplished, is being accomplished or is being “contemplated” but they give no clue as to “when” it has been accomplished or will be accomplished. For example the verb “bumasa” (to read) has the following aspects: Bumasa ako ng aklat=I have read the book (the action has been accomplished, it doesn’t tell you the when) Bumabasa ako ng aklat=I am (in the process of) reading the book Babasa ako ng aklat=I have the intention to read it, I am contemplating the idea of reading it but I am not communicating when in the future I will do it (unless I use a time expression like bukas=tomorrow etc).A nice way to illustrate the difference between a tense and the verbal aspect is the example of the boss of a company and the secretary (which I’ve found on the Tagalog page of the official website of the department of Asian studies of the University of Illinois): the boss of a company is only concerned with whether his employee has done his job or not, the secretary is concerned with when the employee did his job because she has to calculate the amount of his paycheck. Similarly the verbal aspect only communicates if a certain action has been done or not while a tense communicates when the action has taken place or will take place.If I say something like binasa ko ang aklat (I read the book) that expression simply tells me that I did the action of reading the book, it could have happened one moment ago, yesterday, one year ago, 20 years ago. If I say babasahin ko ang aklat I am stating my intention to read the book: it could happen in 5 minutes or 5 years. So, in order to give the listener a clue about the when Filipinos need time expressions like kanina (earlier), kahapon (yesterday), ngayon (today), mamaya (later), bukas (tomorrow) and many others. In my language (Italian) not only do we have tenses but we have plenty of them, 21 to be specific. We have 8 tenses in the indicative mode, 4 in the subjunctive, 2 in the conditional, one in the imperative, 2 in the infinitive, 2 in the participle and 2 in the gerund, imagine that!LINKERSFilipinos often use either ng or na to connect two words, usually an adjective and a noun. If the word that appears before the linker ends with a vowel they use ng, if it ends with a consonant they use na like in the following two examples: Masamang kalagayan (bad situation) Mahirap na kalagayan (difficult situation) So, in the first example, because masama ends with a vowel I used ng, while after mahirap that ends in a consonant, I used na. The same applies when you are linking two numbers like: Limang daan Apat na raanNUMBERSThe first time I heard numbers like labingisa or isang daan at labindalawa etc. I wondered “how am I possibly going to learn this stuff”? In reality, if you are interested in learning numbers in Tagalog, all you really need to memorize are the numbers from one to ten being: isa dalawa tatlo apat lima anim pito walo siyam sampu. Then, the numbers from 11 to 19 are really easy because all you need to do is add labin to the numbers you’ve already learned: 11=labingisa 12=labindalawa and so on. Then, as for the numbers 20, 30, 40 etc. they all end like 10 or sampu: Dalawampu Tatlumpu and so on Between 20, 30, 40 etc. you just add ‘t isa, ‘t dalawa etc.: Example: 21=dalawampu’t isa 22=dalawampu’t dalawa ….. 51=limampu’t isa And so on As for the “hundreds” you just have to learn …ng daan (except for apat and other numbers that end in a consonant where you’ve got na raan) the pattern is: Isang daan Dalawang daan …. Apat na raan ….. Anim na raan Then for higher numbers you add: Libo=1000 Milyon Bilyon And so on.PLURALSGenerally, in order to turn a singular noun into a plural, Filipinos add the word mga between the markers ang and ng and the noun like in the following examples: “Ang mga Pilipino ay umiinom ng gin” meaning “Filipinos drink gin” (which is true, by the way) and the focus is on the actors. “Iniinom ng mga Pilipino ang gin” meaning the same thing the focus being on the object So, when you find the little word “mga” between the marker and the noun that indicates that the noun is in the plural number. This means for example that if you go to a Filipino party don’t just bring ang isang bote (one bottle), rather always bring ang mga bote (ng gin)…..THE “AY” INVERTERIn Tagalog there is no such thing as the verb to be. You will often come across expressions like: ako ay Pilipino. Well, that doesn’t literally translate as “I am Filipino”. That is just an inverted form of Pilipino ako where ay simply inverts the order in the sentence. Well, this blog is mainly about how to have a thriving marriage with a Filipina but, from time to time I also like to talk about the Tagalog language and grammar. I started doing it in the past a little randomly and so in some future articles I will cover this kind of material in a more systematic way….and in so doing I’ll review the Tagalog grammar myself since I haven’t been doing it for quite a while…FOCUS IN TAGALOG A trickier thing about Tagalog grammar is the so-called focus which basically means that in Tagalog you have to use the right affix to form a verb, depending on the focal point of the sentence, and there are many verbal affixes in Tagalog like –um-, mag-, maka-, makapag-, ma-, magpa-, i-, -in, -an. You also need to use the right marker (something like what we call an article in Western languages) like ang, ng, sa (or si, ni and kay if you are talking about a person). The focus of the sentence also determines which personal pronouns you are going to use.The actor focus personal pronouns are: Ako=I Ikaw (or ka)=you Siya=he or she Kami or tayo=we (I’ll talk about the difference in another article) Kayo=You Sila=theyThe object focus personal pronouns are : Ko Mo Niya Namin or natin Ninyo NilaTo illustrate how all of this works, let’s take the root word basa, which conveys the idea of reading and let’s say that we want to say something like “I (or you, he/she, we, You, they) read a book” In this sentence we’ve got: a personal pronoun (I) a verb (to read) a marker (or article being “a”) In this sentence I can basically emphasize two elements: the one who is reading thereby answering the question “who reads the book?” The object or the thing being read which answers the question “what is being read?”ACTOR FOCUS The first type of focus is the actor focus type of sentence: In this kind of sentence I am going to use such verbal affixes like -um- (that goes between the first consonant and the first vowel of the root word) or mag-.The markers I am going to use in connection with the actor are ang or si (if the actor is a personal name, like “si Eduardo”). And the personal pronouns are ako, ikaw etc.MAG- VERBS Let’s make a few examples: “The man is reading a book” In Tagalog that would be: “Ang tao ay nagbabasa (present “tense” or, more accurately “incompleted aspect” of magbasa) ng isang aklat”. Notice that I am using the “ay” which inverts the order of the sentence that could also be rendered as “nagbabasa ang tao ng aklat”. “Eduardo is reading the book” =”Si Eduardo ay nagbabasa ng aklat” (or “nagbabasa si Eduardo….”). “I am reading the book” =”Ako ay nagbabasa ng aklat”In the examples above I have used the verbal affix “mag” which turns the root word basa into a mag- verb, which is only one type of actor focus verb.The completed aspect of magbasa is nagbasa (mag becomes nag)The incompleted aspect is nagbabasa (mag becomes nag and I am doubling the first syllable)The contemplated aspect (basically the “future tense”) is magbabasa.The abilitative form (expressing the ability to do the action) of a mag- verb is makapag-, so to convey the idea that one has the ability or the possibility to read I say makapagbasa.-UM- VERBSThe other common actor focus affix is -um- by using which with basa the verb is bumasa (past: bumasa, present: bumabasa, again I am doubling the first syllable, future: babasa, I am removing the um to form the future) and the corresponding abilitative form is maka- MA- VERBS Another actor focus affix is ma- for actor focus verbs like: Matulog (to sleep) Makinig (to listen) Maligo (to take a bath) Manood (to watch) OBJECT FOCUS The second type of focus is the object focus in which case I am answering the question “what is being read?” -IN VERBS Examples: “The book is what the man is reading” “Binabasa (present “tense” or incompleted aspect of basahin) ng tao ang aklat” “The book is what Eduardo is reading” “Binabasa ni Eduardo ang aklat” “The book is what I am reading” “Binabasa ko ang aklat” In this case I have used a verb that ends in -in like basahin, inumin, ayusin etc. (Past: binasa, present: binabasa, future: basahin) I- VERBS Another common object focus verb is the one that begins with i- like ituro, idiin, itago etc. (past: itinuro, present: itinuturo, future: ituturo). MA- VERBS Some ma- verbs are actor focus like makinig while others are object focus like: Makita (to see) Marinig (to hear) Mapansin (to pay attention) -AN VERBS Some object focus verbs end in -an like: Buksan (to open) Takpan (to cover) These two are just the two main focuses in Tagalog.LOCATION/DIRECTION VERBS In Tagalog the affix -an is used to talk about a location, and this applies not just to verbs but also to nouns. For example the word aklatan, which is formed by combining aklat (book) with –an means “library” or “the place or location where books can be found”. The word basurahan, which is formed by adding -an to basura (garbage) is the place where people dispose of garbage. Similarly verbs that end with –an generally refer to an action where the focus is either the location or the direction of the action. For example if I am going to Juan’s house I can use the verb puntahan and the house of Juan is my pupuntahan. If I do something in behalf of someone and this person is the receiver or the direction of my action, I also use an –an verb like bigyan where the verb (“to give”) is used to talk about the person to whom an object is given, like for instance bigyan ko ng bulaklak ang misis ko (“my wife is the one to whom I give the flowers”, so my action, the action of buying flowers is directed toward my wife). Sometimes –an can also be used for object focus verbs (see part 2) or even beneficiary focus verbs, speaking of which let’s now talk about those BENEFICIARY FOCUS VERBS These verbs are used to talk about the beneficiary of an action like for example the verb bilhan (to buy for someone) ex. bilhan mo ang bata ng kendi (“buy the candy for the child”) In addition to –an another beneficiary focus affix is ipag- like in the following sentence: ipagluto mo ng l angmga bata ng fried chicken (“(you) cook some fried chicken for the children”), even though, to be honest, I don’t hear ipag- verbs very much in everyday speech (my wife never uses ipag- verbs but she does use –an beneficiary verbs) An easy way to talk about the beneficiary of an action without having to learn the beneficiary focus is by simply using the expression para sa (“for something”) or para kay (“for someone”) in an actor focus or in a object focus sentence. For example, instead of saying ipagluto mo ang mga bata ng fried chicken you could simply say magluto ka ng fried chicken para sa mga bata (or para kay Mario if you are using a personal name) INSTRUMENTAL FOCUS The last type of focus is the instrumental which talks about the tool or instrument one is using to do something. The affix here is ipang- or ipan- So I could say something like “I am using the walis tambo to sweep the floor” and, in this case I have to use ipanlinis ko ang walis tambo ng sahig If I wanted to avoid using the instrumental focus I could simply use an actor or object focus verb + the expression sa pamamagitan (“by means of”) like nagwawalis ako ng sahig sa pamamagitan ng walis tambo and, in reality, I have never heard my wife using ipang- verbs, she always uses either an actor focus affix or an object focus affix followed by the expression sa pamamagitan. So these are in a nutshell the various verbal focus affixes in Tagalog. In future posts I’ll cover some more grammar rules.Eduardo Maresca | April 9, 2020 at 8:01 pm | Tags: Tagalog Grammar | Categories: Tagalog Grammar, Tagalog language | URL: https://wp.me/paeiS4-1jU

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