Travails with Tagalog language

By Antonio J. Montalvan

UNTIL now, there is no such thing as a "Filipino" language. The constitutional mandate to develop a Filipino language as the medium of instruction in schools has not been accomplished yet. In that sense, I can sympathize with GMA's order to suspend the use of "Filipino" as the medium in academia. My sympathies, however, end there.

What we do have at the moment is not "Filipino" but Tagalog, a regional language that is spoken in that part of the country where the capital city is. Tagalog is the lingua franca of Manila and its environs. In that sense, it is and was practical for our national leaders, many of whom are or were native Tagalog speakers like Quezon. But because we are a multi-cultural nation, it is not the lingua franca elsewhere.

Ethnic statistics will show that the Tagalogs do not necessarily comprise a demographic majority. And even if they do, Visayan speakers number not very far behind. Numbers alone, however, are not the basis of adopting a national language. We have seen that in Sri Lanka where the Sinhalese majority officially enacted a legislation that conferred on Sinhala the status of the sole official language of that country. The result is the devastating violence that country has had to endure between its ethnic majority and the minority Tamils.

While I agree with ethnolinguists who aver that more and more Filipinos can now speak and comprehend Tagalog, still that does not consider the fact that it is not a language of national scope and it can never be because that is not the reality of Filipino linguistic culture. As such, Tagalog remains a language of intrusion in non-Tagalog areas just as Visayan is intrusive in non-Visayan areas.

Language can be misused as a tool for cultural assimilation. It is not just the language that we imbibe but the culture of the speakers as well. For instance, Filipino television is so dismally Tagalog. Even articulate personalities such as Winnie Monsod and Oscar Orbos often have to remind their debating guests to argue in Tagalog. I presume it is because of the ratings. The views of non-Tagalog speakers can in no way be heard because those who have minimal facility with Tagalog will find it hard to enunciate. The result is having guests mostly from Manila who do not necessarily reflect the views of those from the provinces.

Language can also be a tool of imperialism. In the Philippine cultural reality where the lowland-highland dynamics between ethnic groups is still very much operative, often it is the lowland language that is accorded cultural acceptance over the highland language, often simply considered as a "dialect" when in truth it is not. We find that in northern Luzon where the mountain people have to contend with Ilocano even if this is not their simple everyday language. We also find that in Panay where Kinaray-a speakers shift to Ilonggo once they reach the city. In Mindanao, highlanders and Moro communities have to contend with Visayan widely spoken in the lowlands.

It is prejudicial for those who say that not speaking in the "wikang pambansa" is being un-nationalistic, unpatriotic. But what is national about Tagalog? Our use of Tagalog is very much reflective of our Manila-centric culture. I have had my own experiences. At one national historical conference, the speaker was a UP history professor who spoke in very academic Tagalog. At one point I could not help but interrupt to ask the meanings of words that sounded not Filipino but Greek.

I will cite what has already been referred to in this paper by UP anthropologist Dr. Michael L. Tan, who, last week mentioned the findings that a child easily learns a second language if he or she is already literate in the local language. The importance then of local language in instruction need not be underscored. Substituting Filipino with English may solve globalization needs, but not problems of comprehensive skills.

While it is true that local language has over the years found its way into the Tagalog vocabulary (such Visayan words as kuno and kawatan, among others), still that does not negate the fact that until now no legislative enactment has ever considered putting flesh into the constitutional mandate of developing a Filipino language.

Creating an "artificial language" is not new. That has been done before in the case of Esperanto, developed in 1887 by Lazarus Ludwig Zamenhof, a Polish oculist who wanted it used as a second international language (although present estimates of Esperanto speakers may deem it questionable, but that's another story). Perhaps developing a truly national language can be a pursuit the government can look into, a language where the words are derived from roots commonly found in Philippine languages.

Or are we still suffering the myopia of the Republika ng Katagalogan?

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