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Monday, August 27, 2007
Today we will talk about several tricky little things you need to get used to before you can speak Cebuano properly.
The first is, how to say, “No.” Have you noticed that sometimes they say, “Dili, “ and sometimes they say, “Wala?”
‘Dili’ (which has a glottal stop at the end) means ‘will not, (I) do not, [...]
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Now we come to the third ‘focus’ in Cebuano grammar. I was taught to call this the “direction, place, beneficiary (victim)” focus. We can call it ‘direction’ focus for short.
So, if we go back to that bread we were buying at the store, we will now answer the question,
“Where did (will) you buy the [...]
Sunday, August 12, 2007
This is mostly for those of you who really want to learn to speak and understand Cebuano, but it will also be a help to those who just want to know how to say a few things now and then. Learning a language is not easy. Since language learning was part of our job, a [...]
Friday, August 10, 2007
Well, today we will tackle what I was taught to call ‘object focus.’ This is the “I will buy BREAD at the store,” answering the question, “WHAT did you buy at the store?”
But first I need to clarify something else, and that is ‘tense.’ I know all this talk about grammar makes everyone tense, [...]
Friday, August 3, 2007
First, let me make it clear that I am not a linguist by any stretch of the imagination. I went to language school in Butuan City and studied Cebuano. I came up with my own way of explaining how things work so that it made sense to me. Since there is almost no formal explanation [...]
