George Bernard Shaw has been widely quoted as having said “England and America are two countries separated by a common language.” The quote has also been attributed to Oscar Wilde, but it is more widely attributed to Shaw.
I don’t know if you could really say that English is a common language between England, the USA and also the Philippines. English is indeed one of the Official Languages of the Philippines, but is not the most commonly used language in any part of the country. English is very widely used for things like Court Records, Government Documents and Business Documents. But, the general public does not go around speaking English to each other in most cases.
If you could argue, though, that English is a common language here, and is common with other English speaking countries, it could definitely be said that the Philippines is “separated” from the other countries by this common language. I don’t think that there could be any doubt. English is just used differently here than what we native English speakers are used to.
Yes, there are differences in the language between the USA and Great Britain. Just as there are between every other English speaking country… Canada, Australia, New Zealand and on and on.. English is spoken a bit differently in each of the countries that share the language.
But, in the Philippines it goes to a completely new level, in my view.
Now, let me say, I don’t write this article in any way disparaging Filipinos for their English skills. No, not at all. One time I wrote an article similar to this and a close friend of mine told me that I should not write so negatively about Filipinos. But, I did not feel it was negative. It is just a matter that I am pointing out that they use English in a different way. No different than Americans using English a bit differently than the Brits do, or the Australians, Canadians and so on. Nothing wrong with that, it is just different.
One thing that I learned some 25+ years ago, in my early days of marriage to Feyma was something which I was recently reminded of again.
A week or two ago, I was down in General Santos City and went and visited Feyma’s sister. We were talking about something, and Sally mentioned “Last the other day,” and it all flooded back to me.
In the United States, if we are talking about something in the recent past, we might refer to:
- Yesterday: happened the day preceding today.
- The day before yesterday: it happened 2 days ago.
- The other day: happened several days ago, but “the other day” does not denote any specific day, just within the past week or so.
In the Philippines, at least in this part of the Philippines where I live, they say it a bit different:
- Yesterday: Same usage as in USA
- The other day: what we would say at the “day before yesterday”
- Last the other day: Two days ago.
I find the saying “last the other day” kind of cute… but it is most certainly different, don’t you think?
I was thinking this over last the other day, in fact! LOL
Good point Bob 🙂 Now, I am not so sure that a lot of filipinos don’t speak english… OK, a lot can’t because they weren’t able to attend school, or they don’t master enough english to be able to sustain a conversation. But mostly, I think that they don’t speak english because of its foreign origin, and they are quite touchy when it comes to colonialism…
Now I found out that they have the same issue with their other national language, tagalog ! Just go to Cebu, and you will quickly realize that a lot of people speak cebuano and don’t speak tagalog ! This happened once to my partner, kids and I, while havingh holidays down there. My partner had trouble, at times, because people didn’t speak neither english nor tagalog, but that was while we were discovering the island, in little villages far from Cebu City…
This is probably the beauty, and the curse, of such a huge archipelago as Philippines. You have innumerous local languages, and out of the big cities, people will speak their own local languages and quite never use a national language.
Philippines have the incredible luck to not still being “globalized”, and I really hope it will remain this way for a long time !
I just want to make sure that I’m not misunderstood. I did not mean to imply that Filipinos cannot speak English, what I meant was that in Daily conversation with each other they generally do not choose to use English. Most Filipinos can speak English, although it may be a little bit different than the way we speak English.
As for Cebu City, you are perfectly correct on that. Tagalog is despised in Cebu, it has been forced on them and they don’t like tagalog. If you can’t speak cebuano, much better to speak English than Tagalog. I’m not sure if you’re aware, but I am also fluid in cebuano myself.
Hi Bob I sometimes get a bit frustrated ( I try very hard not to show it ), when I ask for the bill at a resturant, or a sales assistant when I ask where do I pay or where a department is, or a Taxi driver who does not understand what I say. At first I thought it was my Black Country Accent as the Filipino’s are more used to American accents.
At the Resturant when the bill did not arrive after a few minutes I asked the waitress again for the Bill ( the first time she nodded and smiled ) this time she looked at me with a blank expression, thankfully a Filipino couple sitting nearby said ” Bill ” and several words in Filipino, the Waitress smiled and I promptly got the bill. I have had several Taxi Drivers whose English was very good, these guy’s worked on ships and were between jobs and they seem to enjoy talking in English too me. So maybe my accent was part of the problem and that English is not their first language. Just be patient smile and you will get understood in the end.
Hi Gerry – In a restaurant, the culture is that they will not bring the bill unless you signal that you are ready for it, even if that is hours, no bill will be brought. You don’t really “ask” for it, you use your fingers to form a little square while motioning to them, that is how you should indicate that you want the bill. It will be universally understood here, without even speaking a word.
Good luck to you!
Hi Bob I actually signalled as well. I did a square with my fingers…..But really I should know more Filipino Phrases and words
Knowing the language, even a little bit, will make a huge difference in your life, I can tell you that.
It’s very strange because I’ve never had trouble getting a bill in a restaurant, I don’t think I’ve ever really asked, just made the signal and it comes quickly.
“Last other day” is a direct translation of how it is said in Cebuano, ‘Niadtong, naiaging adlaw.’ So, it makes sense! 🙂
Ah, I did not even think about that, Luanne! Interesting, thanks for sharing.
The differences between Filipino English and American English are almost too numerous to mention. Just a few quickies. American English: sports shirt, Philippine English: polo shirt; AE: wash cloth, PE: face towel; AE: checking account; PE: current account; AE: mortgage; PE: amortization.
Oh yes.. we could literally go on for days thinking up differences, and still not cover the whole topic! I guess the French had it right… Viva la difference. 🙂
The ‘Filipino English’ phrase which most puzzles me is “Until now”. It is used by Filipinos to say that something is still happening; e.g. “I never met my brother-in-law until now.” In English I read that as having only now met the brother-in-law but in ‘Filipino English’ it seems to mean that they have still not met the brother-in-law.
Interesting Mike. I had not thought about that particular phrase “until now” LOL. You are right, I would interpret it to mean that he had never met his brother in law until he just met him now. But, you are also right that in use here in the Philippines he would probably be saying that even up to now, he still has not met his brother in law. Good catch!
Verb tense seems to be an issue. But I remember all the time we spent in high school Spanish class conjugating verbs, and I still can’t speak good Spanish. Still, when trying to get things accomplished on the ranch, it can be difficult to determine whether something has been done, is being done, or has not been done yet,
I already knew this, but being here full time does intensify things. Filipinos love abbreviations and shortened English words. Coming from a military background I understand the attraction. But I find that Filipinos often don’t know what the abbreviation stands for. Here, the abbreviation has become the name of the item. Makes it rather interesting when trying to build something.
On the other side of the coin, I’ve met Filipinos whose command of the English language is better than many blue collar Americans I’ve worked with.
Take care,
Pete
Hey Pete, nice to hear from you. Having learned the language, I have a pretty good understanding of why verb tense is hard for Filipinos when they speak English. Verb tense is done in a completely different way here than in English. I think most English speaking foreigners would have a hard time adjusting to the way that they do verb tense here, just as Filipinos find it difficult to adjust to our way of doing verb tense in English. I’m used to it, I don’t consider it a big issue.
Makes perfect sense. I knew that the grammer was very different. The folks who have the most trouble communicating with me are trying to translate word for word from their own dialect. Comes out broken and choppy, and often makes no sense in English. The same would be true if I tried to translate word for word from English.
I have a couple of textbooks on Ilocano. One has a useful phrase book section. I experiment with that in the palenke. Makes things interesting. Even when I use my limited Ilocano, folks seem to prefer to answer in English.
If you want to learn the language, learning it from a book is very difficult. The very best thing you can do, since you are living here, is to find somebody who knows how to actually teach a language, and hire them as a tutor. Somebody who is a linguist, not just a lay person, because learning a language is not an easy process, you have to start with the right building blocks, and work your way up. I can tell you though it will greatly improve your life here if you do that. Good luck Pete.
Agreed. Especially since the grammer is so different.
A lot of people think that learning a language is just basically memorizing a bunch of words. Nothing could be further from the truth. In the case of Philippine languages, you must learn a lot about the word usage, grammar and such. There are a lot of Fiilipino words that have slight variations in meaning, and if you choose the wrong one it might lead to trouble for you. For example, in English, the word “Maybe” has like a half dozen words in Bisaya that have varying degrees of certainty of “maybe”, so it is very important to choose the right one!