Filipino Language

Filipino (Fi-li-pi-no) is the national language of the Republic of the Philippines and along with English, is the country's official language. According to Section 6, Article XIV of the aforecited Constitution, the Filipino language is *"developed and enriched on the basis of existing Philippine and other languages."* Filipino is an officially instituted language distinct and different from languages Pilipino and Tagalog as commonly confused by many authors thus the confusing literature on the matter.

## Background

The Philippines is a multi-lingual nation with more than 175 living languages spoken by various ethno-linguistic groups. When Philippines was colonized by Spain, Philippines was already a civilized nation possessing a established political structure, set of laws, culture, commerce, trade, religion, literature, and such other elements that characterizes a properly structure civil society.

Most worthy be noted however is the fact that when colonizers arrived, Filipino people had long been known to be a literate race who is able to read and write with its own distinctive form of writing being the baybayin. In a book sucesos de las Islas Filipinas, author Dr. Antonio de Morga accounts:

*"Throught the islands the natives write very well using [their letters]... All the natives, women as well as men, write in this language, and there are very few who do not write well and correctly."*

On a similiar account, author Pedro Chirino on his book Relacion de las Islas Filipinas declareres:

*"So accustomed are all these islanders to writing and reading that there is scarcely a man, much less a woman, who cannot read and write in the letters proper to the island of Manila."*

The culture of literacy lived on despite colonization that the enactment of the 1935 Commonwealth Constitution deemed so important the institution of a national language that born of its letters and mandate is the institution of the Pilipino language as the first national language of the Philippines.

The enactment of the 1973 Constitution paved the way to the first coinage of Filipino as the national language replacing then prevailing Pilipino language. Finally, the enactment of the 1987 Philippine Constitution officially mandated Filipino as the Republic's National Language which to date prevails as the constitutionally mandated national language.

## The Alphabet and Spelling Guide in the Filipino Language

Pursuant the issuance of Department Order No. 81, series of 1987 by the Department of Education, Culture, and Sports, the Filipino language was assigned an alphabet and a system of spelling distict from any other existing languages. As provided by said Order, the Filipino alphabet and spelling system are as follows:

### The Filipino Alphabet

The Filipino alphabet consists of 28 letters particularly arranged in the following order of chronology:

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, ñ, Ng, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z.

## Inaccurate Description of the Filipino Language by KWF

The Kumisyon sa Wikang Filipino (KWF) on 13 May 1992 issued Resolution No. 92-1 providing for the statutory description -- definition -- of the Filipino language by providing *inter alia* the following:

*"Filipino is the native language, spoken and written, in Metro Manila, the country's capital, and in other urban central regions of the archipelago, used as the language of communication among Philippine ethnic groups."*

*1. ↑ Article XIV, Section 6, 1987 Philippine Constitution..
2. ↑ Article XIV, Section 7, 1987 Philippine Constitution..
3. ↑ Sucesos de las Islas FilipinasSucesos de las Islas Filipinas (Introduction) (slideshare.net)..
4. ↑ Relacion de las Islas Filipinas..*