Overview of the Tagalog Language

Tagalog (ta-GA-log) is the national language of the Republic of the Philippines. It was
officially renamed Pilipino in 1961. Today, it is taught in the elementary and secondary
schools of the Philippines, where it is spoken by approximately 45 million people. In the
United States, there are at least 900,000 speakers of Tagalog.

The Tagalog people migrated to the island of Luzon from the Malay Peninsula and settled
around the area which today encompasses the city of Manila. Tagalog was selected as the
national language of the Philippines in 1946 because it had a rich literary tradition, it was the
most widely spoken language in the Republic, and it was considered the language of the
revolution against colonialism.

Tagalog is a member of the Western group of Malayo-Polynesian languages. The Malayo-

Polynesian languages are unique and do not appear to be related to any other language group.
Other Malayo-Polynesian languages include: Malagasy, Malay, and Indonesian.

Other languages of the Philippine Islands include: Visayan, Pampangan, Bikol, and Ilocano.
As a result of rule by the United States from 1899 to 1941, English is widely spoken and
serves as a second official language.

The Tagalog Alphabet and Tagalog Vocabulary

The Tagalog alphabet consists of twenty letters: 15 consonants and 5 vowels. Tagalog has had
a written form for hundreds of years. Over time, many words from Malay, Spanish, and
English have been introduced. Tagalog grammar has retained its original form and has
remained unchanged as new words have been incorporated.

Some of the vocabulary in Tagalog will be familiar to speakers of English: bangko means
bank, sero means zero, tiket means ticket, and kompyuter is recognizable as computer. But
don’t be fooled, there are many other words that look the same yet carry very different
meanings! For example, at means and, noon means at that time rather than "midday", and
mama means uncle or mister. Did you know that the English word boondocks is from
Tagalog? In Tagalog, bundok means mountain.

Formal and Informal Address in the Tagalog Language

In Tagalog, the particle po is used to express respect to the person to whom you are speaking.
If you meet a friend on the street you might say, Magandang araw (literally, beautiful day). If
you meet an older person or a stranger you might say Magandang araw po. Po is often
translated as "sir" or "ma’am".
 Tagalog Grammar

The sentence order in Tagalog is markedly different from the sentence structure to which we
are accustomed. We might say "The crocodile is big." A native speaker of Tagalog would
probably say "Malaki ang buwaya," or "Big the crocodile."

To express plurals in Tagalog, the particle mga is often used. For example, "the child" would
be "ang bata"; "the children" would be "ang mga bata".

Most nouns in Tagalog are neuter, but some of the nouns which have been borrowed from
Spanish are gender specific. Of these, the feminine nouns such as "blusa" (blouse) almost
always end in "a" while the masculine nouns such as "amo" (boss) usually end in "o".

Using numbers in Tagalog can be difficult because native speakers use not only Tagalog, but
also Spanish and English numbers! Dates, for example, may be expressed in any of these
languages. You might hear "sa August one" on August first; "unang araw ng Nobyembre" on
November first, or even "a-primero ng Mayo" for May first! If you learn both Spanish and
Tagalog numbers you’ll be better equipped to deal with situations involving numbers such as
dates, times, prices, and measurements.

Tagalog is a phonetic language and the letters and letter combinations virtually always have
the same pronunciation.