Dean answers:

Download the Learn Tagalog Easy podcast on itunes. Or you can go to their website to download the mp3.

Www.learntagalogeasy.blogspot.com
learntagalogeasy.mypodcast.com

and it’s absolutely free.
They answer to emails too.

I hope this helps! =)

Dean answers:

There’s only a few Hispanoparlantes left in the country (muchos de ellos murieron durante la 2ª guerra mundial). If you ever encounter one, he’s probably really old, or he comes from the old rich families. However, thanks to the reinstatement of Spanish as official lanugage, there’s been a renewed interest in learning it. In Manila, you might bump into an Instituto Cervantes student or two, but don’t expect that they speak conversational-level Spanish.

Most of what the others refer to are actually speakers of Chavacano; a pigdin of Spanish words and the structure of local languages.

And many Philippine languages (Cebuano, Ilocano, Capampangan) borrow loads of Spanish words; Tagalog is no different. You’d understand us to a certain degree, but not entirely. Some words have totally different meanings. ‘Almusál’ (from ‘almorzar’) means breakfast instead of lunch. And ‘seguro’ means ‘maybe’ instead of ‘sure’.

Tagalog is a difficult language to master and many foreign students still can’t get the accents right… And end up sounding stupid.

I suggest you stick with English. Many of us here have a respectable, if not passable command of the language.

Dean answers:

We have our own language.. So why use Spanish?? Do spanish can replace words such as sinangag? Tuyo? Kakanin?

And spanish is also to knowldegeable persons only in the Philippines during the Spanish era,, meaning many are not able to speak spanish.. It is not known for the common public

and besides the previous campaigns by the Philippine government to promote Spanish as a popular auxiliary language among Filipinos,, all those learned it are not using it.. Therefore, it is useless as being only as an auxiliary language.. What more if it would be the Philippine national language??

A good compromise that the philippine government must do now is to give equal promotion to all Filipino languages? Why not give Filipino (Tagalog) lessons to BIsayas and Bisaya lessons to Tagalogs? So that no one can feel any hatred or bias to the Philippine government.

Dean answers:

Sign language is taught at DLS-CSB’s School of Deaf Education and Applied Studies. Good luck on that… I attended an alternative class at CSB way back during the day, it was really quiet but fun. Maybe a entire year of that and i would have learned sign language myself.

Dean answers:

First of all, the Philippines and Mexico were the sister colonies under Spain:

About 75% of Filipinos (people from the Philippines) speak English well as a result of it being an official language, together with the Filipino language (based on the dialect Tagalog). Filipinos are taught two languages from nursery to 4th year college and so you get the idea from there. Also, the government uses English as the main language. They also call it Philippine English as the accent-form is not quite like the British English but is more like Americanized and Tagalized. Filipinos are also named Spanish and English names to go with some old-school Filipino names.

>>>So, Yahoo! Answers in the Philippines is in English and as evidenced by the Q and A’s over there, everybody writes in English.<<<

Philippine government (Typical Senate session):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdnzFD9k4is (Disgraced Filipino president speaking in English and Filipino [Tagalog]. That is how ordinary Filipinos talk.)

Spanish-wise, not so many Filipinos speak Spanish anymore: According to the latest census (2006 I think), only about 600,000 people speak Spanish in that country. There is however, a Spanish Creole called Chavacano in some parts of the country which in this case has more speakers. It is mostly Spanish with a little mixture of the Malayo-Austranesian language group and is spoken and written in the Tagalog grammar. Examples:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6tofnmn6Ec

An interesting thing though is that the Filipino language has both the Tagalog-dialect and the Spanish language aspect in it. Examples in Tagalog (the other official Filipino language):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUVyVGN87oM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLePYdggqVQ

Certain terms used by Filipinos that have no Tagalog translation are:

Terms pertaining to time such as "ala una" or "alas dos" or "alas tres". They also name their days and months as Lunes, Martes, Mierkoles, Enero, Febrero, Marso, etc. This is due to the fact that before the Spanish Castellans landed in the Philippines in the 1500's, the Tagalog dialect isn't a fully developed language/dialect yet. Plus, it is more of borrowed from the Austronesian language of the region.

Unfortunately, the Spanish conquerors never taught Spanish to the early Filipino colonies much because they fear that it may lead to revolution and greater knowledge during the Philippine colonial period up until 1898. Most educated Filipinos who were able to go to expensive schools and universities were taught Spanish and used it as a tool to write newspapers and novels that brought the Spanish rule down. Nevertheless, the country was named "Las islas de Filipinas" by the Spaniards in honor of their King at that time, King Philip II. The name stuck until the country got their independence in 1898 and even during the American colonization from 1898 to 1946. During the independence from the Americans in 1946, the Filipinos chose to leave the country's name as such and instead of Filipinas, they changed it to the English form, "the Philippines".

An example of a Filipino (Tagalog-based and NOT Chavacano) sentence would be:

Pwede (Puede) bang pakiayos naman yong kotse (coche) ko kasi depektibo (defectivo) yung makina (maquina).
(Can you fix my car because it's engine is defective.)

Now, a Chavacano example (then an English then Spanish forms):

Philippine Spanish creole: Treinta y cuatro kilometro desde'l pueblo de Zamboanga, el Bunguiao es un barrio chico estaba como un desierto. No hay gente quien ta queda aqui. Abundante este lugar de maga animales particularmente como puerco, gatorgalla, venao y otro mas pa. Maga pajariador lang ta visita con este lugar.
(English: Bunguiao, a small village, thirty four kilometers from the city of Zamboanga, was once a wilderness. No people lived here. The place abounded with wild animals like pigs, wildcats, deer, and still others. The place was visited only by bird hunters.)

(Spanish: A treinta y cuatro kilómetros desde el pueblo de Zamboanga, el Bunguiao, un barrio chico, estaba como un desierto. No hay gente que quede aquí. Abundante este lugar era de animales salvajes como puercos, gatos monteses, venados, y otros mas. Solo los cazadores (de pajaros) visitaban este lugar.)

NOTICE THE BIG DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE REGULAR FILIPINO TAGALOG-BASED LANGUAGE AND THE FILIPINO CHAVACANO-BASED LANGUAGE. TAGALOG HAS LITTLE SPANISH BUT CHAVACANO USES A LOT OF SPANISH WORDS BUT IN BAD GRAMMAR FORM.