It’s true that the vast majority of Filipinos speak English. But if you’re spending significant time with people from Manila and southern Luzon, then life gets richer and more enjoyable as your Tagalog improves. After all, it’s the language of daily life. And as any learner will tell you, it’s about as foreign as a…
English is spoken throughout the Philippines, especially in Manila. That’s nice for short-term visitors, since Tagalog is not easy for most foreigners to pick up. But even without knowledge of Tagalog, there are so many English words in everyday speech that you may still understand more than expected. Given how prevalent (and official) English is, there’s actually a…
If you speak English, then rest assured that you’ll get by perfectly fine in Manila, and virtually everywhere else in the Philippines. After decades of American control, and close cultural ties ever since, that’s to be expected—especially in such a huge, cosmopolitan city. But English is obviously not indigenous, so what language is local to Manila? This…
Learning a useful amount of any language is a feat to be proud of. The process is a terrific hobby, and the outcome is valuable and enriching. But all else being equal, Tagalog—the local language of Manila—is hard to pick up. With that in mind, is Tagalog worth learning for a trip to Manila? When…
Whether you want to learn Tagalog for daily life around Manila, or to talk to friends and family, or just for the fun of taking on a new language…it’s not an easy language to learn. What’s more, classes are rare (in most of the US) and there are fewer good resources than for the more common second-language choices….
If you’ve studied a European language, then you’ve probably spent many an hour trying to separate your le and la or you der, die, and das. And looking elsewhere in the world, languages have and handle gender in countless ways. Some disregard it altogether whereas others have elaborate systems of gender that even differ between people, animals, and objects! But where does…
Conjugation, or changing parts of a verb, is one of the most common ways that languages indicate when and how things happened. Although verb conjugations are common (especially in Western languages), they’re not at all universal. So, you may wonder, does Tagalog have conjugations? Tagalog verbs are conjugated to identify three things: aspect (what state the…
If you can speak passable Tagalog, you’ll never have to worry about getting by and making friends in Manila. Even on your own you’ll find life in Manila easier, more engaging, and simply more fun. However, there’s an idea that “exposure” and “immersion” simply make a language permeate your consciousness. We’d all like to step…