Should the Philippines start speaking Spanish again?

Greetings Everyone,

If any of you are not aware, let me start with a very brief history of the Philippines.

Philippines, a country located in South East Asia, was founded by a Portuguese Navigator under the flag of Spain in the year 1521. The Philippines was fully colonized by Spain under the command of Miguel Lopez de Legaspi in 1571 and it was a Spanish colony for 333 years, the Spanish colonization era ended in 1898 when U.S.A. started conquering the Spanish colonies in Latin America and the only Spanish colony in Asia, the Philippines.

Philippines by the way was not a country, it did not have any official language or government. It was a group of islands, with settlers from Africa and all over Asia including the arabs. But the most dominant settlers were the Malaysians , reason why the majority spoke the language, which we call now "Tagalog".

Philippines was named after King Philip of Spain, the inhabitants were called Indios (Indians in English), the same name the Spanish called the Native Indians of Latin America. The Philippine born Spanish are called Filipinos and therefore carried on to this day and it is now a "Nationality", there is no such thing as "pure" Filipino by blood, for the fact that everyone who came to the islands before the Spanish were migrants from different continents and then mixed with Spanish.

The Spanish language was Spoken from 1565 to 1950 in the Philippines and it was the Official Language, but it was banned by the Americans after they took over from 1898 to 1946 due to promotion of English. After the Philippine independence from the USA in 1946, the new government being run by the Filipinos, implemented the "Tagalog" as the official language to prove that they are now "independent" and not dependent anymore from Spain or USA.

These days, only Tagalog and English are taught in schools. Tagalog being spoken by the majority, but not everyone, a few still speak Spanish, mostly in the southern part of the country. The majority of the high class citizens speaks English and Tagalog as their first languages, some high class citizens speaks English, Tagalog and Spanish as their first languages. These days, usually the old people speak Spanish, but the new generation only speak English and Tagalog.

Now the whole point of the thread is "Should the Philippine government bring back the Spanish as one of the official languages of the country once again?"

Here are some facts :

1. The Spanish founded and BRANDED the Philippines. It is not a country if the Spanish did not colonize it for almost 4 centuries.
2. Spanish was the first official language of the country.
3. The revolutionaries who fought for Philippine independence from Spain spoke in Spanish and Tagalog,but in fact, the flag that they raised during their revolution had "VIVA LA REPUBLICA FILIPINA" written on it and yes it was written in spanish, which means "MABUHAY ANG REPUBLIKA NG PILIPINAS" in Tagalog.
4. The Philippine National hero, Jose Rizal , spoke and wrote in Spanish and it was his first language, but he also spoke the native language which is Tagalog. All his novels were written in Spanish.
5. Millions of Philippine documents are not in English or Tagalog, but in SPANISH.
6. Tagalog is not complete without Spanish words. There may be alternative words but they are very improper to use in a conversation.
7. Filipino culture is mostly Spanish, in every angle you look, go to Latin America or Spain, we all have very similar culture, or we could say "SAME" culture.
8. Our original "national anthem" was written and sang in Spanish.
9. Philippines is a predominantly Roman Catholic country and again, it is because of Spanish.
10. Our traditions and celebrated holidays and important days are the same as the days celebrated in Spanish speaking countries.


Share your opinions.

Have a good day everyone

I am always of the opinion that you shouldn't fix things that aren't broken. Unless the filipinos suddenly have a problem communicating why do they need to start speaking Spanish? What will it prove and to what end?

Dear Tiffany,

Asking you the very same question. Why do Filipinos need English? Both English and Spanish are international languages and part of the Filipino heritage. According to the report it would seem the Filipinos have a much greater Spanish than English heritage.

Filipinos must also communicate with the rest of the world and Spanish is still spoken "in some southern parts" of the country and Tagalog, the national language, has thousands of words in Spanish.

Do you get the point?

No, that's also a good question, and I don't mean they should speak English either. My point is: I don't think anything more needs to be forced on them, as so much has in the past. I'm all for stopping any more interference with the further natural evolution of the Phillipinnes. What happened, happened. Now they are independent and they should make their nation their own, rather than model it after something else. Just my opinion though. I'll bow out now.

To Guest :

Nice behavior you got there. I therefore would like to advice anyone to just ignore this child. Oh and by the way,just in case that you are one of the miseducated or uneducated "wanna be heroes". "There was no Philippines", not until the Spanish came and named the islands "Philippines" ,also, "we did not have a language". Each neighborhood in the Philippines before the Spanish colonization did not speak Tagalog as their official language, they did not speak Visayan or any other language. Each neighborhood had their own "mini government" and those mini governments were barbaric tribes and had their own "dialects" which were only spoken in their "mini neighborhood" of no more than 100 to 200 residents.

Also not to mention, our heroes were not pure Malayans or the other races whom migrated to the islands before Spanish. They were mestizos, a mix of Spanish and native resident of the former "unnamed" islands now known as the Philippines. Also our heroes "did not" speak Tagalog, they spoke Spanish, of course they knew how to speak Tagalog, but they spoke it to the natives who did not speak Spanish. Not to mention that our own national hero Jose Rizal, did not speak Tagalog as his first language, he spoke Spanish, including his works were all in Spanish.

Everything was in Spanish, translated to English during the American colonization and then translated to Tagalog after the American colonization. And you cannot erase the Spanish in us Filipinos, in every sentence you speak, it will always consist of 10% Spanish words. In every paragraph you speak, it will always consist of 20% to 40% Spanish words.

Tagalog basically is not a complete language without Spanish, of course we do have a lot of Malaysian and Indonesian words, since the Tagalog is a combination of both and the missing words were sealed by Spanish words to make it a complete "language" .

Now tell me.. how do you say these words in Tagalog

Spoon,fork,plate,room,chair,window,store,television,electric fan,table,radio,car etc etc and so on.

Of course there are alternative words in tagalog for a few of them.

Chair = Upuan

Why upuan?, upo means sit in Tagalog, if you add "an" it makes it a thing, in where it means you can use it by sitting. But the proper words being used by "experts" in the Tagalog language for chair is "salung pwet" , salo means catch and pwet means butt, meaning "catch butt or could be butt catcher" which is way too improper,try using it in a formal conversation, won't you feel totally embarassed?. Therefore, we use the Spanish word to say these things or English.

I will post something from my past thread to clear up the minds of these miseducated Filipinos about the real happenings during the Spanish Colonization. The post is also for the non-Filipinos who are not aware of the fact.

I believe that what they are trying to say is far from inferiority complex. Also, there is nothing too great in being Spanish, since all races are equal,at least in my own eyes. It is more about "not forgetting" where you really came from. Yes we are Malayan,Indonesian,Chinese,Indian,Arabic,African, Latin American and European mix which makes the "Filipino race", also to make it clear to anyone who is unaware of the fact. The word Filipino is a nationality, there is no such thing as "pure Filipino" as I have heard majority of the Filipinos I meet say, that they are "pure Filipinos", which really sounds annoying when you are aware of the fact, that there is no such thing.

The whole point of my thread is "why" do we push it so hard to be like the Americans and to be chinese and something else, you name it. While most of us deny that we are also part Spanish?. The Spanish language by the way became the official language of the Philippines in 1565 when Miguel Lopez de Legaspi fully colonized the Philippines. The Spanish language was spoken until 1950, but was banned from being spoken during the American era in 1898 due to promotion of the English language. After the Philippines was given its own independence, the government wanted to prove to everyone that they are already independent, therefore they made the Tagalog the national language and was supported by the past presidents. My grandparents speaks 3 languages, English, Spanish and Tagalog and so do I, but I am 1/3 Chinese and Filipino(mixed races) by blood. (I lived in the Philippines for 17 years, was born and grew up there).

I once went with a group of friends to have a dinner, in where we had the topic about Filipinos. One of my friends said that she is a "pure Filipina", then came my other friend and said "there is no such thing, our ancestors were all migrants from different continents and mixed with the Europeans, mostly the Spanish during the colonization". And then another one said "we are chinese" so I was shocked of what she said and I replied "what the are you talking about?, we are a mix of different races,not only chinese" and then she was pushing it that we are chinese or whatever. Then the other ones said that we look closer to Indonesian and Malaysians, which is true. But basing on the words that my friends said, they are more proud being "chinese" ,which is plain stupid in my own point of view. While the rest of our friends from Latin America, agrees with me and my other friend, that we are not just chinese, but also Spanish mixed with other Asian races. Which I made clear to them that we all have blood from all the mentioned races earlier, not just chinese, not just spanish or the other ones.

Also, in my years of studying, I have proven to myself that the history class being taught in the Philippine schools, especially the Spanish colonization era, is too exaggerated. The Spanish was not that cruel, the high class in the past (the current average to high end wealthy people) were treated well. The poor people (the ones that we usually see on Philippine TV having rallies and riots against the government) were the ones that were treated bad. Up to this current time, the doings of the Spanish colonizers still exist through the Philippine government, but this time, it is hidden and it is in a more organized and smarter way to hide it from the general public. Also the Spanish using the religion to threaten people, "DID NOT" only happen in the Philippines. Religions were used in the past in whole Europe to make people pay taxes and give their lands to the church. "And Filipino students are never made aware of this fact" therefore thinking that all the Spanish did was to enslave the Filipinos in the past using the government and the religion.

If I will compare it to the present, the ones speaking Spanish in the past are the ones speaking English in the present. The ones going to jail and getting smashed by the cops on the streets while they're performing their rallies were the ones who were tortured in the past. Our heroes are compared to the current Filipino politicians who are in favor to change the Philippine government to a better government, in which some of those politicians ended up being in jail, since torture is not allowed at all in our current time.

If Filipinos revolted in the past for independence, some of our current politicians wants a charter change. Speaking of charter change, majority of the Philippine population are "uneducated", therefore the people voting for the ones who will lead the country can easily be tricked. Just look now.. who are running for the government seats?, actors and actresses (LOL) . Pretty sure they will win due to the massive amount of fans that they have, fans that belong to the low class or poor families which makes the majority of the Philippines population. Now look back to the past :) , can you see the significance? , the difference between the Spanish government in the Philippines and the current Philippine government?

Revolutionaries(Spanish Era) = People Power(Current Time)

About the American colonization, the history of American era taught in the Philippines makes the Americans look so good and very caring to the Filipinos after the betrayal. I believe that the Philippine education is designed to make the Americans look good, why?, because we depend on them, from the past to the present and for sure in the future.

Therefore, I believe that the past posts were talking about how "bias" us Filipinos were being informed about our real ancestry.

I hope this helps

The post before this one originally came from "Spanish and Filipino" topic.

Have a good day everyone

I AGREE!!! BRING BACK THE SPANISH LANGUAGE!!!!

Yo soy Filipino!!

<<Should the Philippines start speaking Spanish again?>>

Might as well. The Philippines is a poor country. Spanish is the poor man's language. Sounds like a perfect match!

Written by Tiffany : I am always of the opinion that you shouldn't fix things that aren't broken. Unless the filipinos suddenly have a problem communicating why do they need to start speaking Spanish? What will it prove and to what end?

Answer :

Yes ,us Filipinos are not having a hard time speaking with each other using Tagalog. But that is, if we stay in the Tagalog speaking areas, which I could say the majority. But in the provinces or cities in where tagalog is NOT their primary language, their accents,wordings ,sentence and grammar structure are different. If you go to the central part or southern part of the Philippines, they speak Tagalog, but the problem is, when speaking Tagalog they usually mix the words of their own dialects plus Spanish words.

The only words that unite us from understanding each other are Spanish or English words other than the common Tagalog words. There are 170 dialects in the Philippines, Tagalog is the biggest one, Visayan is the second. The Visayans do speak Tagalog, but the Luzonians and the Mindanao residents do not speak Visayan, depends what area or province they live in. In short, only the major cities and provinces speak Tagalog, the rest do not, instead, they have their own dialect.

I have a friend from the Visayas area and we always talk about whatever things, luckily I am also a Spanish speaker. In every conversation, his sentences are always 50% Spanish 45% Tagalog and 5% Visayan, believe me or not but the Visayan dialect uses a lot of Spanish words, the Visayan dialect is consist of more than 6,000 Spanish words. Whenever he speaks with me, he is always having a pause, thinking how to say this word and that word in Tagalog. He came from the main city of Visayas which is Cebu, where they speak Tagalog as well but different accent ,wordings and grammar structure, as I was saying earlier.

Also I have a friend who came from Zamboanga in where they speak the Chabacano, a Spanish creole. He speaks Tagalog, but again, sometimes I'm having a hard time understand what he's trying to say, because his grammar structure is different from mine,also some of his Tagalog words are mispronounced. When I say something in Tagalog, I usually have to elaborate one word for him to understand what that one word means. Do you know what he understands better?, Spanish.

Written By : Guest

Might as well. The Philippines is a poor country. Spanish is the poor man's language. Sounds like a perfect match!

Answer : There is nothing wrong being poor, but there is something wrong being uneducated and to be raised by their parents in a wrong way , judging from your behavior. Have fun on your future posts child, I won't even bother stepping down to your level nor reading your future posts.

Unknown -- the way you punctuate is reminiscent of one of the trolls that periodically shows up in this forum. Just an observation...

lol guest,you must be referring to yourself then... based on what I see from your past posts on other threads. Why where are you from? India? hahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!! im glad you speak english lol

The reason why Filipinos switched to English in an instant it's because when the Philippines was still under the control of Spain, few Filipinos had acess to education that the majority of them coud not even read or write.

By the time the Philippines was under American rule, many of them got a taste of education for the very first time. Their self esteem was uplifted which they did not experience during the Spanish regime.

If only the Spanish authorities cared for the education of the Filipinos by setting up schools all over the country, then at least the Filipinos would have been still speaking Spanish.

Furthermore, the biggest mistake of the Spanish authorities was they did not teach the native peolple to speak Spanish with the exception of those few who had access to education and therefore they belong to the upper class which were called Hispanized natives. They had a fear that if the entire people of the archipelago shared a common language, they could easily rebel because since they could easily communicate to each other. So the Spanish authorites let the vernacular languages flourish which is equivalent to tribalism that the native Filipinos did not have a little knowledge of the cultures and languages of those who belong outside their ethnic group. It wa like a DIVIDE AND RULE tactic.

So, who's to blame to this present linguistic and cultural situation?

Still wondering how the Latin Americans speak Spanish while the same thing happened to them :P

Plus Spanish was still spoken until Corazon Aquino became president and that was around 1987 if i'm not mistaken. Beyond that year, there are only very few Spanish speakers left.

English is just being promoted at this current time, only few years ago when the Philippine government made the English speaking "mandatory" in private schools. I just left the Philippines last year.

And to honestly tell you the truth, only the upper class citizens speak English properly. Most of the people there have a horrible grammar or terrible English accent. The ones who can speak it straight are the ones with high wealth status back there.

Which is again, the same in the past during the Spanish era.

Students who go to public schools are mostly unable to speak English, only very very few of them, I would say 2/10 of the public school students are the ones who can speak and write in English, and only 1/2 of that 2/10 are able to use the English language properly.

For private schools, in the lesser private schools, where poor to average families usually send their children, I would say 4/10 are able to use the English language properly. For the high class schools, 8/10 students can use the English language properly. That is based on my observation when I was still a student and a resident of the country, not to mention that is only in Manila. So far what I have heard is, residents in other cities other than Manila or Cebu , have horrible English grammars and accent.

I always meet people here who just migrated from different parts of the Philippines, I know one who just came from Manila, though she used to go to a high class college in the Philippines, she has a lot of bad grammars.

Filipinos I meet who came from the rural areas of the Philippines , most of them are really having a hard time to speak and understand the English language. Some of them can't even speak Tagalog properly.

What exists now is what used to exist in the Spanish era. The distance of each island makes the transportation harder for people here, to move to that other place therefore affects to communication. Also the current government doesn't really give a damn about the Filipino education that much either. Why do you think that more than 60% to 70% of the Filipinos are still uneducated? , could be higher actually.