Cebuano Dialect 101
Cebuano, also known as Sugbuanon, is an Austronesian language spoken in the Philippines by about 20,000,000 people (according to Ethnologue). It is a subgroup or member of Bisaya, Visayan and Binisayâ. The name came from the Philippine island of Cebu, the site of the first and biggest Spanish settlement whose vicinity speaks the said language. Cebuano is a member of the Visayan language family.
Sounds
Cebuano has seventeen consonants: p, t, k, ʔ (the glottal stop), b, d, g, m, n, ng, s, h, w, l, r, y, and j (also spelled gy or dy).
There are four vowels: i, e, a, and u/o. The vowels u and o are allophones, with u always being used when it is the beginning of a syllable, and o always used when it ends a syllable. But there are some exceptions, like kamatuoran (truth) and hangtúd (until).
"E" originally appears only in few words such as "babaye", "dayeg" "parayeg", and "pangadye". When Spanish arrived, more words with e has been added with the introduction of loanwords. Accent is also a distinguisher of words, so that dápit means "to invite", while dapít means "near" or "nearby place".
Consonants [d] and [ɾ] were once allophones, but cannot interchange, like kabungturan (uplands) [from bungtód, mountain] is correct but not *kabuntudan and tagadihá (from there) [from dihá, there] is correct but not *tagarihá.
Pronouns
Pronouns are inflected in person, number, and case.
The four cases are nominative, preposed genitive, postposed genitive, and oblique.
| Absolutive | Ergative₁ (Postposed) | Ergative₂ (Preposed) | Oblique | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person singular | ako, ko, (ta only when the object is ka/mo=you) | nako, ko | ako, akoa | kanako, nako |
| 2nd person singular | ikaw, ka | nimo, mo | imo, imoha | kanimo, nimo |
| 3rd person singular | siya | niya | iya, iyaha | kaniya, niya |
| 1st person plural inclusive | kita, ta | nato | ato, atoa | kanato, nato |
| 1st person plural exclusive | kami, mi | namo | amo, amoa | kanamo, namo |
| 2nd person plural | kamo, mo | ninyo | inyo, inyoha | kaninyo, ninyo |
| 3rd person plural | sila | nila | ila, ilaha | kanila, nila |
Cebuano, like most other Austronesian languages, makes use of the inclusive and exclusive we. This distinction, not found in most European languages, signifies whether or not the addressee is included in the pronoun "we."
Examples:
Moadto kami sa sinehan.
"We (someone else and I, but not you) will go to the movies."
Moadto kita sa sinehan.
"We (you and I, and perhaps someone else) will go to the movies."
Demonstrative Pronouns
kiri = (English : this, these) for things that are near or touching distance to the speaker but not necessarily near the listener
kini = (English : this, these) for things that are near or touching distance to both the speaker and the listener
kana = (pronounced kanaq, English : that, those) for things that are not of touching distance to the speaker but is near the listener
kadto = (English : that, those) for things that are not of touching distance to the speaker nor near the listener
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