The right to speak our own native languages

I asked our good friend Mr. Tom Magee, Executive Director of the Cebu Hub for English Language Excellence (CHELE) on how the 2nd Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) Conference went last Friday and Saturday and he emailed me this message, “The conference was a success in regards to the following. We had over 100 speakers from 39 countries attend this year’s TESOL Conference. This is about 30 more speakers than they had in the previous conference in 2010.”

Indeed on this alone, CHELE, as an important annual meeting for English Teachers here in Cebu, has achieved its goals. How many conferences have you attended that had more than a hundred speakers? Unfortunately, due to the pressing engagements I had during the Meetings, Incentive Travel, Conventions and Exhibitions Convention (MICECON), which also happened at the same time, I couldn’t attend the TESOL conference. What I really wanted to attend was the Accent Neutralization Seminar, which, Mr. Magee also said was a success. I’m happy to hear this report.

More importantly, Mr. Magee noted, “I think that this coming year will tell the tale so to speak as far as to the progress CHELE can expect to make the future of Cebu as becoming an English Hub. We are working on programs designed to help and promote the universities, ESL schools, and Cebu, which should be appealing to them which should entice them to participate next year.”

In my book, CHELE officers should now sit down with the Hotel, Resorts, and Restaurants Association of Cebu (HRRAC) as they can help provide the living facilities for the foreign students who come to our shores to learn how to speak English in Cebu.

These foreign students are expected to stay here for at least a month or two, which should be a boost to our hotel and restaurant industry. Of course, the universities too must keep in close contact with CHELE, after all, if all our students learn good English speaking skills, they would certainly land good jobs abroad. With that, allow me to congratulate the CHELE officers led by Chairman Oscar Tuason, President Efren Valiente, Mr. Tom Magee and Mr. Paul Robertson for bringing to life CHELE in Cebu.

* * *

Speaking of languages, I almost forgot that August is considered as “Buwan ng Wika” or Language Month by the Department of Education (DepEd). This brings us to the question as to what language should we be promoting every year? We know that our ultra nationalists insist on speaking in “Pilipino” or “Filipino”, which they say is the National Language. But few people realize that the National Language has yet to be created or enacted because no one really knows what Filipino should be?

When Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino, III made his SONA, I read that one ultra nationalist spoke with pride that the President spoke entirely in Pilipino. This fellow forgot that when Pres. PNoy said, “Kayo ang Boss ko!” He was speaking in Taglish. In truth, according to the 1935 Constitution, a national language should evolve from one of the spoken languages of this country. But from the way things are going, it seems that the Pilipino or Filipino being spoken by the ultra nationalists contain not just a good number of Spanish words, but English, as well.

Few Filipinos know that the Philippines is a signatory of the United Nations Convention on Human Rights (UNCR) and one of these basic human rights is the right to speak your native tongue or the language of your forefathers. So we ask, why does DepEd continue to insist forcing students to get 6 units on Pilipino, which we all know is 99.9% taken only from the Tagalog? This is detrimental to all the other Filipinos who do not speak Tagalog as their native tongue.

During the Marcos years, especially during Martial Law, one of the slogans of the Marcos dictatorship was “Isang Bansa, Isang Diwa” (One Nation under One Tongue” because that was supposed to unite Filipinos. But that did not materialize. Those selling this idea failed to realize that speaking in one language doesn’t promote national unity. Just look at the United States, which fought a bitter Civil War. What about the Spanish Civil War?

We’ve written it here many times before that if Filipinos here at home cannot unite; perhaps it is due to our poverty. However when you go to the United States or the Middle East or Europe where there are large groups of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW), you will immediately realize that there are so many Filipino associations based on their native tongues. An association of Bicolanos, Boholanos, Cebuanos, Tagalogs, Ilocanos or Samarenos. This is proof that even in prosperity, Filipinos will always band together according to the regions or tongues that they were born. The only way to achieve national unity is through a shift to a federal form of government.

* * *

Email: [email protected]