Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online

1. Introduction ⇫ ¶

Ternate Chabacano (autoglossonym: bahra) is spoken in the town of Ternate, situated at the mouth of the river Maragondon in the Manila Bay area on the island of Luzon in the Philippines. Approximately 3,000 of the town’s 20,500 inhabitants speak Ternate Chabacano. There are also some diaspora speakers in the United States and other migrant worker destinations. The official languages of the Philippines are English and Filipino. Filipino is based on Tagalog, which is the main language in the Manila region. All speakers of Ternate Chabacano speak Tagalog actively.

2. Sociohistorical background ⇫ ¶

The Spanish colonization of the Philippines began with Magellan’s expedition in 1521, and by the end of the century the Spanish had forts in many of the strategic locations in the islands. However, the origins of Ternate Chabacano can be traced back to the island of Ternate in the Moluccas. Ternate was a central location for the spice trade and the object of constant disputes between the Portuguese, the Dutch, and the Spanish (Whinnom 1956). Around 1660 the Spanish evacuated the garrison in Ternate to Manila, and with them a group of local Christians called mardikas arrived in the Philippines. The mardikas were allowed to resettle on the shores of the Manila Bay in the latter half of the 17th century, and as a consequence the new Ternate was born. The mardikas were said to have spoken Spanish, Tagalog and their own language (de la Concepción 1789: 103), and eventually Chabacano.

Ternate Chabacano is considered the earliest Chabacano variety. It may have arisen from a contact variety spoken already in the Moluccas or developed after the mardikas’ arrival in the Philippines. However, very few lexical items can be traced back to Portuguese, Malay, or Ternate (the West Papuan indigenous language of the island of Ternate), the languages spoken in the Moluccas (Molony 1973). These languages are also considered the probable substrate languages for Ternate Chabacano, while Tagalog is the only clearly attested adstrate language. Little is known about the social history of the Ternate community in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first known document of the language is a collection of folktales by T. Tirona, which dates back to 1924.

Ternate Chabacano shares many grammatical structures and an important part of the vocabulary with Cavite Chabacano (see Sippola, this volume). They probably share a common origin, even though Cavite Chabacano is more influenced by modern Spanish. All Chabacano varieties are mutually intelligible (see also Steinkrüger, this volume, on Zamboanga Chabacano).

3. Sociolinguistic situation ⇫ ¶

The 3,000 speakers of Ternate Chabacano in the central parts of Ternate represent a traditional local speech community in the town. The speakers generally use the name bahra to refer to their language and the locality. Chabacano has become a minority language in the town due to increased population movement from other parts of the country to the region. The speakers are bilingual in Chabacano and Tagalog, and some also speak English or other Philippine languages. Chabacano is a local language spoken primarily in the home and in the neighbourhood, while English and Tagalog are the dominant languages of the region and the languages of the school and the media. The language of the younger speakers of Chabacano has especially been influenced by English and Tagalog. Officially, the language policies of the Philippines have as their main goal the promotion of English and Filipino, but local languages are also recognized as auxiliary languages. At the moment there are no language materials or standardized orthography for Ternate Chabacano, which would be essential in its promotion. However, in nearby Cavite the development of Chabacano materials has begun.

4. Phonology ⇫ ¶

Ternate Chabacano has a vowel system with five vowels (see Table 1). There is alternation between e and i, and o and u in unstressed syllables, e.g. hénte ‘people’ can be realized as [hénte] or [hénti].

Ternate Chabacano has 17 consonants (see Table 2).

The consonants /t/, /d/, and /s/ are often palatalized before the palatal glide /j/, and /s/ is often aspirated in syllable final positions. In addition, [ʎ] and [ɲ] occur as variants of the glide combinations /lj/, /nj/, and /dʒ/, /ʃ/ occur in loanwords from English. The sequence /kj/ is occasionally realized as [tʃ]. Word stress is contrastive, especially distinguishing verbs that generally have final stress, e.g. kása ‘house’ vs. kasá ‘to marry’. There is no official orthography for Chabacano; the writing often follows etymological conventions and displays considerable variation.¹

5. Noun phrase ⇫ ¶

Nouns are invariable. Some nouns contain a fossilized element going back to the Spanish feminine definite article la, as in lamár ‘sea’, latárdi ‘afternoon’. Natural gender is distinguished by different words, as in nay ‘mother’ and tay ‘father’; by the final vowel -o or -a in a small class of nouns, as in prímo ‘male cousin’ and príma ‘female cousin’; or by adding ómbri ‘male’ or muhér ‘woman’ to a noun, as in gátu ómbri ‘male cat’, gátu muhér ‘female cat’.

Number is expressed by the preposed particle mánga (also mangá), as in mánga kása ‘houses’. Some nouns have maintained the Spanish plural marker -s, but it is no longer productive. There is an indefinite article un preposed to the noun, as in un ómbri ‘a man’. The demonstrative kel is used as a definite article. Generic noun phrases are expressed by a definite article and generally also with the plural marker.

The adnominal and pronominal demonstratives are éste ‘this’ and kel ‘that’. Ése ‘that’ is also used by some speakers. The adnominal demonstratives precede the noun, as in éste karakól ‘this caracol dance’.

In possessive constructions, adnominal possessives precede the noun, as in mi gargánta ‘my throat’, or they are expressed by adpositional marking following the possessum, as in el mánga íha di éle ‘his daughters’. In possessor noun phrases, the possessor is marked by adpositional marking, as in kása di Lóling ‘house of Loling’.

The cardinal numerals are of Spanish origin and they precede the noun, as in tres muhér ‘three women’. The ordinal numerals can be formed using the Tagalog origin prefix ika-, as in ika-dós ‘second’. The Spanish forms can also be used, as in terséru ‘third’.

Adjectives are generally invariant and precede the noun as in (1). Sometimes postposed adjectives are used as well. A limited number of adjectives have Spanish feminine forms, e.g. boníta muhér ‘beautiful woman’.

The comparison of adjectives is done marking the adjective with mas ‘more’. The standard is marked with the object marker kon or occasionally with kóntra ‘against’:

The Tagalog-origin prefix pínaka- and the construction of Spanish origin kel más alternate in the superlative construction, as in pínaka-gwápa ‘most beautiful’ and kel más gwápa ‘most beautiful’.

Personal pronouns have subject, object, and possessive forms, as in Table 3.

The plural pronouns have the weak or unstressed forms mótro, tédi, and lótro, mainly occurring after the verb (cf. Steinkrüger 2007: 368), but they have not grammaticalized and so cannot be considered dependent pronouns. The second person singular has two forms contrasting in politeness: bo expressing familiar ‘you’ and tédi respectful ‘you’. The dual category can be constructed by lexical means, and its use is common for the first person plural, adding dos ‘two’ to the subject pronoun, as in mordós from mótru dos. The pronominal possessives have two series: de-forms and simple forms that are used especially for the singular series. In pronoun conjunction with a personal name, both the singular and plural pronoun occur but with different conjunctions, e.g. yo i Lébi or mótru di Lébi ‘I and Levi’.  

Subject pronouns can sometimes be left out of narrations if the subject is known or expressed earlier in the discourse:

6. Verb phrase ⇫ ¶

Ternate Chabacano has three overt preverbal markers: ya/a, ta, and di. No combinations of the markers are possible. Ya and a mark the perfective aspect, ta marks the imperfective aspect, and di marks the irrealis/future. There are two main forms of the verb, one derived from the Spanish infinitive, such as komé ‘eat’ from comer, which combines with the preverbal markers, and the other from an inflected Spanish form for a limited group of verbs, including the modal verbs: dábli ‘must’, dwéle ‘hurt’, kyére ‘want’, pwéde ‘can’, sábe ‘know’, tyéne ‘have’, which generally occur without the preverbal markers.

The limited group of unmarked verbs with stress on the penultimate syllable can have both present and past reference. 

The unmarked verb can also occur in general statements and occasionally in narrative contexts if the aspect and the point of reference in time have been set earlier.

The perfective aspect markers ya and a are in free variation.

The imperfective aspect marker ta has both habitual and progressive meaning.

The contemplated aspect marker di has future, intentional, and irrealis meanings.

Predicative adjectives and predicative noun phrases do not have a copula.³ Predicative locative phrases are formed with the copula ta, which combines with the locative adverbs, e.g. takí < ta akí  [COP here] ‘is here’.

The existentials are expressed with the verb tyéni:

The verbal negation particle no precedes all verbal markers and preverbal subject pronouns. For negative existentials and the negation of possession, the negative copula nuwáy is used. The negators can be emphasized with the prefix ni-, e.g. ninó.

The negative existential construction is also used to express indefinites or can occur in combination with negative indefinites.

7. Simple sentences ⇫ ¶

Ternate Chabacano has VSO word order. In transitive clauses, human, and sometimes animate, objects are marked with kon.

Other orders are possible in topicalization.

There is no morphological passive voice, but it is possible to omit the agent in the clause.

Reflexive voice is expressed by saríli (of Tagalog origin) or by valency reduction.

Reciprocal voice is expressed with the verb hugá ‘to play’. The lexically formed dual (pronoun + dos) can be used too. 

Causatives make use of asé ‘make’, mandá ‘order’, or dáli ‘give’ in analytic constructions.

The imperative uses the unmarked verb. 

8. Interrogative and focus constructions ⇫ ¶

In content questions the interrogative word is fronted and the question particle ba can be used:

Question words are (d)óndi ‘where’, kómo ‘why‘, kósa ‘what’, kwándo ‘when’ (also kósa óras), kyén ‘who’, and (pa)kilaya ‘how’.

Polar questions are marked by the question particle ba or only by rising intonation.

In subject and object focus constructions, the focused element is fronted and followed by a relative clause. In verbal focusing the particle numá (or dumá) ‘only, just’ can be used.

9. Complex sentences ⇫ ¶

The coordinating conjunctions are i ‘and’ and pati ‘and’, but juxtaposition is common in spoken discourse. Other coordinating conjunctions are péro ‘but’ and o ‘or’.

Object clauses can be headed by ki (from Spanish que) with verbs of knowing and speaking, but this is not obligatory, and zero marking is more common in spoken discourse. The verbs kre ‘believe’ and kyére ‘want’ almost never occur with the complementizer. Indirect interrogative sentences are often introduced by si ‘if’.

Adverbial clauses are introduced by the subordinators bágo ‘before’, kayá ‘so, therefore’, kwándo ‘when’, pag ‘when’, pára ‘in order to’, si ‘if’, máske ‘even if’, and others.

Relative clauses generally follow the head noun. They can be marked with the relative particle kel or ki, which is not generally used in spoken discourse.  

10. Other features ⇫ ¶

There are a number of discourse markers that are very common in spoken discourse, e.g. lang ‘only’, pa ‘yet’, rin/din ‘too’, raw/daw ‘it is said’, ya ‘already’, and which occur generally after the first full word or sentence finally.

The reduplication of adjectives and adverbs has an intensifying function. Nouns are reduplicated for exhaustive plural or for diminution, as in kubu-kubu ‘playhouse’ and tienda-tienda ‘playstore’ (examples of diminution from Nigoza 2007: 41).

Verbs are reduplicated for intensification or for iterative and progressive functions.