ROMBLOMANON
5
egids
Romblomanon is one of the languages spoken in Romblon island in the Mimaropa region. Located at the center of the Philippine Archipelago, the islands of Romblon are known for its group of three major islands composed of (1) Romblon island, (2) Sibuyan island, and (3) Carabao island surrounded by its 17 other small islands. The province lies within the Sibuyan Sea, between the provinces of Masbate from its east, Mindoro from its west and Panay from its south.
According to SIL's ethnologue website, Romblomanon language has a number of dialects namely Sibuyanon, Romblon and Bisaya. Along with the dialects, the people are also said to be around 70% mutually intelligible with the Inakeanon (also called Aklanon) from Aklan and 94% with Hiligaynon from Iloilo. The people are also known to speak Filipino and Bantoanon which they use as their second language.
There are around 101,231 people (equivalent to 44.47%) who speak Romblomanon in Romblon Province. On the other hand there are 27, 895 people (equivalent to 93.31%) people speaking Romblomanon in Romblomanon. It is evident in the data that the people of Romblon province are both Bilingual and Multilingual.
In recent data, the younger generation speak Tagalog since it is the language used and taught in schools, Romblomanon and a little bit of English. On the contrary, the older generation in the province who are said to have never been to school speak only their native language, Romblomanon.
As mentioned above, there are a number of neighboring dialects which are the different languages spoken in neighboring provinces where a few of them are (1) Waray (0.37%), (2)Ibanag (0.30%), (3) and Bicol (0.16%).
SOUNDS OF ROMBLOMANON
Romblomanon consists of 16 consonants: p, t, k, Ɂ, m, n, ŋ, l, r, s,h, w, j. All 16 consonants are commonly found in Philippine languages.
On the other hand, Romblomanon has three phonemic vowels. The three vowels are the high front i, the low central a and the high back u. Within these three vowel systems are variants present in pronunciation:
High front /i/ has lengthened /i/, /e/ and schwa as its variants
Low central /a/ has the lengthened /a/ and the /^/ (but) in English as its variants.
High back /u/ has the lengthened /uː/ (mood), /ʊ/ (foot) and /oʊ/ (float) as its variants.
SOME ROMBLOMANON WORDS
A ROMBLOMANON STORY
"ROMBLON"
Nang una, nag-una nga nag-abot ang mga Espanyol sa Romblon, may kastila nga naglibot sa mga bayay.Nang una, nag-una nga nag-abot ang mga Espanyol sa Romblon, may kastila nga naglibot sa mga bayay. Nagpangutawa siya sa isa nga taga-Romblon kung diin siya kag kung ano ang tawag sa lugar nga ata. Kalapit sa kastila, may nagalumyom nga manok. Kaldam ng taga-Romblon na ginapangutana kung ano ang ginahimo ng manok, kagasi ginhambay niya nagalumyom. Hindi mahambay ng Kastila ang lumyom kaga, ginhambay na lang niya na Romblon. Tuna ato imaw na ang naging pangayan ng lugar.
"ROMBLON"
Long before, during the Spaniards’ first time reaching Romblon, a Spaniard went house-to-house. He asked one of the inhabitants of Romblon where he is and what is the place called. Near the Spaniard was a [nagalumyom] chicken.The inhabitant thought that the Spaniard was asking what the chicken was doing so he answered ‘nagalumyom’. The Spaniard coould not say ‘lumyom’ so he just said Romblon. Because of this, that became the name of the place.
WORKS ON ROMBLOMANON
Constantino, E. (1975). An English-Romblomanon dictionary. Diliman,
Quezon City: University of the Philippines
Law, R.S. (1997). The Romblomanon grammar essentials sketch. Manila:
Linguistic Society of the Philippines
Law, R.S. (1998). The affix 'pa'- and movement in Romblomanon. In S.
Brainard (ed.), Localist case grammar and Philippine verbs (35-43). Manila: Linguistic Society of the Philippines
Law, R.S. (2006). Working orthography for Romblomanon. Manila:
Linguistic Society of the Philippines
Newell, L.E. (1995). Computer processing of texts for lexical analysis. In
B. Sibayan and L. Newell (eds.), Papers from the First Asia International Lexicograpy Conference, Manila, Philippines – 1992 (15-28). Manila: Linguistic Society of the Philippines.
Rappa, P. (1996). Romblomanon phonology statement. Manila: Linguistic
Society of the Philippines
Rappa, P. (1999). The morphophonemics of Romblomanon. Manila:
Linguistic Society of the Philippines
Tabardilla, E. & Newell, L.E. (2006). Romblomanon dictionary. Philippine
journal of linguistics: special monograph issue, 52, xviii+853.
Zorc, R. (1977). The Bisayan Dialects of the Philippines: Subgrouping and
Reconstruction. In Pacific Linguistics: Series C, 44 (xxi+328). Canberra: Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University.