Kapampangan: Who is Killing Our Language?!? (Part 1)
Date Posted: January 25,2010 03:31 AM

Kng metung a kasal nabengi, atupan kong mipag-istoria reng limang anak a maki-edad pitu ampong ualung banua. Mipanagalug la. Kitang ku nung biasa lang Kapampangan. Tambing yang mekibat ing metung kng Tagalug "Ayaw ko. Tagalog na ako" (I don't want to. I am now Tagalog.). Mengapamulala ku. Anti ra ku uaring timpaling kng kamatutuan na ning pamaglau ning Amanung Sisuan at ning Bangsang Kapampangan.
The Kapampangan Language is currently moribund since most Kapampangan parents now speak to their children only in the dominant language Tagalog. Experts say that in 20 years time, the Kapampangan language will cease to exist.


Sadia ing pibalebale ya na mu kabud ing pekasantungan ning Amanung Sisuan pauli ning babaual de iti kareng escuela ampo' kng obra. Dapot ngeni pilalung kng kilub ning bale deyu da ne mu rin deng mismung pengari.

Kapampangan ya ing ima. Kapampangan ya ing tatang. Obat Tagalug la reng anak? Nanung kabugukan ini? Reng pengaring Kapampangan a panagalugan do reng anak da lilu la't sukaban kng Bangsang Kapampangan! 

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At a wedding last night, I chanced upon five grade school kids, ages 7 and 8, talking to each other in Tagalog. Their parents are pure blooded Kapampangan native speakers. So I asked them if they speak Kapampangan. One of them quickly answered in Tagalog "I don't want to. I am Tagalog now!" I was shocked. It was like the reality of the end of the Kapampangan Language and the Kapampangan Nation was slapped on my face!
Graph that shows the steadily declining numbers of Kapampangan speakers within the Kapampangan homeland every 5 years. National Census and Statistics Office 2003.


The household used to be the last sanctuary left for the Kapampangan language since it was not allowed to be used in schools and the work place. Yet now it has even lost it's place in the household since parents are now talking to their kids in Tagalog.

The mother is Kapampangan. The father is Kapampangan. But why are the children Tagalog? What stupidity is this? Kapampangan parents who only speak Tagalog to their kids are traitors to the Kapampangan Nation!!!

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Bas, Rene Q. (2007, September 2). Even Kapampangan and Pangasinan are now DYING LANGUAGES. The Sunday Times, pp. A1, A2.

Del Corro, Anicia. (2000). Language Endangerment and Bible Translation. Malaga, Spain: Universal Bible Society Triennial Translation Workshop.

Pangilinan, Michael R.M. (2009). Kapampangan lexical borrowing from Tagalog: endangerment rather than enrichment. A paper presented at the 11th International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics, June 21 - 25, 2009, Aussois, France.

National Census and Statistics Office. (2003). 2000 Census of Population and Housing. Manila, Philippines: National Economic and Development Authority.
Retrieved from http://www.census.gov.ph/data/pressrelease/2003/pr0314tx.html.

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