Discussing clitics, variables, and ethno-lexicon at the 2025 Graduate Students Research Colloquium

Last 3 September 2025, the Graduate Students Research Colloquium (GSRC) for Academic Year 2025-2026 was held live on Youtube Livestream. The event was held in celebration of Lingg Month and the 103rd founding anniversary of the Department. It was originally slated as a live event for 26 August 2025, but was eventually rescheduled as an online event. This year’s GSRC was moderated by Assoc. Prof. Maria Kristina Gallego, one of the graduate program coordinators. Featured in the colloquium were works from five students of the Department’s MA program. These students were Teaching Assoc. Katrina Joyce Jose, Instr. Brian Salvador Baran, and students of the Lingg 225 [Pangfild na Metod sa Linggwistiks] fieldwork class: Ethan Nicholas Salvador, Jethro Jordan Bautista, and Ralph Deneil Mangalino. The studies encompass various levels of grammar including phonetics and phonology, morphology and syntax, and the lexicon. Live in the Zoom audience were the Lingg 201 [Ang Sayans ng Linggwistiks] class of Asst. Prof. Fellow Kritsana Canilao.

The program was formally opened by Chair Francisco Rosario, Jr. In his opening spiel, Chair Rosario underscored the importance of holding colloquia for graduate students as a way for students to disseminate their research updates and findings to the wider community as well as to focus on the contribution of student research to the development of linguistics in the Philippines and as a field in general. Chair Rosario points out how the studies presented are all products of language documentation and description that give voice to and help in our understanding of understudied communities.

The first of the three studies was presented by Teaching Assoc. Katrina Jose. She has previously worked on the syntax of Western Bisayan languages, assists in the collaboration with the Dumgat Remontado community, and is currently interested in grammar description and language change. Her paper entitled “Comparative Analysis of Pronominal Clitic Ordering in Three Western Bisayan Languages – Cuyonon, Akeanon, and Kinaray-a” was originally a term paper for Lingg ng Pil 285 [Istruktural na Pagkokompara ng mga Wika sa Pilipinas] under Prof. Aldrin Lee and was shortlisted for the Best Paper Award in the 2025 Linguistics Society of the Philippines International Conference (LSPIC) in Lingayen, Pangasinan.

Teaching Assoc. Jose started off by referencing R. David Paul Zorc’s description of Cuyonon (ISO 639-3 [cyo]), Akeanon [akl], and Kinaray-a [krj] in his landmark study on the subgrouping of Bisayan languages as the “extremes” of the West Bisayan subgroup. As such and being understudied relative to other Bisayan languages, Teaching Assoc. Jose described and compared the behavior of pronominal clitics in these three languages. Clitics, Teaching Assoc. Jose explains, are bound forms that are neither affix nor root such as the English ‘t in can’t or pa ‘still’ in Tagalog. Pronominals, on the other hand, are words that act as replacements to nouns or noun phrases.

She points out that several constraints including the phonological constraint are active in the three languages such that lighter pronominal clitics precede heavier pronominal clitics. For example the genitive third person pronoun na ‘he/she’ precedes the second person nominative kaw ‘you’ in the Cuyonon sentence, Tatawagan na kaw ‘He/she will call you.’ Whenever clitics are of equal phonological size, then genitive pronouns precede nominative pronouns as in the case of genitive namon ‘we’ preceding the nominative kamo ‘you’ in the Kinaray-a sentence, Makita namon kamo ‘We will see you.’ For Cuyonon, there is an added constraint where the enclitic forms of genitive pronouns such as the the third person na can only occur in the predicate position, but proclitic forms like akeng ‘his’ can occur elsewhere as in Ang pumangga na akeng kakaenen ‘It is his manggo that I will eat.’ On the other hand, Akeanon and Kinaray-a do not exhibit the same constraint but do prefer proclitic over enclitic forms for the genitive pronouns. Teaching Assoc. Jose concludes by revealing that while the same phonological constraints apply to all three languages, they differ in their restrictions for the use of genitive pronominal enclitics.

Instr. Baran then follows Teaching Assoc. Jose’s presentation with another study on a type of variability—this time, on phonological variation. His main research interests are on coastal and island languages such as Bantayanon, Cebuano/Binisaya, and Pangasinan, particularly on the liquid and particle variation occuring in these languages. The paper he presented entitled “Estilo at Metadiskurso bilang Tagatakda ng Baryasyong Likwid: Panimulang Sosyo-Dayalektal na Pagsusuri ng (l) sa Wikang Binisaya at Bantayanon” was originally submitted as a term paper for Lingg 204 [Fonoloji] under Asst. Prof. Fellow Kritsana Canilao and was previously presented in English at the online 2025 Language, Culture, and Communication (LCC) Graduate Conference organized by graduate students at the University of Alberta in Canada.

Instr. Baran began his talk by highlighting his objectives for the presentations including his goal of discussing sociolinguistic concepts in the Filipino language. The primary goals of the study itself involve the analysis of liquid variation in Cebuano (Autonym: Binisaya) [ceb] and Bantayanon [bfx] from a non-geographical point-of-view and highlighting the role of social and metalinguistic processes such as stylistics and enregisterment in influencing variation. He introduces the concepts he employed by focusing on the variation of the liquid voiced alveolar lateral approximant consonant or /l/ in the many English varieties. He shows that while /l/ can be phonologically conditioned where it is pronounced as velarized or more at the back of the mouth at the end of words, social contexts and classes in Philippine English also cause it not to be pronounced as such. He appeals to the concepts of social indexing and the heightened awareness of this indexicality through enregisterment as a means to explain the variation. Instr. Baran then connects this to his main object of inquiry, the loss, the vocalization into a <y>-like sound, and retention of the (l) and (L) variables of /l/, as in how Bantayanon ‘house’ can be <bay>, <byay>, and <balay> at the same time, and how this variation can also be explained through formal and casual styles and meta-awareness.

Using wordless elicitation materials and an adapted computational method from dialectology, Instr. Baran shows that given a small sample size, Cebuano speakers tend to prefer the retention of (l) in formal style but that no preference could be established for the casual style. For Bantayanon, a higher preference for both deleted and vocalized variants of (l) and (L) respectively was seen for both formal and casual styles. This leads Instr. Baran to conclude that style as an explanation for the variation can only be done so for Cebuano. When testing for meta-awareness using a simple questionnaire, he shows that though (l) is sensitive to style in Cebuano, Cebuano speakers are generally not aware of the variation. On the other hand, Bantayanon speakers are very much aware of their varied pronunciations of (L) and make use of it in deliberate interpretative and performative contexts. As such, he concludes that (L) is an enregistered variable. Finnishing on his presentation, Instr. Baran calls out the preliminary nature of his work and that given a larger sample and more sophisticated statistical methods, clearer results could be found.

Branching off from the different levels of grammar, students from the fieldwork class of Lingg 225 under Prof. Aldrin Lee, Mr. Bautista, Mr. Mangalino, and Mr. Salvador discussed the possibly unique lexicon of Pangasinan [pag] as spoken in the coastal towns of Central Pangasinan. Each of these students have varying research interests from phonological theory to diachronic linguistics and even socio- and ethno-linguistics. Their paper entitled “Mga Datos at Tala sa Wikang Pangasinan: Pagbubuo ng Isang Talasalitaang Baybayin” was originally a section of their annotated dataset of Pangasinan as spoken in the coastal towns of Lingayen, Binmaley, Dagupan, and San Fabian, Pangasinan that was also co-written with Instr. Baran.

The Lingg 225 students orientate their study by appealing to the possible uniqueness of varieties spoken in coastal areas and how they contribute to the adjacent discussion on so-called island languages. They argue that the validity of a coastal variety of Pangasinan is emboldened by a historical distinction between coastal Pangasinan and inland Caboloan regions in Pangasinan. Based on this distinction, they made use of the island language questionnaire by Prof. Lee as a way of eliciting coastal-specific lexica including sea-orientation and occupation words as well as terms for the tidal systems and and ocean vessels and marine life. as well as metaphorizations based on these aquatic systems.

The students list out several lexica possibly unique to coastal Pangasinan and hitherto undocumented that involve words for the currents, winds, and bodies of water, words for fishing, and finally, words for sea creatures. Some of the highlights of their lexicon include the use of masábang to describe a combination of a rough, wavy, and windy sea, the contrast between the landward wind mamáris and the seaward wind baitán, as well the highly detailed lexical dissection of the outrigger canoe including its dolóng ‘face’, ebét ‘backside’, pasáplak ‘outrigger’, and even the átal that hold it in place as it docks the sandy beach. They also list multiple different types of seine fishing methods such as the dáklis, karókor, and the bawér, táksay, and katkat among others. Of course, they were sure not to miss the many different terms for the sea creatures caught during fishing trips and many of these words have yet to be listed in the existing Pangasinan dictionaries such as gelegelé ‘big mudfish’, galéwey ‘swimming crab’, and even sea plants such as tansáw for ‘seaweed.’ The Lingg 225 students conclude that the existence of these possibly unique vocabulary highlight the existence of coastal varieties of Pangasinan and that while there may possibly be distinct varieties within Pangasinan, the speakers themselves might not be highly conscious of the boundaries between these varieties.

Upon the completion of all three presentations, Assoc. Prof. Gallego proceed towards the open forum where several insightful questions were raised and answered by the presenters. For Teaching Assoc. Jose, there were clarifications regarding the phonological constraint and possible exceptions. She underscores that her gathered data showed no exceptions to these constraints. For Instr. Baran there were questions regarding other sociolinguistic factors that might explain the variation in both Bantayanon and Cebuano languages to which he points out that Cebuano plays a massive role as a prestige language on Bantayan Island and so, usage of Cebuano and the other languages spoken on the Island and strength of ties to those networks might explain the variation as well. Asst. Prof. Christopher Vincent Santiago also note how /l/-deletion in Cebuano was referred to by the late Carlos Everett Conant as a “cockneyism” in 1916 paper on the “Indonesian l“. Instr. Baran then connects to this comment by highlighting how there is also a noted form of hypercorrection involving the re-insertion of [l] where there originally was not in Cebuano and to which he gives the example of the English loanword bag being possibly mistaken as balag. Instr. Baran then further probes by pondering whether these slips-of-the-tongue are due to subconscious rules of alternation or as a result of hyper-awareness of this alternation. For the Lingg 225 students, Chair Rosario, Jr., a native speaker of Pangasinan, noted that taew has a ‘deep sea’ meaning in Coastal Pangasinan but a ‘mountain’ meaning in Inland Pangasinan. The students speculate that taew might have been analogized as ‘some faraway land’ or ‘place of resources’ resulting in two opposite interpretations for the word. Assoc. Prof. Gallego continues the conversation by talking about how the pulling of boats to shore in Babuyan Claro involve using of Ilokano numerals and that there are sea and land registers in the Batanes Islands. She then asks if the students have any similar observations beyond the lexicon. The students then respond by stating that they were unable to elicit the related belief systems to the lexicon given the limited time.

Assoc. Prof. Gallego ends this year’s GSRC by thanking the presenters and awarding them with their certificates. The archive of the livestream can be found on the official Youtube channel of the Department.