As much as we want to preserve our culture, which language is a part, change is still a constant. The world evolves, culture evolves, language evolves. Indeed. The world has gone old and culture has evolved faster and faster as technology formed a borderless world shrinking it into a global village where everyone is a part of a small community.
Change can also be brought about individuals and certain sub-cultures of young people and even gender inventing their own culture of language (perhaps, as they make tusok-tusok of the fishballs by the pantalan or in the silid-aralan...) These changes may be welcomed and embraced by some while hurled by criticism by some. Shakespeare himself caused a stir when he invented his own words that contributed to the leap from old Elizabethan English to the modern English. He was criticized but now, he is revered by many for his talents in using words to express his thoughts and feelings.
The Bisayan language is not spared by changes. What we know as Bisaya today may be different from the Bisaya centuries ago. The words Karyapa used when she foretold the doom of the Dapitan Kingdom at the Tagbilaran Straight in the hands of the Portuguese were very much different from our Bisaya today. Yet, we recognize and take pride of Karyapa as the Inahan sa Bol-anong Mambabalak and the first- ever recorded poet in the records of Philippine history.
Even then, Bisaya is not soley our own since it is rooted to Arabic, Sanskrit, Malay. Even some of our Bisayan words are very similar with Bahasa in context and meaning. We don't exist in a vacuum. We are social people exchanging culture, beliefs, and ideas. It is true then. It is true now.
Whether we welcome change or frown about it, change will always be constant as our shadows.
However, it doesn't hurt us to zap ourselves back to the past to learn and relearn what we have as a culture, what we know and have known as a people for us to appreciate and give honor. Research and documentation of our culture and language per se is one way of revering our ancestry and giving honor to the past that has molded us to become who we are and what we are as a people today. Learning how to use it is a part of putting the pieces of the puzzle in our lives to make us completely understand what we are and who we are as Bol-anons.
Learning Bisaya (the old and the new)- whether in formal instruction or otherwise- does not mean that we are obliged to use it in our daily lives or that we are constrained from using the modern language.(Even in the English language there is formal, informal, slang, or street language, da va?
) Let us just see language as a form of art and learning Bisaya (the old and the new) could be a skill that would allow us to whisk beautiful concoction of words in poetry and prose allowing us to express artistically what we want to share to the rest of the world. (Mabuhi si Mike, si Sigbin, si Coy Ponte ug uban pang mga mambabalak dinhi!)
Even as we make tusok-tusok the fishballs or the saging on the sidewalk now na now na now na, or as we make pagtsur to achuchu the ek-ek, or as make sure that we spell gud am/pm, welkam, helo and gudbye correctly on our Nokia or Samsung, let us not let go of the kaanyag sa atong pinulungan Bol-anon bisan na lamang sa pagbasa sa mga libro og mga sinuwat sa kaniadto og karon didto sa tunghaan o asa pa man.
patsur woi!
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