Facts About the World's Languages: An Encyclopedia of the World's Major Languages, Past and Present; Pangasinan

Orthography and Basic Phonology

The Roman alphabet is used today in two forms. The Spanish
system (including the symbols c, ch, n, ng, qu, and z) is pre-
ferred by most writers. Because of the TAGALOG-based educa-
tional system, some speakers employ the Tagalog system which
employs 20 letters: ABDEGHIKLMNNGOPRSTU
W Y. This outline employs the latter system.

The alveolar trill (r) does not occur word initially; it is an
intervocalic variant of the phoneme /d/. The orthographic se-
quences /ch, ti + V/ and /dy, di + V/ represent voiceless and voiced
alveo-palatal affricates, respectively. Stops are unaspirated and
unreleased in final position, and the voiceless velar stop (k) of-
ten fricates between vowels (see Table 1).

Pangasinan has four native vowel phonemes /a e i u/, and
two phonemes /o/ and /e/, introduced after Spanish contact.
Vowels are represented orthographically by five symbols /a e

i o u/. The orthographic symbol e stands for two separate pho-
nemes. In native words e is pronounced as a centralized high
back unrounded vowel, while in Spanish loans it is pronounced
as a front mid unrounded vowel like its Spanish counterpart.
The other vowels of the language closely resemble their Span-
ish equivalents (see Table 2 below).

Table 1: Consonants

Labial

Dental/
Alveolar

Palatal

Velar

Glottal

Stops
Voiceless
Voiced

P
b

t
d

qu, k
g

\(-)

Fricatives

s

Nasals

m

n

ng

Lateral

1

Trill/Flap

(r)

Glides

w

y

Table 2: Vowels

Front

Central

Back

Unrounded

Rounded

High

i

e[ra]

u

Mid

(e [e])

(o)

Low

a

Stress is phonemic in Pangasinan. Vowels are lengthened in
stressed open syllables (those that have no consonantal coda)
-* laki 'grandfather' [14:.ki],^/a^'male' [la.ki]; bdlo 'new'

540 Pangasinan

[ba:.lo] ^ bald 'widow' [ba.16]; ^ nadwat 'will receive', ^
[na'.a:.wat] naawdt 'received' [na'.a.wat].

Rubino, Carl. 2001. Pangasinan. In: Garry, Jane and
Carl Rubino (eds.) Facts About the World's Languages:
An Encyclopedia of the World's Major Languages, Past
and Present. New York: H. W Wilson.