How proud are Filipinos of being Filipino?
TikToks of foreigners trying Filipino food, posts proving the Filipino roots of the most recent Miss Universe, Instagram lives of artists shouting out their Filipino fans — all these spark a rush of national pride.
Yet, this pride, so visible in moments of international recognition, seems to be absent where it is truly needed: in the safeguarding of the Filipino language.
While the month of August stands to honor this cause, the celebration has become a hollow spotlight that shines upon the true, fragile state of our national language.
After all, not all aspects of Philippine culture are celebrated with the same enthusiasm. When it comes to communication, Filipinos tend to take greater pride in speaking English than their native tongue. This reveals the deep roots of colonial mentality.
This mentality is not accidental. It stems from a long history of colonization by Spain, the United States, and Japan. Each power left behind not just systems of governance and education, but also imposed languages, values, and beliefs. Over time, these influences eroded the Filipino identity, shaping generations to see themselves through foreign standards.
As a result, many Filipinos grow up believing their culture and language are inferior — a form of internalized oppression. It manifests most painfully in the act of abandoning one’s mother tongue for another.
With colonial mentality in place, many believe that English is needed over Filipino as a means to thrive and not just survive. Hence, colonial mentality runs deeper than preferring imported goods, it has seeped into crucial spaces in Philippine society: classrooms, curriculums, and workplaces.
Schools encourage recitations in the English language to appear professional, while companies make fluency in it a prerequisite for career growth. In this pursuit of global recognition, the national language is sidelined — as though it is unfit for serious spaces.
And so, if a nation abandons its own tongue in the name of progress, does it not also abandon the very essence of what it stands for?
Laying down the foundation
A child’s first step into a classroom is their first step to learning what the world has to offer: the history of their ancestors, the culture of their people, and the society they will one day shape.
With that, the language used in imparting such knowledge is a determining factor of how a child will connect with the world.
Magdalena Bendini and Amanda Devercelli, in their book Quality Early Learning: Nurturing Children’s Potential, emphasize that children are sensitive to people’s language. The words they hear are the very blocks that would form the foundation of their knowledge, skills, and identity as they make their way through life.
This is why the 1987 Philippine Constitution, under Article XIV Section 6, mandates the Government to “sustain and develop” Filipino as the medium of instruction in the educational system.
Despite the law’s enactment, the trajectory of Philippine education has been moving in the opposite direction.
2019 marked a major turning point in the country’s medium of instruction with the ruling of the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) Memorandum Order No. 20 Series of 2013 — an order that sidelined the use of Filipino in Philippine education.
Owing to the memorandum, college students now enroll in a general education (GE) curriculum without any Filipino and Panitikan or Philippine Literature core subjects.
Moreover, the law gave professors the option to choose whether or not they want to teach in Filipino, heightening the odds of the gradually fading in the background of academia.
Adding fuel to the fire, President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. shared during his State of the Nation Address (SONA) in 2022 that he planned to “improve” the Philippine education system by pushing for the use of English as the primary medium of instruction in schools.
His motive for this? Catering to the preference of foreign employers by maintaining the advantage of Filipinos as “English-speaking people.”
When schools say no to Filipino
Every second a child spends in the classroom slowly opens their eyes to the standards expected from learners, with English fluency being one of them.
But how would a child react when they realize that they would be reprimanded or even penalized for speaking in Filipino — the language that is supposedly their own?
As an effort to promote English proficiency, several schools, such as Holy Angel University (HAU), adopted an English-only policy wherein elementary students are required to communicate in English at all times, with their Filipino subject being the only exception.
Until the late 2010s, one word spoken in Filipino, or even Kapampangan, would cost you a peso at Holy Family Academy (HFA). Echoing the same colonial chains, English teachers from St. Scholastica’s Academy (SSA) would deduct points from students if caught using Filipino.
“Thank you po,” were the words Tiara Deang said to a canteen worker at SSA during her sixth grade. A classmate who overheard this alerted their Reading teacher to Tiara’s use of “po,” a word that reflects not only the language but also the culture of Filipinos. As a consequence, the teacher gave Tiara a deduction.
While the said schools have loosened or even scrapped the policy, the fact that it once existed at a rigid level still speaks volumes about the marginalization of Filipino in education.
Recently, discussions on the issue of English-only policies sparked on social media, all because of a Facebook post by the University of Cabuyao which branded itself as an “English-speaking campus,” starting February 3, 2025. The post mandated students and staff alike to communicate in English.
Although the post was taken down, the university still stood by its policy in the name of “developing globally competitive and world class students.”
However, some students were quick to voice out their concerns against the policy.
“Dapat hindi strict compliance ang paggamit ng English kasi hindi naman po talaga ‘yun ang pinakaunang salita namin o gamit na wika,” Dominica Dumirique, a student of the said university, shared in an interview with TV Patrol.
In the 2018 results of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), nine out of 10 students in the Philippines speak a different language than English at home. However, learners are expected to quickly adapt to the omnipresence of the universal language in schools — from learning English terminologies in Math and Science to receiving instructions to write in only English for nearly every output.
As a result, some students have unconsciously internalized the idea that English is the only language needed for their academic and professional growth, making it a “superior” language — an idea that has set the tone for colonial mentality.
Praises and promises
As a typical part of one’s high school life, Jaycee Serrano, a second-year Bachelor of Science in Accountancy (BSA) student, was once tasked to present in front of the class for Theology. Since students were allowed to use any language they wanted to, Jaycee asked her friend about her preferred medium.
To this, the latter answered, “English. It just sounds better that way.”
Sharing the same sentiments, most of Jaycee’s classmates associated one’s English proficiency with being “better.” Whenever she used “expound” instead of “explain” or “colloquium” instead of “seminar” when reporting, the audience would immediately exclaim, “Wow, ang lalim ng vocabulary mo!” or “Galing, ang talino!”
During presentations, Jaycee could not help but notice how her classmates also used complex English words. However, some used English merely for its appeal, confessing that they were actually clueless about the words’ definitions.
When Jaycee used Filipino words that were just as rich and precise as their English counterparts, she experienced the complete opposite. More often than not, her words were met by blank stares and puzzled looks rather than praises of approval.
“My classmates made me realize that for many, the appeal of English isn’t always about clarity, it’s about status,” shared Jaycee, emphasizing how society sees English as the more “formal” or “intelligent” language.
Beyond academic settings, the inferiorization of the Filipino language has seeped into social gatherings as well.
For one, Abby Nicole Ednacot, a BS in Civil Engineering (BSCE) sophomore, felt that Filipino was deemed inferior to English during social gatherings as well.
Her aunts and uncles would often praise children who effortlessly communicate in English, paving the way for comparisons to other family members who used Filipino more that did nothing but diminish one’s self-worth. Abby also shared how her peers admired her English proficiency, describing her as “capable, intelligent, and classy.”
Beyond compliments that equated English fluency to intelligence, Abby also received referrals from multiple people for interviews.
Similarly, Jaycee shared how mastering English has opened doors for her. She received recognition from her teachers, leading to invitations for seminars, competitions, and even opportunities to become a featured speaker at events.
“If we Gen Z see that English, versus Filipino language, can open more opportunities for us, leading to the betterment of our lives, then, of course, we will choose the former as it assures us that our chances of survival are secured…” shared Abby.
Given the praises and promises tied to English fluency, Gen Z students are likely to put more effort into mastering it over their national language.
Through the lens of Gen Z
“Magsulat kayo ng isang pormal na liham,” were the instructions given to Elijah Benjamin “Trey” Yambao, a second-year BS in Psychology student, for their Filipino subject during his grade school days in the past.
As someone who grew up with a preference for English, Trey’s mind flooded with a whirl of worries when his teacher’s words finally sunk in.
“How will I finish this task, let alone start it? What is a ‘pormal na liham’? Was this even taught to us?”
And so, Trey did what he knew best: consult the Internet. Despite scouring dozens of websites on “pormal na liham,” he came up empty-handed, with little to no information on how to accomplish the assignment given.
But Trey did not give up, choosing to consult a different website instead: Google Translate. By typing English sentences into the online tool and writing whatever came out as the translation, Trey “conquered” the assignment — or so he thought.
“Anak, ano ‘to?” was the teacher’s baffled comment for Trey, who was asked to stay after class when he finally submitted his work.
Google Translate, while helpful to students, can give awkward translations as it relies mostly on patterns in millions of documents translated by humans rather than the actual context of the words inputted by the user.
For instance, according to Google Translate, the Filipino counterpart of “Englishera ako, halata” is “I’m English, obviously,” failing to interpret that Englishera means a woman who prefers to speak in English.
However, students such as Trey resort to using Google Translate due to their limited vocabulary or grammatical competence when it comes to Filipino.
The fact that students must turn to Google Translate to navigate their own national language speaks volumes about the failure of both curriculum and culture to nurture linguistic identity.
Likewise, when Jaycee was cast as one of the journalists for BAGWIS, the Filipino publication of Basa Air Base National High School, she first hesitated to take up the post because she experienced mental blocks at times when translating certain terms into Filipino.
Even when it comes to common words such as “turtle,” Jaycee found herself asking “Ano bang tamang salita para rito?” to her peers, family, or even Google Translate when writing Filipino texts.
Another difficulty of Gen Z is figuring out the rules of Filipino grammar. When asked to differentiate the use of “ng” and “nang,” many would often wince, struggling to search their brain for the stock knowledge they built up from years’ worth of Filipino lessons.
If a person has trouble with Filipino fluency, what does that say about their cultural identity?
When language fades, so does identity
As someone whose parents mostly used English, Trey grew up to the sounds of cartoons, songs, and dinner conversations — all of which were in English.
However, his classmates often took advantage of his perceived foreignness when he was young, using Filipino words that he could not grasp and making fun of his accent when speaking in Filipino.
With the shame he felt after every cruel joke made, young Trey began to despise the national language. A rift separated him from the beauty of Filipino writers, songs, and the Philippine culture as a whole — the beauty that he only uncovered recently when he came across Original Pilipino Music (OPM).
As the years passed by, Trey realized that Filipino allows the speaker to not only familiarize themself with their identity and culture but also create bonds with the people who share it.
During a yearly outreach at his previous school, HFA, Trey noticed that his “Englishero” classmates found it hard to interact with their beneficiaries, the Aeta community, because of language barriers.
Despite having a genuine desire to connect with and help the Aetas, Trey’s classmates could not comprehend what the Aetas were saying at times while the Aetas experienced the same struggle in working out what the students wanted to say.
Having a similar experience, Hans Punsalan, another BSA sophomore, could not relate to anyone when he finally moved to the Philippines after spending the first few years of his life in Canada.
In his first jeepney ride, Hans did not know how to say “Para po!’” He sat in silence and nearly missed his stop. But that moment did not discourage him from connecting with his cultural roots.
Rather, he pushed himself to learn bits of the Filipino language, to integrate parts of Filipino culture into his life. And so far, it has brought him an abundance of experiences and meaningful friendships.
“So no, I no longer feel disconnected [to the Philippine culture], rather I feel grateful and honored to be accepted in a society that I once saw as a heavy contrast to my old life,” Hans opened.
In the end, it was not just the words Hans had learned — it was the world they opened that taught him how to be proud of who he was.
In making efforts to embrace the national language alongside their preference for English, regardless of the “difficulty” in doing so, one embraces their Filipino identity at the same time.
A sign of what’s to come?
When a language is set aside for another, the culture it is intertwined with follows.
If colonial mentality is allowed to fester in the minds of Gen Z, previous generations, and those yet to come, it may cause Filipinos to forget what it truly means to be Filipino.
Rather than focusing on how the country can make its people more palatable for a chance to shine on the global stage, society must look inward: How can the people uplift the local community through the tongue of their homeland as well, both Filipino, the national language, and regional languages like Kapampangan?
Our national language is not merely a set of words used to express whatever one is feeling at a particular moment, it reflects the culture and history associated with the Filipino identity along with the stories of the present Philippine community. Thus, to be bound by the strings of colonial mentality — to abandon Filipino in the hopes of fully adopting English — is to abandon one’s cultural identity.
This August and in the days ahead, may we not only celebrate our language but live it — cherishing the words that carry its beauty and protecting the soul that binds it to our cultural identity.
Only then can we claim, with truth and conviction, that we are proud to be Filipino.
