Yohan Yuki Xieㆍ사요한・謝雪矢 on Nostr: If you visit the Philippines, you'll more likely encounter people say, ...

If you visit the Philippines, you'll more likely encounter people say, “barangay”.

A “barangay” is the smallest political unit in the Philippines.

a. City > Districts > Zones > Barangays; or
b. City > Districts > Barangays

The closest in American context is a “town”. A gated village or subdivision is usually considered a separate barangay as well (but there are cases where it is not if the village/subdivision is too big to be a single “barangay”).

How do you pronounce the word “barangay”?

How do you pronounce the word “barangay”?

A. ba·ra·ngay
B. ba·rang·gay

If you chose A, because the Filipino language is syllabic, it is wrong, the correct answer is B.

The modern Latin-based spelling of “barangay” is the shortened form based on current Filipino language rules. Originally, it was written like so: “barang̃ay”, a tilde above the letter ‘g’. It was to signify to the reader that the pronunciation is actually “ba·rang·gay”.

There are actually two letters: “ng” and “g”, hence “ng̃” (with a tilde).

Prior to writing it with a tilde, it was originally written as “baranggay”. Which in the Philippines' native script called “Baybayin” or “Suyat” (both umbrella terms), it was written as “ba” + “ra” + “ng” + “ga” + ”y” (one syllable is one letter in Baybayin/Suyat script).

* ᜊᜍᜈ᜔ᜄᜌ᜔ = baranggay = barang̃ay = barangay

That is why “barangay” is pronounced as “ba·rang·gay” not “ba·ra·ngay”.

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