Atty. Selenne Anne S. Leynes, a Ph.D. graduate student under the English Language Studies program and an academic staff from the Department of English, Faculty of Arts and Letters and Prof. Arwin M. Vibar, an Assistant Professorial Lecturer who teaches the course Missionary Linguistics at the UST Graduate School, presented their research on missionary linguistics in two research events: a national conference organized by UST Legazpi Bikol Studies Center on February 24, 2022 and an international conference by the UST Institute of Religion on March 24, 2022 .
In the first conference, Atty. Leynes and Dr. Vibar discussed their study titled “The linguistic, pedagogical, and religious experiences of the Bicolanos: A missionary linguistics approach” in PANDUWANG RAWOG: A Research Conference, which was held via Zoom.
During the paper presentation, Leynes emphasized the religious teachings present in the book written by Santos Herrejón underscoring that the missionary works integrate a lot of Christian teachings and doctrines unlike the post-Spanish grammar books that focus primarily on language teaching and learning.
“Although the other themes for verb conjugations that are used are the most common and basic ones for the children to experience and encounter such as go, walk, give, play, err, fear, and remind among others, it is love that is emphasized as perhaps all children should know not only how to use love with sense and meaning, but to also act with love,” said Leynes.
Vibar also added that as decided during the 1582 Synod of Manila, evangelization would be better carried out in the early Filipinos’ own tongues, so they started writing artes or grammars, which ordinarily entailed compiling vocabularios or dictionaries, to facilitate the mastery of the local languages.
In the second conference, Leynes and Vibar presented the research titled “Evangelizing the Bicolanos: A qualitative analysis on Herrejón’s Lecciones de Gramática Bicol (1882) and de Vera’s Gramática Hispano-Bicol Según el Método de Ollendorf (1904)” in the St. Thomas Aquinas Forum – International Conference.
With the theme, “500 Years of Christianity in the Philippines: Embracing the Gift and Charting New Paths”, the international research conference also provided an opportunity for the presentation of the two grammar books that embodied linguistic rules, methods of language teaching and learning, different forms of evangelization, and fundamental theological teachings.
