Philippine E-Journals

Variations among Mandaya Dialects: A Multiple Case Study

Arnold M Duping

 

Abstract:

This qualitative multiple case study analyzed the phonological, lexical and morpho-semantic variations of Mandaya dialects among four municipalities in Davao Oriental. Purposeful sampling, in depth interviews and sorting and classifying of words according to phonological, lexical and morphological structure in data analysis were employed. Findings revealed that the Mandaya dialects consisted of 23 segmental phonemes, 17 consonants: /b/, /k/, /d/, /g/, /h/, /l/, /l~l/, /m/, /n/, /Æž/, /p/, /r/, /s/, /t/ /w/,/y/ and /Ɂ/; six vowels: /a/, /e/,/i/,/o/, /u/ including the schwa sound /Ə/. The phonological variation of Mandaya dialects focused more on these three distinct phonemes: the phoneme /h/, the phoneme /l~l/ and the schwa sound /Ə/ and the vowel lengthening and phoneme substitution. Classification based on lexical structure revealed that there were words that had no variations among municipalities particularly loan words. Mandaya also used different terms to call a single referent and a single term used to call different referents. Morphological variations were observed more on the affixation, reduplication, and addition/ deletion. Variations among the dialects were observed. These were in phonological and morphological processes, lexical and affixation. These variations observed were attributed to the geographical location, inter-marriages, influence of technology and social media and the overlapping of languages.