Filipino

Abstract

Filipino is the national language of the Republic of the Philippines and an official language, with English. Filipino has 150 million native speakers worldwide, including Japan, which hosts the third largest community of Filipino emigrants, more than 260,000, after the USA and Canada. Due to frequent mobility and intermarriage, many ethnically mixed children were raised in the Philippines with Filipino as a mother tongue. In Japanese public schools, Filipino is a widely used foreign language by children who need special education in the Japanese language. As a major migrant language in Japan, there is increasing demand for the training of bilingual interpreters and translators. There is a vibrant Filipino culture of ethnic media and social networking with Catholic churches, a focal point of linguistic and cultural contact. Filipino is rarely employed or transmitted as a home language in Japanese households.