Markers

Markers

	Direct	Indirect	Oblique
Singular	ang	ng	sa
Plural	ang mga	ng mga	sa mga
Singular (for name of person)	si	ni	kay
Plural (for names of two or more persons)	sina	nina	kina

Direct Case

Ang/Ang mga— introduce common noun or proper noun except names of people.

Si/Sina—introduce names of person.

These markers are under the direct case and have the same usage shown below, except for letter d, which is just inherent function of ang, ang mga.

a. It marks the main topic in a sentence.

Ang masa ay kontento sa pamahalaan. The mass is contented with the administration.

Ang mga bata ay sabik sa kanilang mga bagong laruan. The kids are excited to their new toys.

Si Chris ay magaling sa paglalaro ng basketball. Chris is good at playing basketball.

Sina Luis at Angelica ay mag-aaral sa bahay ko. Luis and Angelica will study in my house.

b. It also tells the doer of the action of a verb in the actor focus form.

Umani ang magsasaka ng 300 kabang palay. The farmer harvested 300 sacks of rice.

Gising ang mga kwago kapag gabi. The owls are awake at night.

Tumakbo si Jose sa pagkapresidente. Jose runs for presidency.

Aalis sina Topher and Jorge mamaya. Topher and Jorge will leave later.

c. And it tells the direct object of a verb in the object focus form.

Kinain ng peste ang mais. The pest ate the corn.

Hihilahin ko ang mga lubid. I will pull the vines.

Sinigawan ko si Kenneth. I shouted at Kenneth.

Pinagluto ni Jenny sina Angel at Jorge. Jenny cooked (something) for Angel and Jorge.

d. It also highlights a noun, or put it on the spotlight. It gives an emphasis that an action is done by the subject itself alone.

Si Maria ang kumain ng cake. Maria is the one who ate the cake.

Siya ang may sala. It is her fault./She is the one who is to blame.

Indirect Case

Ng/Ng mga-introduce nouns except names of persons, just like ang,ang mga. And Ni/Nina introduce names of persons.

a. To mark the subject of a verb in object focus form.

Inani ng magsasaka ang 300 kabang palay. The farmer harvested 300 sacks of rice.

Kinain ng aso ang buto. The dog ate the bone.

Nilisin ni Mark ang bahay. Mark cleaned the house.

Pininturahan nina Chris at William ang kwarto. Chris and William painted the room.

b. Ng/Ng mga mark the direct of object of the verb in actor focus form, but not ni/nina

Kumain ang manok ng mais. The chicken ate corn.

Nagbigay ako ng regalo. I have given a gift.

Note that ni/nina cannot be used to mark a direct object which is a name of person, for both object focus form and subject focus form of the verb, instead use Si. However, subject focus form of the verb can be used, but an oblique case marker should be used to introduce the name of person, making the object of the verb functions as an indirect object.

(Object Focus ) Tinawag ko si Pedro. I called Pedro

(Subject Focus) Tumawag ako ni Pedro –Tumawag ako kay Pedro. I called (to) Pedro.

Oblique Case

Sa/Sa mga- mark common nouns, and proper nouns and to refer to clan and family, except for specific name of person. Kay/Kina- mark specific names of persons.

a. It marks the indirect object of the verb.

Binigay ni Dr. Martinez ang pera sa bahay-ampunan. Dr. Martinez gave the money to the adoption center.

Nagpasa ang aplikante ng resume sa mga kompanyang nadaanan nya. The applicant submitted resume to the companies he passed through.

Ipinakilala ko ang anak ko kay Manuel. I introduced my daughter to Manuel.

Ipinakita ko ang larawan ng lola kina Sally at Vincent. I showed to Sally and Vincent the picture of grandmother.

b. location where the verb takes place.

Kumain kami sa Gigalo’s Restaurant. We ate at Gigalo’s Restaurant.

Nakatira sila ngayon sa Italy. They live now in Italy.

Bumaba ka sa Ayala Ave. Corner Paseo de Roxas. Get off at Ayala Ave. corner Paseo De Roxas.

Ipinatong ko sa mesa. I put it on the table.

Kay/Kina to show that an action will happen to the place of the person pertained by Kay/Kina

Gagabihin po kami kina Jorge. We will be there at Jorge’s place until evening.

c. sa is used with prepositions of place, and with para (for, receiver) {derived from Spanish}

Ibaba (below), Itaas (above), ilalim (under),ibabaw (on top of, above), gilid (corner, edge), tabihan (corner), gitna (center, middle), pagitan (between), kaliwa (left), kanan (right), likod (back), harap (front), loob (inside), labas (outside). Almost anything can be introduced with the word sa. Sa mga is not used with this presposition. However sa and sa mga is used both for para. Note that para precedes sa/sa mga, and sa/sa mga precede the preposition.

Makikita mo ‘yung libro ko sa tabi ng kabinet. You will see my book besides the cabinet.

Ang Building C ay makikita mo sa harap ng HPT. You will see the Building C in front of HPT.

Mga donasyon ko ito para sa mga nasalanta ng bagyo. This is my donation to those devastated by the hurricane.

With proper markers the noun will inherent the case no matter if it is placed before or in the middle of the sentence.  While the Tagalog followed the default syntactical order (Verb-^{Marker} Doer-^{Marker} Object), you can still switch the places of the parts of the sentence giving emphasis to the one place at the beginning.

Binigay ko kay Josh ang laruan.	I gave the toy to Josh.
Kay Josh ko binigay ang laruan.
Ang laruan ay binigay ko kay Josh.

Same way in English, we can say Josh was given a toy (by me), the toy was given to Josh, and I gave Josh the toy; without changing the meaning of the sentence. But this grammatical voice change should also use proper tenses since we are shifting from active to passive, in order to provide accurate details. Much more like in Tagalog, as you can notice in the third sentence Ang laruan ay binigay ko kay Josh, the particle ay is used. Ang laruan being the subject (can be called nominative case) is connect to the description (predicate) with ay (which function as a copula). [Refer to next discussion.]