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Why is 'Philippines' spelled with a PH, but 'Filipino' is spelled with an F?

⁨143⁩ ⁨likes⁩

Submitted ⁨⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨58008@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

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  • sbeak@sopuli.xyz ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    The Philippines were named after a Spanish king, King Phillip, or Felippe in Spanish. Given that the country was first controlled by the Spanish for ages, then the Americans, I’m guessing that at first the Spanish name for both the people and the territory was used, but when the Americans took over, the English-ified name of the territory was used, while the Spanish name for the people stuck as colonial powers use the name for the territory more often? Perhaps the Filipino diaspora also plays a role in this. I don’t know, just my guess.

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  • 6stringringer@lemmy.zip ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Phuck if I know.

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  • WanderingThoughts@europe.pub ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    English, misspelling and never admitting mistakes go hand in hand.

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    • DebatableRaccoon@lemmy.ca ⁨12⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Don’t forget ‘far too inconvenient to correct now’

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  • funesto@sh.itjust.works ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    And is pronounced “Pilipino” by most Filipinos. But my Filipino wife, who grew up in South Carolina, had a friend who said “Flippin-o”. So that’s what we say now, lol.

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    • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      “Flippin-o” sounds like if a kids show tried to create a fake curse word, so they could curse on air, without being fined by the FCC.

      It’s all a bunch of smoo!

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    • starlinguk@lemmy.world ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      That’s not because of the spelling but because of the language. Just like Indonesian, the language doesn’t distinguish between f and p, because they’re basically the same letter (one is a plosive and one is a fricative but that’s it). In Indonesian you’ll hear fancake and coppee, for example.

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    • NutinButNet@hilariouschaos.com ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      I knew a Pilipino family that seemed to pronounce it both ways.

      I tend to think it’s due to those around them. Like this kid I knew from school who came from the UK; with us as his friends, he had an American accent like the rest of us. But as soon as he talked to his parents or his sister, he had this heavy English accent. He seemed to be aware of it but had no control over it.

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  • schwim@piefed.zip ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    I had no idea either but I did find this while Googling(Kagi-ing?)

    https://grammarphobia.com/blog/2010/04/why-is-filipino-spelled-with-an-f.html

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    • valek879@sh.itjust.works ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Back in my day we used to call it “searching”

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      • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Here’s a Nintendo game. It’s Halo for the Xbox360.

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    • Archer@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      People that use Kagi are the Harvard grads of search engine users

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  • heyfrancis@lemmy.ml ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Hey Filipino here - i honestly don’t know the answer (or maybe I’m too old to remember my history class) but as per Wikipedia

    The name Filipino, as a demonym, was derived from the term las Islas Filipinas ‘the Philippine Islands’, the name given to the archipelago in 1543 by the Spanish explorer and Dominican priest Ruy López de Villalobos, in honor of Philip II of Spain.

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filipinos

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  • bright@piefed.social ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    How did this question never occur to me before? Now i need to know the answer too

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  • expatriado@lemmy.world ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    was an Spanish colony for 300 years, Filipino sounds Spanish, otherwise it would be “Philippine”

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    • saltesc@lemmy.world ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      I always remember the ‘pp’ by imagining it as some suburban estate. “Phillip Pines”

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      • purrtastic@lemmy.nz ⁨13⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        That is exactly what I do.

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  • DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Lol

    Guangzhou is spelled with the Pinyin

    But the local language is not called “Guangzhouese”, its Cantonese, but the city is not called “Canton”

    lmao

    Also: Petition to rename my city to “Filadelfia” 🤭

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    • scutiger@lemmy.world ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Canton was originally the transliterated name for the province of Guangdong, which is why the language is called Cantonese in English, from guǎngdōnghuà.

      The name Canton being applied to Guangzhou came later.

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  • MrSelfDestruct25@fedinsfw.app ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    My issue with gif and graphical

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    • deadbeef79000@lemmy.nz ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      They’re the same G.

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      • MrSelfDestruct25@fedinsfw.app ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        J-spot

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    • TranquilTurbulence@lemmy.zip ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Gotta say, pronouncing it as /dʒɪf/ is just top tier trolling. Everyone knows that /ɡɪf/ is the only one that actually makes sense, but some people intentionally choose to pronouns it wrong anyway. Steve Wilhite saw an opportunity to leave his mark on the world by trolling the hell out of everything, so he took it. Who could resist an opportunity like that.

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    • ripcord@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      But the f is for format

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  • brownsugga@lemmy.world ⁨19⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Probably something to do with Tagalog vs English, and the English named the Philippines

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  • Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    The only relevant spelling is the original language.

    What foreigners are doing in their languages has no meaning. You can spell it however you like, change it every year etc.

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    • Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      Do you mean Spanish or Tagalog?

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      • jdr@lemmy.ml ⁨18⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Proto-Austronesian

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    • ThomasWilliams@lemmy.world ⁨17⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      That would be latin ? I’m pretty sure that’s where “Phillipines” originates.

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      • freeman@sh.itjust.works ⁨14⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        Greek name meaning he who likes horses, the name of Alexander the great’s father, then a Spanish King’s who colonized the islands.

        Therefore actually spelled with a Φ and the issue being different transliterations of it.

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