Editing Cebuano language (section)

==Nomenclature==

[[File:Cebu Capitol historical marker (Cebuano) (cropped).jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|Cebu Provincial Capitol's historical marker in [[Cebu City]]|left]]

The term ''Cebuano'' derives from "[[Cebu]]" (which is an island found in central east of the Philippines (some peoples believe that this language came from Cebu)) and ''[[:wikt:-anus|ano]]''" which means (in this case) "people/s", a Latinate calque reflecting the Philippines' Spanish colonial heritage. Speakers of Cebuano in Cebu and even those from outside of Cebu commonly refer to the language as ''Bisayâ''.{{citation needed|date=April 2024}}

The name ''Cebuano'', however, has not been accepted by all who speak it. Cebuano speakers in certain portions of [[Leyte]], [[Northern Mindanao]], [[Davao Region]], [[Caraga]], and [[Zamboanga Peninsula]] objected to the name of the language and claimed that their ancestry traces back to Bisayâ speakers native to their place and not from immigrants or settlers from Cebu. Furthermore, they refer to their ethnicity as ''Bisayâ'' instead of Cebuano and their language as ''Binisayâ'' instead of Cebuano.<ref name="Endriga 2010">{{harvnb|Endriga|2010|p=}}</ref> However, there is a pushback on these objections. Some language enthusiasts insist on referring to the language as Cebuano because, as they claim, using the terms ''Bisayâ'' and ''Binisayâ'' to refer to ethnicity and language, respectively, is exclusivist and disenfranchises the speakers of the [[Hiligaynon language]] and the [[Waray language]] who also refer to their languages as ''Binisayâ'' to distinguish them from Cebuano ''Bisayâ''.

Existing linguistic studies on Visayan languages, most notably that of R. David Paul Zorc, has described the language spoken in Cebu, Negros Occidental, Bohol (as Boholano dialect), Leyte, and most parts of Mindanao as "Cebuano". Zorc's studies on Visayan language serves as the bible of linguistics in the study of Visayan languages. The Jesuit linguist and a native of [[Cabadbaran]], Rodolfo Cabonce, S.J., published two dictionaries during his stays in [[Cagayan de Oro|Cagayan de Oro City]] and [[Manolo Fortich, Bukidnon|Manolo Fortich]] in [[Bukidnon]]: a Cebuano-English dictionary in 1955, and an English-Cebuano dictionary in 1983.<ref>Cabonce S.J., Rodolfo. 2007. ''English-Cebuano Visayan dictionary, An.'' [[National Bookstore]]: [[Mandaluyong]].</ref>

During the [[Spanish Colonial Period (Philippines)|Spanish Colonial Period]], the Spaniards broadly referred to the speakers of Hiligaynon, Cebuano, Waray, [[Kinaray-a]], and [[Aklanon language|Aklanon]] as ''Visaya'' and made no distinctions among these languages.<ref>{{cite book |last1=González Fernández |first1=Ramón |title=Anuario Filipino para 1877; Segunda Edición del Manual del Viajero en Filipinas |date=1877 |publisher=Establecimiento tipográfico de Plana y Ca. |location=Manila |page=37 |url=https://ustdigitallibrary.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/section5/id/59673 |access-date=June 11, 2023 |ref=González Fernández 1877 |archive-date=10 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230610202943/https://ustdigitallibrary.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/section5/id/59673/ |url-status=dead }}</ref>