Methodology
The kind of research methodology employed in this dictionary
varies depending on where a certain food word and definitions could possibly be
sourced. There are information that can readily be gathered at the grocery
stores and supermarkets, or at the food stalls and eateries in the neighborhood
and the busy streets in Metro Manila and other cities across the country. My
personal experience and knowledge of Visayan foods and cuisine and my almost
three decades of making my first Visayan vernacular dictionary helped me a lot
in compiling Cebuano, Boholano, Waray, and Ilonggo food words. Some data and
information I gathered required me more effort to discover as they are rarely used
in present-day commerce you have to dig like bookworms in libraries,
bookstores, newspapers, magazines, cookbooks, and other publications including
the virtual world of the internet. I also asked for information from ordinary cooks and
chefs on how foods are prepared and what else they knew about our foods.
My enthusiasm in language and food research even
brought me to the point of going to all four corners of our archipelago where I
could find native speakers and actual specimens. It is in my many travels
around the country that I witnessed and experienced the daily lives and foods of
the locals. My many travels in the southern part of the Philippines introduced
me to the kind of foods and culinary customs of our Muslim brethren and other
ethnolinguistic groups in Mindanao. When there is urgency for immediate verification
or validation of Muslim food words, good thing there are Muslim communities
right in the heart of Metro Manila, such as in Quiapo, Manila, and in Maharlika
Village in Taguig City. My many travels
all over the provinces in mainland Luzon gave me an opportunity to discover
food words directly from the natives and local residents. My field research across the country proved to
me that many provincial delicacies and country cooking, particularly in the
Visayas, Mindanao, and central Luzon are least or have never been featured
in any book, magazine, and any other publication or medium of mass media
communication. For instance, in southern Mindanao, there is plenty of daily
fare cooking, their kind of ingredients, dishes, fruits, and other food stuff that are still unknown to
the rest of the Philippines. I have the same findings in the hinterlands of
Cordillera Regions in central Luzon.
Related topics:
My kind of research methodology also took advantage of the advancement of
information technology and the complexity of electronic gadgets in gathering, storing,
and exchanging information about Pinoy food, cooking, and dining.
My self-styled research methodology helped me create this
first-of-a-kind dictionary that covers many of our local and ethnic dialects,
with a long list of food, cooking, and dining terms never known or heard of before
by most of us. With this book, you don’t have to travel and conduct lengthy
research the way I did just to find out what a native or indigenous food word
is all about. The encyclopedic entries I wrote in my dictionary would help capture the imagination closest to the real thing and enrich our knowledge and awareness of
what else we have in this country. It does not serve merely as a reference but
also helps preserve and share Pinoy food culture, traditions, and practices.
This makes my dictionary more interesting to read and to own a copy.
Sources of information
- Personal experience and knowledge
My personal experience and knowledge of Visayan words being
a native speaker helped a lot in almost three decades of compiling my first
vernacular dictionary, the Cebuano-English Dictionary. My 20 years of stay in
Metro Manila exposed me to a lot of Tagalog words and the kind of food and dining
places you find in this metropolis. I’m also into cooking Pinoy dishes where I learned
more about the simplicity, intricacy, and versatility of our foods and tastes.
- Interviews and insights from cooks and other informants
In various parts of the country, I also Interviewed,
though informally, ordinary cooks and chefs about their cooking. I also
interviewed those who have tried a kind of food for their insights and comments
about the food. Having been to many food exhibits and festival celebrations in
the provinces and in Metro Manila, I learned from my informants what are those
foods considered by Filipinos as panghandaan
(food for special occasions), pambahay (home-cooking food), and
pagrestoran (ideally sold or served in restaurants). I realized in my many interviews that in rural areas, food
for them is classified into pangkaing pangmayaman
(affordable only by those who are rich) and
pagkaing pangmahirap (what the poor
can afford to have).
- Printed materials
My personal collection of various indigenous and cultural
dictionaries is my most treasured depository of written literature, word bank, and semantics. My daily newspaper readings kept me updated with what food
columnists and feature news writers are talking about food. My fondness for
visiting libraries all over the country helped me open the pages of some unpublished
research papers and theses right on their bookshelves. I also mined the
treasure of food and agriculture magazines. Moreover, I am not sparing any kind
of food brochures, handouts, and print ads in updating my list of food words.
- Broadcasting media
I also picked words and information from radio and
television programs that feature food, cooking, and current events. During my
childhood years in Leyte, I was an avid listener to radio broadcasts from local
radio stations based in Cebu. Even when I moved to Tacloban City in my college
years still listened to local radio and television news programs in Waray-waray
dialect and brought that habit to Metro Manila when I moved to work here. I
always wake up with my radio clock every morning and listen to Tagalog
broadcasts, and watched television programs featured both in English and
Tagalog in the evening prime time and on weekends. Local broadcasting media
regularly and consistently used local dialects and this medium of
communication helped enrich my lexicon of the local dialects and stock
knowledge about anything around us.
- Internet and electronic applications
With the advancement of communication and information
technology, data gathering these years now include browsing the internet. I
regularly checked information from government websites, bloggers’ posts, and
posts from a circle of social networks. I also get information and data from legitimate
local and international online databases of plants and animals other than my
visits to the Philippine National Museum in Manila for information about the
scientific names of living things around us. With modern communication
technology, I can now access to online and software-application-based English
and other foreign language dictionaries hosted by legitimate sites and the web-based
encyclopedia. The Internet websites and social networks are my widest and
fastest way of getting and sharing information from around the globe. In fact,
I am now a regular food blogger. I posted
some of my works and finds in my blog sites and accounts on Yahoo, Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest.
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| My workplace at home |
Research methods
Ethnography type of research under the qualitative
research method was largely employed in gathering words and descriptive
definitions of food words from ethnolinguistic groups in Mindanao and the
locals in Luzon and Visayas. I traveled a lot around the country and
conducted actual interviews with native speakers in any possible location. I
personally interviewed my informants/participants while in the marketplace, restaurants
and other eateries, stores, trading centers, and even in the farm and the village
of fishermen. I inquired and took notes directly from them of information about
their kind of foods, and cuisine, as well as about their customs and traditions in preparing,
serving, and eating their foods.
Visiting local places is my best opportunity of
finding native speakers, printed references, and actual specimens of food,
ingredients, and implements that could help me define and validate the
following:
a.) How certain words are commonly spelled in certain locality.
b.) How certain words are pronounced by the locals or
native speakers.
c.) How their kind of foods are prepared and what are the ingredients
and implements needed.
d.) Have an actual visual description of food, ingredients,
cooking tools and other implements, as well as the place and people from where
and whom I sourced or found the specimen.
e.) Experience the taste, smell, and touch of their kind
of food and how it feels joining them in partaking their foods.
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| Red dots represent the many places where Edgie had been all these years setting footprints all over the Philippine archipelago. |
Wherever I go in the Philippines, I visit any library
and bookstore to search and secure a copy of any written literature on cultural
foods, customs, traditions, and practices of the locals.
While in travel, I also got information from a fellow
passenger or traveler while in transit or in the station.
I also took the opportunity of talking to my
relatives, friends, officemates, and neighbors who are native speakers of a
particular dialect to get information about certain words and their
pronunciation.
A basic research method is also employed, such that I took photographs and made audio and video
recordings to aid descriptive recollection and to recall some details of the
interview. When possible, I brought home some specimens to further evaluate and
scrutinize my findings.
Back home, I compared and validate my findings with the
entries from my collections of indigenous and local vernacular dictionaries and
other references that include online databases.
Now, I will tour you to some of souvenir
photographs of places where I had been. Click the images below and you will be redirected to my Facebook account to view the photo albums.
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