Learn Cebuano

sa  - of / to / on / in / with / at  (common noun)

sa mga – same as above but plural

Using the same example from the lesson on SECOND CLASS personal pronouns:

Gamay ang balay niya – His or Her house is small

We will replace the personal pronoun with common noun

Gamay ang balay sa lalaki – The house of the man is small

Negosyo ( ne-gos-yo ) – business

Ug ( ug ) – and

Bata ( ba-ta ) – Child

Mo-adto (mo-ad-to) – Will go (future)

Mo-uban (mo-u-ban) – Will go with (future)

Libro (lib-ro) – book

Lamesa (la-me-sa) – Table

Here is another example:

Negosyo niya – His or Her business

Negosyo sa babaye – Business of the girl  (Girls buisness) 

If we want to refer to a group of girls:

Negosyo sa mga babaye – The business of the girls

The prefix MGA is used to pluralize a noun.

Or refer to a house belonging to multiple children.

Balay sa mga bata – The house of the children

More examples

Moadto ko sa Manila – I will go to manila

Mouban ako sa imo – I will go with you

Ang Libro sa lamesa – The book on the table

Ang libro sa balay – The book at/in the house

Second class MARKERS for use with proper nouns – ni / nila ni

ni ( ni ) – of (proper noun)

nila ni ( ni-la-ni ) – same as above but plural

Using the same example from the lesson on SECOND CLASS personal pronouns:

Gamay ang balay niya – His or Her house is small

We will replace the personal pronoun with proper noun

Gamay ang balay ni John – The house of John is small (John’s house is small)

Negosyo ( ne-gos-yo ) – business

Ug ( ug ) – and

Here is another example:

Negosyo niya – The business of him or her (His or Her business)

Negosyo ni John – The business of John (John’s business)

If we want to include John’s business partner:

Negosyo nila ni John ug nila ni Peter – The business of John and Peter

Or refer to a house belonging to John and his wife Mary.

Balay nila ni John ug nila ni Mary – The house of John and Mary

You should review the FIRST CLASS personal pronouns before moving to the SECOND CLASS.

Here are the SECOND CLASS personal pronouns:

nako ( na-ko ) – My nimo ( ni-mo ) – Your niya ( ni-ya ) – His or Her nato ( na-to ) – Our (inclusive of the person being addressed) namo ( na-mo ) – Our (exclusive of the person being addressed) ninyo ( nin-yo ) – Your (plural) nila ( ni-la ) – Thier

As stated with FIRST CLASS there can only be one used in a sentence but with SECOND CLASS there is no limit on how many you can use. Gamay ang balay. (The house is small) Now lets expand this sentence to denote ownership of the house. Gamay ang balay nako  – My house is small You can see we are using the SECOND CLASS personal pronoun.

Attaching SECOND CLASS personal pronouns to objects denotes ownership.

In a previous lesson we had:

Gamay ang balay ako / ko WOULD PROBABLY BE UNDERSTOOD BUT VERY WRONG GRAMMAR

Using the wrong CLASS of personal pronoun can often change the entire meaning of the sentence.

So here is the example for each SECOND CLASS personal pronoun expanding our description of a small house to denote ownership:

Gamay ang balay nako – My house is small Gamay ang balay nimo – Your house is small Gamay ang balay niya – His or Her house is small Gamay ang balay nato – Our house is small (inclusive of the person being addressed) Gamay ang balay namo – Our house is small (exclusive of the person being addressed) Gamay ang balay ninyo – Your house is small (plural as in belongs to those being addressed) Gamay ang balay nila – Their house is small The MARKER ANG is FIRST CLASS and identifies the topic of the sentence which in this case is the house.

There are other ways to construct sentences with the same meaning but making other parts of the sentence the topic.

This is often done for emphases or continuation of a previous topic.

It can also be the personal choice of the speaker what form the like to use.

This is an advanced area we will look at in the future but for now I just wanted to touch on it here.

In our next lesson we will attach SECOND CLASS personal pronouns to VERBS.