Translation of the title in English: Expressions in English and Visayan.

This 1905 book was primarily meant for use by Cebuano speakers to learn English ‘by example.’ Given its ‘no grammar’ approach, it works equally well (or not) the other way round. The book starts with thematic lists of words, followed by a number of translated sentences on various themes, short sample letters, and concludes with a pronunciation guide (of English).

For modern users, two caveats apply: First, the spelling used is the old Spanish-derived orthography. This is fairly distinct from the modern orthography. The most conspicuous changes are: c is now written as either k or s, depending on the context; qui becomes ki, and gui becomes gi. The semivowel w is represented by o (For example, adlao for adlaw ‘sun’, or oala for wala ‘not’), and the semivowel y is not always written (for example, sia for siya ‘he’). The g with a tilde in the combination ng~ is no longer used: modern Cebuano simply uses ng in that case. The preceding n is enough to indicate the correct pronunciation; when the g is to be pronounced, ngg is used. Second, the Cebuano used is sometimes rather formal, and does not reflect modern usage in many cases. Often, Spanish words have been abandoned in favor of English equivalents. Common contractions as used in speech have not been applied. Even a native Cebuano speaker might have trouble understanding some of the sentences, and will consider the language very ‘deep‘.

For English readers, a translation of the table of contents has been added.

Some more up-to-date resources for learning Cebuano on the internet are available from binisaya.com, bohol.ph, and sandayong.com.