root word: saklóng
panaklong
parenthesis
panaklaw
bracket
Sa korespondensiya, ang “Retirado” ay laging dinadaglat o pinaiikli at nasa loob ng panaklong (Ret.) pagkatapos ng pangalan ng retiradong opisyal.
In written correspondence, “Retired” is always abbreviated or shortened, and is placed inside parentheses (Ret.) as well, after the name of a retired official.
This word panaklong was invented in the late 1950s or early 1960s by select national language authorities, along with the words tuldok (period), kuwit (comma), tuldukuwit (semicolon), tutuldok (colon) and parirala (phrase).
At the time, there was quite an outcry among the educated, even from senators, who deplored such forced coinage. Fast-forward a few decades later… by the 1980s, these words had become so commonplace due to being taught in schools that the main generation of Filipinos today will find it hard to believe if told that these were mere inventions and not naturally developed “native” Tagalog words.
Today, practically every Filipino knows that a tuldok is the punctuation mark that is called a “period” in English. It’s hard to imagine that a hundred years ago, the word’s only plain meaning was “dot” and that most people were using the Spanish punto for the punctuation mark.
