Maranaoan was historically written in Arabic letters, which were known as Batang Arab. It is now written with Latin letters. Though there is no officially proclaimed standard orthography, Maranao is more or less written phonetically as influenced by Filipino. The following are the letters used in writing out native words: A, B, D, E, G, H, I, K, L, M, N, NG, O, P, R, S, T, U, W, Y In representing the mid central vowel , different authors have employed various means to represent this sound. Consequently, Maranao social media use either of the two letters or just leave it blank. "Ë" may also be used as recommend by the Komisyong ng Wikang Filipino's Ortograpiyang Pambansa of 2013. In 1996, McKaughan and Macaraya, in their revised Maranao dictionary, the digraph "ae" was introduced and used to represent the supposed presence of the vowel. Double vowels are pronounced separately. For example, "kapaar" is pronounced as. In some older orthographies, "q" is used for the glottal stop regardless of position, while in others an apostrophe is used. Outside of linguistic literature, the glottal stop, regardless of position, is not marked in contemporary spelling. The final sound in diphthongs and "W" were marked with "-o" in older orthographies, as in other Philippine languages, but both are nowadays spelled as "W". Also, "i" was used in older orthographies to transcribe, which is currently spelled as "Y". "H" is only used for Malayloanwords, and "sh" is used for Arabic loanwords and names such as "Ishak". "Di" or "j" are used to transcribe the sound, such as "radia/raja" or the English name "John".
Maranao has four vowel phonemes that can become more close or higher when in certain environments. Although previous studies have analyzed the ɨ sound as an ae phoneme.
Front
Central
Back
Close
/i/
Mid
//
//
Open
//
Consonants
According to Lobel, Maranao has the following consonants:
According to Lobel, only occurs in a select number of Malay loanwords:
tohan 'God'
tahon 'astrological sign'
hadapan 'in front '
Consonant elongation
Consonants are also pronounced longer if preceded with a schwa. However, this process is not a form of gemination since consonant elongation in Maranao is not distinctive as seen in other Philippine languages such as Ilokano and Ibanag. Some of these are:
Since 2009, it has been proposed that previous studies on the phonology of Maranao had overlooked the presence of "heavy" consonants. These four "heavy" consonants being. Vowels that follow these consonants are raised in position. There are four possible environments for that determine whether the vowel will be raised or not:
Non-raising - /p t k s m n ŋ r w y/
Obligatory Raising - /p’ t’ k’ s’ /
* Tohan is pronounced as instead of
Optional Raising - /b d g/
Transparent - /l ʔ/ -
Grammar
Case markers
In contrast to Tagalog which has 3 case markers, and Iloko which has 2, Maranao has four: so ko o sa
Pronouns
Maranao pronouns can be free or bound to the word/morpheme before it.
