Pakanengneng: The Pangasinense’s Sense of Sight

Pakanengneng: The Pangasinense’s Sense of Sight

The Pangasinan language is consistently nuanced even in the rarefied fields of, um, ophthalmology, optometry, and optics.

Pakanengneng is the basic term for sense of sight fro the root word nengneng (to see).

For the shape and size of eyes, there’s muldagat (wide-eyed) and pikit (slit-eyed). Chinky-eyed people with Chinese ancestry are jokingly called singa mata’y pantat (catfish-eyed) or singa makakaugip (sleepy-eyed), if not pikit (singkit in Tagalog).

On the other hand, terms for eye movements include:

Limata: to open the eyes

Pikit: to close the eyes

Mulagat: to open the eyes wide

Kurarap: to open the eyes wide to see in the dark

Kunineng: to move the flaps of the eyes to make sense of something in the dark

Kulirep: irap in Tagalog; to move the eyes in such a way as to briefly stare at someone sharply, with the eyes opening and closing within a second; almost like a squint, it is an expression of disgust

Kindat: to wink

Pultak: to make the eyeballs bulge as to seem to be out of the eye sockets owing to sheer fright/terror, excitement, or surprise

Kespay: to flap the eyelids

Birbir: to stare at someone intently and for a longish period of time to recall who the person is

Imaton: to observe

Lingaw: lingon; to turn around and see; to look back on

Laram: to feel uncomfortable when staring directly at strong light (glare)

Siim: to espy someone (done in secret, of course)

Silip: to peek or to look through

Bista: to inspect

Even more interesting are the terms for when the someone stares from certain vantage points:

Tandag: to stare or observe from a ledge or higher position

Takiling: to stare at something high from down below

Tangay: to look up

Usdong: to look down on

(Note: The terms for crying are also numerous, and they have been discussed in this forum separately.)

What other eye-related terms do you know?