There are approximately at least 50,000 speakers of the language, most of whom are concentrated in Mindanao, notably in south central Bukidnon, northeastern Cotabato and northwestern Davao del Sur provinces.
This is in contrast with the spelling convention of most other Philippine languages, where sequences of identical vowels are separated by a glottal stop, e.g. Tagalog saan ([sa'ʔan]).
First, similar to the better-studied ang-marking in Tagalog, the language also employs a case-marking reserved for the noun with which the verb agrees (via focus/voice morphology).
kiNonFocusInday/AnggamInday/uncleki Inday/AnggamNonFocus Inday/uncle'to/from Inday/uncle'teNonFocuslukesmante lukesNonFocus man'to/from the man'Characteristic of Philippine-type languages, Matigsalug verbs carry what is known in the literature as focus morphology.
This piece of morphology indicates the semantic roles of the participants in the clause with respect to the verb.
Matigsalug can put the agent/experiencer (AF), goal (GF), location (LF), and instrument (IF) into direct focus.
In the first example, the prefix eg- indicates that the ka-marked noun functions as the agent, that is, the entity doing the kicking.
In the second example, the prefix eg- in combination with the suffix -en together indicate that the ka-marked noun is the goal, that is, the entity being kicked.