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% toki pona page 8 - interjections, questions, commands and names % /dev/urandom % march 2020
The vocabulary for this page:
| word | meaning | derived from |
|---|---|---|
| a | (emotional interjection) | n/a |
| anu | or (for yes/no questions) | Georgian "an" (or) |
| mu | (any animal sound) | "moo" onomatopoeia |
| o | (addressing people, commands) | Georgian "-o" (vocative case) |
| seme | what? (for questions) | Mandarin "shénme" (what, smth) |
| word | meaning | derived from |
|---|---|---|
| kute | listen, hear, obey, ear | Acadian French "écouter" (listen) |
| nimi | word, name | Finnish "nimi" (name) |
| lawa | head, control, own, rule, main | Serbo-Croatian "glava" (head) |
| anpa | lowly, humble, to conquer/defeat | Acadian French "en bas" (below) |
| insa | inside, contents, center, stomach | Tok Pisin "insait" (inside) |
Interjections and commands
The word "a" functions like a emotional interjection. It is usually either added at the end of a sentence or functions as a sentence on its own.
sina suwi a! -- You are so cute!
More specifically, laughter is indicated with the sentence "a a a!" (ha ha ha!).
The word "mu" substitutes for any sound made by any animal.
The word "o" is used to address people and issue commands.
When used on its own at the beginning of a sentence, it turns the rest of the message into a command.
o kute e mi! -- Listen to me!
When used after a noun phrase, it addresses a person.
sina o! -- Hey, you!
Both uses can be combined.
jan pali o, kepeken e ilo awen! -- Worker, use protective equipment!
Questions
There are two ways to ask questions in toki pona.
If you want to ask a yes-or-no question, you phrase the sentence normally, but replace the word being questioned with a "[word] ala [word]" structure.
sina pona ala pona? -- Are you okay?
There are no words for "yes" and "no", so to answer positively, you repeat the verb, and to answer negatively, you add "ala".
pona. -- Yes.
pona ala. -- No.
(From what I understand, this structure is similar to what is used in Mandarin.)
ona li pali ala pali? -- Are they working?
jan lili li moku ala moku? -- Are the children eating?
Alternatively, you can add "anu seme" ("or what?") instead.
sina pona anu seme? -- Are you okay?
For freeform questions, you start with a regular sentence, but replace the word you're interested in with "seme".
sina pali e seme? -- What are you (doing/working on)?
Names (unofficial words)
So far, these pages only relied on native toki pona words to refer to things and people. But this is clearly not enough when you need to call someone by their name. For proper names, toki pona uses so-called "unofficial words". These are usually names of people, cities, countries, etc., taken from their native languages and adapted to toki pona's pronunciation rules. Unlike all toki pona words, they're spelled with the first letter capitalized.
Unofficial words are always treated as adjectives, which means that before them is always a noun or a noun phrase describing what is being referred to.
jan Mimi -- (the person) Mimi
ma Kanata -- (the country) Canada
ma tomo Napoli -- (the city) Naples
Alternatively, the unofficial words can actually be used as adjectives:
jan Kanata -- a Canadian person
Thanks to different people interpreting both the native names and toki pona's sounds in different ways, there may ultimately be several different unofficial names for the same city or country's name.
Also, people speaking toki pona are free to pick their own personal toki pona names, either by adapting the name from their native language or coming up with something new.
Examples
o toki ala a! -- Shut up!
sina pali ala pali e ni? -- Did you do this?
mi jan San. mi lon ma Mewika. -- I am John. I live in the United States.
nimi sina li seme? -- What is your name?
jan lawa mi li ike mute. -- (My boss / our leader) is very bad.
Exercises
Now, try to figure out the meaning of these sentences.
And try to translate the following sentences into toki pona.
- I don't think gods exist.
- Don't make noise in the library.
%spoiler% * * * * *
%spoiler%
- mi toki insa e ni: jan sewi li lon ala.
- o kalama ala lon tomo lipu.