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Toki Pona is a constructed language designed by Canadian translator and linguist Sonja Elen Kisa. It was first published online in mid-2001.
Toki Pona is a minimal language. Like a pidgin, it focuses on simple concepts and elements that are relatively universal between cultures. It was designed to express maximum meaning with minimum complexity. The language has 14 phonemes and 118 words. It was not designed as an international auxiliary language, but instead inspired by Taoist philosophy, among other things.
As a language designed to shape the thought processes of its users, it relies on and demonstrates the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.
Phonology
Toki Pona is phonetically minimal. Its system sounds similar to that of Japanese but lacks distinctive voicing, geminate consonants, long vowels, and palatal clusters. (This is not how the syllables are presented in the official lessons, but it shows the parallels to better-known CV(n) languages.) It also lacks diphthongs. a e i o u Toki Pona 'u' may be rounded or unrounded. ka ke ki ko ku Obstruents (stops and fricatives) sa se si so su may be pronounced voiced or unvoiced. ta te to tu 'ti' has fallen into 'si'. na ne ni no nu pa pe pi po pu ma me mi mo mu ja je jo ju 'j' == IPA [j] (En <y>). 'ji' has fallen into 'i'. la le li lo lu wa we wi 'wu' and 'wo' have fallen into 'u' and 'o'. n syllable-final Within a word, syllable-final n cannot precede a nasal consonant (n or m), and a syllable without an initial consonant can only appear as the first syllable of a word. Sandhi effects change the pronunciation of np (but not its spelling) to [mp] or [mb].
Generally, words are accented on the first syllable.
Syntax Syntax overview expressed in Extended Backus-Naur form: <sentence> ::= [<sentence-adverb> "la"] <subject> "li" <predicate> <sentence-adverb> ::= <noun-phrase> <subject> ::= <noun-phrase> | <compound-subject> <predicate> ::= <verb-phrase> | <compound-predicate> <compound-subject> ::= <subject> "en" <subject> <compound-predicate> ::= <predicate> "li" <predicate> <noun-phrase> ::= <noun> <adjective>* <verb-phrase> ::= <verb> <adverb>* <direct-object>* <direct-object> ::= "e" <noun-phrase> Toki Pona uses Subject Verb Object typology.
Pronouns Whenever the subject of a sentence is either of the pronouns mi or sina, then li is not used to separate the subject and predicate.
Nouns Toki Pona does not use proper nouns. For example, names of people and places are modifiers of the common root for "person" and "place", e.g. "Canada country" or "Lisa person".
Adjectives Toki Pona noun phrases are head-initial, meaning that the modified word comes before the modifiers.
Order of operations is completely opposite to that of Lojban. In Toki Pona, "N A1 A2" (where N represents a noun and A1 and A2 represent modifiers) is parsed as ((N A1) A2), that is, an A1 N that is A2. This can be changed with the particle pi = "of", which groups the following adjectives into a kind of compound adjective that applies to the head noun. E.g., jan pona lukin = ((jan pona) lukin), a seeing friend (jan pona = "friend", literally "good person"); jan pi pona lukin = (jan (pona lukin)) = "good-looking person".
Demonstratives, numerals, and possessive pronouns follow other modifiers.
Verbs Some verbs, such as tawa = "to go", which in English govern prepositions, do not take e before their direct objects.
Vocabulary The 118-word vocabulary is designed around the principles of living a simple life without the complications of modern civilization. The words generally come from English, Tok Pisin, Finnish, Georgian, Dutch, Acadian French, Esperanto, Croatian, Chinese (Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese).
Some words have archaic synonyms because they were changed to avoid a potentially confusing minimal pair. For instance, ona = "he, she, it" used to be iki (which sounds a bit like ike = "bad")
See also Common phrases in different languages.
Colours Like several natural languages, this language lacks any word that labels green as a colour distinct from both blue and yellow.
Numbers Toki Pona only has words for "one" (wan), "two" (tu) and "many" (mute). Zero is ala, which literally means "no" or "none".
Literature Toki Pona's literature currently consists of proverbs, sections of religious texts, some poetry and a few short stories and essays. There are also many fan-made websites to be found across the Web.
There are currently 10-20 proficient speakers and several hundred enthusiasts.
These samples reflect an old version of Toki Pona.
Sample of The Lord's Prayer: (Listen to MP3 audio (http://www.wikipedia.com/upload/mamapimimute.mp3))
mama pi mi mute
mama pi mi mute o,
sina lon sewi kon.
nimi sina o sewi en pona.
ma sina o kama.
jan o pali e wile sina en lon sewi kon en lon ma.
sina o pana lon tenpo suno ni e moku tawa mi.
o weka e pali ike mi, sama la mi weka e pali ike pi jan ante.
o pana ala e wile ike tawa mi.
o awen e mi weka tan ike.
ni li nasin.
Sample of the Tower of Babel story: (Listen to MP3 audio (http://www.tokipona.org/kalama/pape.mp3)) ma tomo Pape
ma ale li jo e toki wan en sama.
jan ale li kama tan nasin pi kama suno, li kama lon ma Sinale, li awen lon ni.
jan li toki e ni: "o kama! mi mute o pali e leko kiwen, o seli e iki."
jan mute li toki e ni: "o kama! mi mute o pali e tomo mute e tomo palisa suli. lawa pi tomo palisa li lon sewi kon. o nimi pi mi mute li kama suli! mi wile ala e ni: mi mute li kan ala. mi mute li lon ma ale."
jan sewi Jawe li kama anpa, li lukin e ma tomo e tomo palisa pi jan lili mute.
jan sewi Jawe li toki e ni: "jan ni li jo e ma wan, li jo e toki sama, li pali e tomo palisa. tenpo ni la iki mute li ken pali mute ike. o mi tawa anpa, mi pakala e toki pi jan mute ni. o jan li sona ala e toki pi jan ante."
jan sewi Jawe li pali e ni: jan ale li kan ala jan, li lon ma mute, li ken ala pali e tomo.
nimi pi ma tomo ni li Pape tan ni: jan sewi Jawe li pakala e toki pi jan ale. tan ma tomo Pape la jan sewi Jawe li tawa e jan tawa ma mute.
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