Toki Reo (working title)
⚠️ 🏗️ Under Construction 🚧 ⚠️
I just wanted something compact and productive.
Maybe one day I will have enough vocabulary to take notes in it.
This language is heavily inspired by Māori, a natural language from New Zealand.
Check out the dictionary.
Introduction
Words
Words falls into one of two groups: content words, and function words (particles).
As in Toki Pona, content words have no particular part of speech. Often, the same word can be used as either a noun, adjective, verb or adverb, depending on context. As such, whenever we say e.g. “noun” in this document, we mean “a word acting as the head of a noun phrase”.
After the definite article te, for example, a word will be treated as a noun. After the past tense marker i, on the other hand, it will be treated as a verb, and so on.
Determiners
The term determiner is used here not in its usual sense as a specific part of speech, but as a wider category of words that can begin a noun phrase. Indeed, every noun phrase is introduced with a determiner, and this is what allows the reader to distinguish between adjacent noun phrases, as well as between the verb phrase and its arguments.
Determiners include the articles, the personal pronouns, and the demonstratives.
Sentence structure
The primary word order is verb–subject–object (VSO).
A lexical word following another modifies it, acting as an adjective or adverb.
Noun phrases
Articles
Equivalent to English a or the.
| Type | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Definite | te | ta |
| Indefinite | e | a |
| Universal | ale |
Personal pronouns
Equivalent to English I or me.
| Person | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | mi | mia |
| 2nd | ti | tia |
| 3rd | si | sia |
Possessives
Possession comes before possessor, and they are separated by the particle o (equivalent to English of). Both parts follow the usual rules of noun phrases, i.e. they must begin with a determiner.
Examples
- te kata o te jan — the person’s cat
- te wai o mi — my water
- te wai o te kata o mia — our cat’s water
Possessive pronouns
For personal pronouns, a contracted form exists. mo is equivalent to o mi, etc.
| Person | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| 1st | mo | moa |
| 2nd | to | toa |
| 3rd | so | soa |
Examples
- te wai mo — my water
- te wai o te kata moa — our cat’s water
Demonstratives
| Type | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Proximal | en | ena |
| Distal | ten | tena |
Equivalent to English this (proximal) or that (distal).
The demonstratives can also be used to refer to previously mentioned entities (see anaphora), in which case en(a) refers to a more recently mentioned entity and ten(a) refers to a less recently mentioned one.
Examples
- en jan — this person
- tena kata — those cats
Verb phrases
Tense markers
Tense markers come before the verb and determine when an event takes place.
| Tense | Particle |
|---|---|
| Past | i |
| Future | ka |
Note that there is no present tense marker. A verb is understood to be referring to the present by default if no overt tense marker is used.
Examples
- kite mi te kata — I see the cat
- i kite mi te kata — I saw the cat
- ka kite mi te kata — I will see the cat
Longer examples
| kite mi ale kata | |
|---|---|
| Gloss | see I all cats |
| English | I see all the cats |
| i kite sia te kata suli | |
|---|---|
| Gloss | PST see they.PL the cat big |
| English | they saw the big cat |
Dictionary
| Root | Type | Meaning | Meta-etymology |
|---|---|---|---|
| wai | N | water | Māori |
For now, Toki Pona can be used for missing words lol