lipu sona

Names

Sometimes, you need to refer to people and places by their name. In toki pona, you can do this using “unofficial words”, also known as “loan adjectives”. Names are adapted from their source language using a series of phonetic rules.

Unlike most words in toki pona, names can only be used as adjectives:

Riley (the person)
jan Wali

Canada (the country)
ma Kanata

English (the language)
toki Inli

Seattle (the city)
ma tomo Sijata

Gender

toki pona has three words for gender:

tonsi
non-binary

meli
female

mije
male

These words are most often used as adjectives:

jan meli li pali e tomo.
The woman builds a house.

Questions

There are three types of questions:

x ala x?

If you want to ask a question that can be answered with yes or no, phrase the sentence normally, but use the form x ala x in place of the word you’re questioning.

jan pona ni li suli ala suli?
Is this friend (“good person”) big?

ona li pana ala pana e kili?
Did they give the berry?

toki pona has no explicit words for yes or no. The most common way to answer this type of question is to repeat the word for “yes”, or to add ala for “no”:

lipu li pona ala pona?
Is the book good?

pona.
Yes.

pona ala.
No.

x anu seme?

anu means “or”. (Some people use anu as a content word meaning “choice”.)

You can append the form anu seme (“or what?”) to the end of your sentence.

moku li pona anu seme?
Is the food good? (“The food is good or what?”)

lipu li pakala anu seme?
Is the book damaged? (“The book is broken or what?”)

x seme?

For more freeform questions, insert seme in place of what you want to know.

nimi sina li seme?
What’s your name?

ijo li seme e jan?
What’s that object doing to the person?

jan seme li ni?
Who is this person?