Search found 18 matches

by leoboiko
Fri Jun 10, 2011 10:23 am
Forum: kama sona toki
Topic: Amen in toki pona
Replies: 7
Views: 4461

Re: Amen in toki pona

I was not thinking “empty” as negative. I didn’t even know it could be read this way? (not a native speaker, sorry). I said “empty” as in “devoid of semantics”, like “Ah” or “hurrah!”. And around here I don’t think “amen” is like that; as far as I can tell, it still carries the meaning of “what was ...
by leoboiko
Fri Jun 10, 2011 9:44 am
Forum: kama sona toki
Topic: Amen in toki pona
Replies: 7
Views: 4461

Re: Amen in toki pona

Are you sure it’s just an empty interjection? I’m not a catholic but live in a catholic country, and I think more or less everyone knows it has meaning as an affirmation (“so be it”, “verily”, “be it done what was just said”). Like in the English colloquial “amen to that, brother.” So I’m inclined t...
by leoboiko
Sat Mar 12, 2011 6:04 pm
Forum: jan nasa li wile ante e toki pona
Topic: things that have surprised me when learning TP
Replies: 27
Views: 18464

Re: things that have surprised me when learning TP

Btw, I don’t want to give the impression that I think toki pona is at a fault for being too English-like. I could write a longer (but probably more boring) post on things that didn’t surprise me when learning TP even though English speakers (e.g. jan Pije) thought they would, like the syntax for que...
by leoboiko
Thu Mar 10, 2011 3:59 pm
Forum: jan nasa li wile ante e toki pona
Topic: things that have surprised me when learning TP
Replies: 27
Views: 18464

Re: things that have surprised me when learning TP

For those of you who are also nonreligious and bothered by the idea missionary work in general, here’s Geoffrey Pullum on SIL and the Pirahã guy: And so we come to anti-Christian prejudice. Earlier in his life, Everett was a missionary linguist working with the Summer Institute of Linguistics, the o...
by leoboiko
Thu Mar 10, 2011 3:31 pm
Forum: jan nasa li wile ante e toki pona
Topic: things that have surprised me when learning TP
Replies: 27
Views: 18464

Re: things that have surprised me when learning TP

... My remark about Piriha~ is generalizable across the whole of Latin America and parts of Indo-China, especially if the report comes from SIL folk (personal prejudice). Who or what is SIL? The people who publish the Ethnologue book? http://www.sil.org/ Yup, missionary group http://en.wikipedia.or...
by leoboiko
Sat Mar 05, 2011 7:54 pm
Forum: jan nasa li wile ante e toki pona
Topic: things that have surprised me when learning TP
Replies: 27
Views: 18464

Re: things that have surprised me when learning TP

laso is grue (blue-green) and has been a long time. I learned TP with jan Pije lessons, with simply state laso is blue and laso jelo (or jelo laso) is green. I should have checked the wiki—you’re right, it says laso is blue, green, cyan. A language this small shouldn't have anything beyond black an...
by leoboiko
Sat Mar 05, 2011 12:44 pm
Forum: jan nasa li wile ante e toki pona
Topic: things that have surprised me when learning TP
Replies: 27
Views: 18464

Re: things that have surprised me when learning TP

In a language necessarily full of ambiguities, null subject presents problems in figuring out what the subject is. Not sure if I entirely agree with that. It’s the same argument that English speakers keep saying about Portuguese and Japanese &c., but we speakers seem to be able to do just fine....
by leoboiko
Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:45 am
Forum: jan nasa li wile ante e toki pona
Topic: things that have surprised me when learning TP
Replies: 27
Views: 18464

things that have surprised me when learning TP

I don’t have a place to post this so might as well do it here. • No green I find it strange that a language so focused on nature doesn’t have a word for “green” as primary. I mean, plants and all. As people who are into color theory will know, what color is “primary” is determined culturally. Accord...
by leoboiko
Wed Mar 02, 2011 9:49 am
Forum: musi
Topic: twitter haiku thing
Replies: 0
Views: 4652

twitter haiku thing

toki, mi wile kepeken e toki pona.  mi pali e ni: lipu Tuwite pi toki musi lili http://twitter.com/jan_Leo mi ante e toki musi Aiku tan toki Nijon.  toki musi Aiku li pakala e toki Nijon tan ni: ona li lili mute.  mi pakala sin e toki pona.  o weka e ike jan mi! toki musi Aiku li kepeken e nimi tenp...
by leoboiko
Tue Dec 28, 2010 8:39 am
Forum: sitelen toki
Topic: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona
Replies: 45
Views: 43426

Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Wow, that was fast! Sorry for taking too long and changing things after you created the transliterator :) After some experimentation, I’ve updated the original post with more explicit punctuation conventions; but feel free to disregard anything you think doesn’t work. I don’t have more authority abo...