jan pona tan ma Amasona

[jan Ote]

D.Everett describes his experience living with the Piraha people in Brazil, and their language:
Daniel Everett: Endangered Languages and Lost Knowledge (1h speech plus 30 min. of Q&A)

[janKipo]

The Piraha are the latest source of all things wonderful and weird in languages. It is interesting to hear about these, but not necessary to believe in them.

[Mako]

toki Pilaa li pona mute tawa mi. jan Pilaa li sama jan pi toki pona tan ni: jan Pilaa li kepeken e nanpa lili. toki Pilaa li toki nasa li toki musi.

[janKipo]

mi sona ala e mute pi toki Pilawa. taso jan ante kin li sona ala e mute. mi awen tawa sona pona pi toki ni.
Good question -- what do you put in for 'h's? The little I have heard of Piraha~ suggests that tp would record the r as t (very dental flap)

[janMato]

I did read they have a discourse pattern that I haven't seen in toki pona yet-- a type of subordination avoidance strategy

mi lukin e jan. jan li jo e waso lon luka. jan ni li sama.
I saw the man carrying a chicken.
I saw a man. The man was carrying a chicken. These men were the same person.

Anyhow, I'm skeptical that bumping grammar out of syntax and into discourse make a language much simpler. Some day I hope to demonstrate this by creating a language with all 2 word sentences, the longest sentence that chimpanzees have been able to reliably and intelligibly produce. (Source Adam's Tongue) The hypothetical conlang would have massive chains of interlocked 2 word sentences that would probably follow a lot of recognizable discourse patterns. And the chimps probably still wouldn't be able to use this hypothetical language.

[Mako]

mi sona ala e mute pi toki Pilawa. taso jan ante kin li sona ala e mute. mi awen tawa sona pona pi toki ni.
Good question -- what do you put in for 'h's? The little I have heard of Piraha~ suggests that tp would record the r as t (very dental flap)

ken la ona wile kepeken e nimi ala. nimi Piraha li kama Pitaa. nimi sama li namako ala namako e nimi kipisi?
nimi pi kulupu ni la sina toki lon. mi kute e toki Pitaa la mi kute e nimi t.

[Mako]

I did read they have a discourse pattern that I haven't seen in toki pona yet-- a type of subordination avoidance strategy

mi lukin e jan. jan li jo e waso lon luka. jan ni li sama.
I saw the man carrying a chicken.
I saw a man. The man was carrying a chicken. These men were the same person.

Anyhow, I'm skeptical that bumping grammar out of syntax and into discourse make a language much simpler. Some day I hope to demonstrate this by creating a language with all 2 word sentences, the longest sentence that chimpanzees have been able to reliably and intelligibly produce. (Source Adam's Tongue) The hypothetical conlang would have massive chains of interlocked 2 word sentences that would probably follow a lot of recognizable discourse patterns. And the chimps probably still wouldn't be able to use this hypothetical language.

Sounds a bit like uncompressed POP
http://fiziwig.com/conlang/soaloa/pop.html

lipu sitelen ni li pona mute tawa mi. nimi ona li tenpo suno sewi pi tomo sewi Pape. ken la toki lili pi mute lili li lon lipu sitelen ni li kama namako ala tawa toki sin sina.
http://ebbolles.typepad.com/

[Mako]

I did read they have a discourse pattern that I haven't seen in toki pona yet-- a type of subordination avoidance strategy

mi lukin e jan. jan li jo e waso lon luka. jan ni li sama.
I saw the man carrying a chicken.
I saw a man. The man was carrying a chicken. These men were the same person.

Anyhow, I'm skeptical that bumping grammar out of syntax and into discourse make a language much simpler. Some day I hope to demonstrate this by creating a language with all 2 word sentences, the longest sentence that chimpanzees have been able to reliably and intelligibly produce. (Source Adam's Tongue) The hypothetical conlang would have massive chains of interlocked 2 word sentences that would probably follow a lot of recognizable discourse patterns. And the chimps probably still wouldn't be able to use this hypothetical language.

Interesting example, but the use of a pronoun and the difference in volition of jan and waso might not make it the _best_ example. Perhaps we need a proof text free of TP pronouns (at least, free of 1st and 2nd person pronouns). That said, this discourse pattern shares some similarities with my (perhaps pleonastic) rough drafts of TP.