Adverbs, Auxiliary Verbs, Verbs

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SoweliTeloNasa
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Adverbs, Auxiliary Verbs, Verbs

Post by SoweliTeloNasa »

Although it looks like some words are auxiliary more often (wile/kama for example), could any word be auxiliary or an adverb? I've mostly been following the vocab list to see if a word can be a verb/modifier/noun but I've noticed many words being used in other ways the vocab list says aren't allowed.

Can any word be used as a noun/verb/adverb/auxiliary and it's only limited by what makes sense? Prepositions seem like an exception since I can't imagine how kiwen could be a preposition. But for example, the vocab list says kiwen can only be a modifier or noun. But can you use it as follows:

kiwen as a verb
mi kiwen e tomo : 'I harden the house'. (make more stone like or fortify)

kiwen as an adverb
mi lukin kiwen lon tomo : 'I stared stonily (in a still and stone like manner) at the house'.

I feel like this is kind of a stretch, but I'm not sure if it's because it's against the rules, or an auxiliary verb for kiwen doesn't exist in english but it's conceptually ok.
kiwen as an auxiliary word.
mi kiwen tawa : 'I'm becoming more stone like walking / to walk' (maybe getting sore/stiff walking)

There's probably better examples of kiwen as a verb/adverb/auxiliary but just curious if it's possible. As a related note, I've haven't seen anyone use kama/pini as future or past tense and I can't be the first person to want to say something like 'I will eat (in the future) the fish' as:

'mi moku kama e kala' or 'mi moku pi tenpo kama e kala'

instead of what I assume is the correct way that I see regularly,
'tenpo kama la mi moku e kala' or 'mi moku e kala lon tenpo kama'.
janKipo
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Re: Adverbs, Auxiliary Verbs, Verbs

Post by janKipo »

Well, prepositions and modals (“pre verbs”) aside, any content word can turn up in any role. Prepositions and modals can function as any other thing, but what can function as one of them i limited (at a given time, the list has changed several times over the years). For the standard set:nouns, verbs, adjectives there are a set of guidelines for changing to other roles, but there are many cases of going off guideline -- or extending the guideline in a novel way. Prepositions and modals generally behave like verb (subject to some interpretation).
So, verbs become nouns meaning either the general direct object (so ‘moku’ “eat” becomes ‘moku’ “food”) or the activity of the verb “eating”. As an adjective it is the potential for being the DO, so “edible”.
Nouns go to (transitive) verbs either as causatives “subject cause DO to be [noun]” ‘telo e’ is “turns DO into a liquid”, “melts DO”, or an applicative “Subject applies [noun] to DO” “washes/wets down DO”. As an adjective, it is the characteristic property of so ‘telo’ is “wet/fluid”.
Adjectives go to verbs as causatives ‘loje e’ “painted DO red/ made DO blush”. As nouns they are either things wth that property or the property itself “a red thing” or “redness”.
As noted, each word then has a range of special cases that have to be picked up individually, although most are close to these general guidelines.
Note, not shifts are forbidden except to prepositions and modals.
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jan_Lope
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Re: Adverbs, Auxiliary Verbs, Verbs

Post by jan_Lope »

SoweliTeloNasa wrote:Although it looks like some words are auxiliary more often (wile/kama for example), could any word be auxiliary or an adverb? I've mostly been following the vocab list to see if a word can be a verb/modifier/noun but I've noticed many words being used in other ways the vocab list says aren't allowed.

Can any word be used as a noun/verb/adverb/auxiliary and it's only limited by what makes sense? Prepositions seem like an exception since I can't imagine how kiwen could be a preposition. But for example, the vocab list says kiwen can only be a modifier or noun. But can you use it as follows:

kiwen as a verb
mi kiwen e tomo : 'I harden the house'. (make more stone like or fortify)

kiwen as an adverb
mi lukin kiwen lon tomo : 'I stared stonily (in a still and stone like manner) at the house'.

I feel like this is kind of a stretch, but I'm not sure if it's because it's against the rules, or an auxiliary verb for kiwen doesn't exist in english but it's conceptually ok.
kiwen as an auxiliary word.
mi kiwen tawa : 'I'm becoming more stone like walking / to walk' (maybe getting sore/stiff walking)

There's probably better examples of kiwen as a verb/adverb/auxiliary but just curious if it's possible. As a related note, I've haven't seen anyone use kama/pini as future or past tense and I can't be the first person to want to say something like 'I will eat (in the future) the fish' as:

'mi moku kama e kala' or 'mi moku pi tenpo kama e kala'

instead of what I assume is the correct way that I see regularly,
'tenpo kama la mi moku e kala' or 'mi moku e kala lon tenpo kama'.
toki!

Unfortunately, many vocabulary lists are incomplete. They often do not display all word types for a Toki Pona word. Furthermore one finds statements like this "... an adjective becomes a verb...".

To me, an adjective is an adjective and a verb is a verb. I try to list all the words for a Toki Pona word in my dictionary.
https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https:// ... onary.html

If you search for "kiwen" you will find the following entries:

kiwen
adjective: hard, solid, stone-like, made of stone or metal

kiwen
adverb: hard, solid, stone-like, made of stone or metal

kiwen
noun: hard thing, rock, stone, metal, mineral, clay

kiwen (e )
verb transitive: to solidify, to harden, to petrify, to fossilize

My vocabulary list is probably not (yet) complete. But not every Toki Pona word can accept every part of a word. For example, it would be very confusing if the word "la" had another word type besides the function as a separator.

Times are often given before the separator "la" or after the preposition "lon" or after the transitive verb "lon". The adverb "kama" also allows a time indication. So your example is correct (But please with a dot at the end of the sentence.):

'mi moku kama e kala.'

Your sentence, on the other hand, is grammatically incorrect:

'mi moku pi tenpo kama e kala.'

"moku" is a noun here, since the separator "pi" is after "moku". However, there must be a transitive verb before the separator "e".

More information can be found in my lessons.
https://jan-lope.github.io/Toki_Pona_lessons_English/
pona!
jan Lope
https://jan-lope.github.io
(Lessons and the Toki Pona Parser - A tool for spelling, grammar check and ambiguity check of Toki Pona)

On my foe list are the sockpuppets janKipo and janSilipu because of permanent spamming.
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janTepanNetaPelin
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Re: Adverbs, Auxiliary Verbs, Verbs

Post by janTepanNetaPelin »

toki!

Whereas any content word can be used as a noun/verb/adjective/adverb, only a few can become auxiliary verbs, and only a few can become prepositions.

The ones that are allowed are listed as such in the official dictionary. I have to admit though, that I use "pini" as an auxiliary verb, even though it is not listed as such.

mi kama sona - I learn
mi awen sona - I remember
mi pini sona - I forget

("pini" seems to fill a gap here.)

I could imagine to fill a gap with "ante" as a preposition, too. That is because "ante" is the opposite of "sama", and "sama" is a preposition. But I try to restrain myself. :D
There are too many rogue prepositions out there that make the possibilities of how a toki pona sentence can be parsed explode.

In general, though, it seems that many possible content word usages are missing in the official dictionary. For example "kiwen" is listed only as a noun ("hard object" and the like), but its modifier meaning "hard" is missing. (Other words like "luka" could have a modifier meaning like "touching", too.)

"kiwen e" means "to harden something" (or "to apply/give hard objects to something", which I would formulate as "pana e kiwen tawa"). So your usage of "mi kiwen e tomo" is correct. :)

I wouldn't use "kiwen" in the sense of "stone-like", because that's a metaphor, and the implied "sama" has been dropped. I try to be more direct, and pona - hopefully. I would say: "mi awen lukin e tomo". But, your "lukin kiwen" is not against the rules. (I want to add that pre-pu people - from before 2014 - might tell you that "lukin kiwen" means "to look like a stone" and that "lukin kiwen e" means "to make something look like a stone".)

"kiwen" as an auxiliary verb could work if "mi kiwen tawa" can be expanded to something like "mi kiwen e ni: mi tawa". As a parallel:

"mi ken e ni: mi lape."
-> "mi ken lape."

But what would it mean to harden to go? Perhaps what you said, to stiffen one's walking. But as I said, giving every content word the status of an auxiliary verb is not an option.

Back to "pini" and "kama" for past and future: yeah... that makes sense. "pi tenpo pini" and "pi tenpo kama" become "pini" and "kama", for example in:

"sike suno pini" - "last year"
"sike suno kama" - "next year"

So "mi moku lon tenpo pini" if turned into "mi moku pi tenpo pini" could turn into "mi moku pini" - "I ate". I don't know if you are the first one to say that. It seems actually viable to me, from a grammatical point of view. I still wouldn't use this trick, though, because adding or removing a "lon tenpo pini" at the end of a sentence (or "tenpo pini la" at the beginning) is easier (and something that I still want to do, since I want to see Toki Pona sentences as basically tense-less) than making a "pini" fit in next to the verb, and things could become cluttered when "pini" or "kama" is used as an auxiliary verb:

"mi kama sona pini e toki pona."

Hm, now I can see another reason why not to use such a structure: it could be read as "I learned how to end Toki Pona". So "pi tenpo pini" would be safer:

"mi kama sona pi tenpo pini e toki pona."

Still, I would want to isolate "tenpo pini" or leave it all together.

mi tawa.
https://github.com/stefichjo/toki-pona (mi sitelen e lipu ni pi toki pona)
mi jan Tepan. mi pu. mi weka e jan nasa Kipo e jan nasa Lope.
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jan_Lope
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Re: Adverbs, Auxiliary Verbs, Verbs

Post by jan_Lope »

janTepanNetaPelin wrote: So "mi moku lon tenpo pini" if turned into "mi moku pi tenpo pini" could turn into "mi moku pini" - "I ate".
pona!

But "mi moku pi tenpo pini." means "I'm old food." "moku" can only be a noun here. "mi moku lon tenpo pini." and "mi moku pini." can mean the same. But it can mean "I ate." also. (Why do many people forget punctuation marks?)

BTW: Here is more grammatical background about adverbs, auxiliary verbs, verbs:
https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https:// ... 0000000000
pona!
jan Lope
https://jan-lope.github.io
(Lessons and the Toki Pona Parser - A tool for spelling, grammar check and ambiguity check of Toki Pona)

On my foe list are the sockpuppets janKipo and janSilipu because of permanent spamming.
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