This post is about kot wawa, a conlang of mine. When I was first learning toki pona, one of the guides I read was this thing: GitHub - kilipan/nasin-toki: mi pana sona pi nasin toki mi lon lipu ni. It gave me a lot of insight into the grammatical mechanics of the language. Now, seeing it mentioned on this forum, I had another look through, and wrote up sort of a response post explaining kot wawa's differences to it. toki pona grammar guides like this one were sort of a checklist for me when I made Kot Wawa. For each kind of structure, I had to know how I would implement it in my language. In doing so, I managed to devise some tricks that I think brought elegance to it, like collapsing the prepositions class to just e, with adverbials to replace the others, and the pre-verbs to just two that can be combined with any content word to create one, and unifying "la", "taso", "a" and "kin" into the connectives class that allows any content word to be used to describe a whole sentence.
Anyway, I've broken this post down according to the structure in the guide, and stopped partway through, but still covered a lot of it.
general principles
implied politeness
Like toki pona, politeness is assumed by default.
os is taken to, by default, mean "should", so imperative statements can be read as factual statements "You should do ...".
And as advice or friendly suggestions, rather than orders.
no sentence-level recursion
kot wawa wasn't built to recurse, but it can. Do with this what you will. Remember, this language is designed to let you break things up into many sentences, so if a sentence is getting to combersome, break it up into pieces.
"I see people who walk to the house."
"mi lukin e jan ni: ona li tawa tomo"
can be
mí li lùki e ján dàu-tóm
"I see people who see me seeing them walk to the house"
"mi lukin e jan ni: ona li lukin e mi lon ni: mi lukin e ni: ona li tawa tomo"
mí li lùki e ján lùki-án lùki ìl-mí è-án dàu-tóm ìl-sɒ́
no single word for "and"
kot wawa follows the logic of repeating the appropriate particle (except in numbers).
no tense-marking
kot wawa also doesn't require marking of tense or aspect. For these things, like in toki pona, you use context phrases, pre-verbs or prepositional phrases.
There is a content word introduced for a specific aspect - dà for a past participle. I like to use it, but it's still not strictly required.
word types
particles
kot wawa has particles too. They're like connectives except they can have different grammatical rules.
Still, many of them have content word analogues.
pure particles
en still joins subjects together before li.
Kot Wawa also currently has pi ... en ... phrases, which it uses for numbers.
There is also content word èn, which means to be one of many things doing the same thing.
li - works like toki pona. Unlike a connective, repeating it works like an "and".
"lì" means "do".
li can be used to start a sentence. When it is, the verb that follows it has the same subject as that of the previous sentence.
e - still marks the direct object, and can be used to apply many to the one predicate.
However, there is now another way to apply a direct object. More on that in phrases.
è means "to happen to".
la is not a particle but in fact a connective, because it follows the default grammatical rules for connectives.
là - to be a context in which the object exists or happens.
pi - performs its function in toki pona of grouping words. Can't be said to mean "of" because modifiers aren't genitives in kot wawa.
When inflected into noun or verb form, it applies the noun/verb rolew to the whole phrase.
e.g.
táu mùt - "many travellers"
pí dàu mùt - "something that moves many times"
dàu mùt - "move many times"
bì dàu mùt - "do an action that moves in many different directions", e.g. broadcast a message or share food
kot wawa also has ip, which closes pi phrases.
o - split into two words: o and os.
o is the vocative.
ò - to be the thing the speaker is talking to or calling
os - the imerpative/optative marker, can be repeated to act as "and" like li.
òs - "should"
Like a connective, os can be reversed. This allows imperative statements to be marked at the end.
e.g. dàu so - "go."
unu is kot wawa's "anu". Made to be palindromic because the relation is commutative (I haven't applied this rule to all words in kot wawa, but I have for this one).
ùnu - to be something that will happen or exist if the object doesn't.
emoticle
a - is a connective in kot wawa.
à - to be something worth emphasizing
pseudo-particles
"nanpa" li weka tan kot wawa
"kin" - generalised into content word gìn - "to also happen"
"ala" - weka - replaced by the negation inflection.
"jan li tawa ala" → ján li gʉ̀ɻ
"jan ala li tawa" → ján àle li gʉ̀ɻ
"taso" - generalised into dàs - "to be the only one(s)".
The sense of "but" is used in the reversed connected form sat, literally "The only thing is ...".
content words
Like in toki pona, content words are the default in kot wawa.
They can be inflected into three different forms - noun (mók), verb (mòk) and connective/alternative (mok).
Even many particles have parallel content words that can be used in the noun and verb forms.
pronouns
mí, sína, ní, nɒ́, sɒ́
First of all, kot wawa has no grammatical privileges for pronouns. "mí" and "sína" must come with "li" when being used as subjects.
Instead of ona (them), kot wawa has nɒ́ (that), as an analogue to ní rather than to "mí" and "sína".
ján nɒ̀ ("that person") can be used to refer to a third "person" like ona would be.
sɒ́ is a reflexive pronoun, and refers to the subject of the word its an object of, or the subject of the overall sentence, or the subject of any of the words connecting the two.
sɒ́ ànt means "each other".
ján nɒ̀ li bàna e pán zùwi ip dàu-pi sɒ́ ànt. - "They gave each other cakes."
prepositions
kot wawa has no words that grammatically behave like a toki pona preposition, except e.
lon, tawa, tan, sama, and kepeken all exist as regular content words, as
lòn, dàu, dàn, zàm, and bèke, respectively.
The direct object of these words is what would serve as the prepositional object in toki pona.
mí li dàu-tóm - "mi tawa tomo"
Note, this makes use of e contradict toki pona usage:
mí li dàu e tóm dàu - "mi tawa tomo tawa"
to say mi tawa e telo tawa sína you'd make the causation explicit, e.g. with nàt:
mi li nàt-án dàu-sína ìl-télo (= télo li dàu-sína dàn-mí)
Because they are regular content words, these words don't automaticly absorb a whole phrase. So you use pi:
mí li dàu-tóm lòn-pi tém nì - "mi tawa tomo lon tenpo ni"
kot wawa allows you to use other content words in the same way, e.g.
ján nɒ̀ li bàl ìsan-ní - "They work this way." - "ona li pali kepeken nasin ni"
preverbs
kot wawa has just two pre-verbs: àn and ʉ̀ŋ.
àn means to be a/the act of doing the verb phrase that follows it.
ʉ̀ŋ is its negation, and means to not be the act of doing the verb phrase.
It can be nominalised, e.g.
án bàl - "work"
án zòn - "knowledge"
án bàl li bàna-án zòn - "work brings knowledge" - "pali li pana e sona".
That nominalised form can be applied to verbs to create a pre-verb like meaning to it.
e.g.
mí li wìl-án mòk - "I want eating", i.e. "I want to eat", i.e. "I'm hungry."
sína li gèn-án jò-ní - "You can do some having of this," i.e. "You can have this."
mí li àlas-án bàl-póki - "I'm hunting the act of making a box," - "I'm trying to make a box."
question word
zèm is kot wawa's version of seme.
It can be used as a noun or verb, or if you're creative, maybe even a connective.
sém li dàu - "Who's going?"
sína li zèm - "What are you doing?", "What are you?"
mí li wèn sem sína li dàu - (?)"What about me staying would make you go?"
loan words
kot wawa follows toki pona's principles for loan words, except
- once introduced to the conversation, a loan word can be used as a head word, rather than just a modifier, and
- the phonology of kot wawa is more flexible, so loanwords can more closely, if still not exactly, match the pronounciations of the original forms.
Generally, morphologically flexible word endings from the original language are discarded, sometimes making a clipped form of the original word.
Verb and noun inflections are put on by default.
e.g.
má ɰɒ̀s - "France"
má ə̀stɻɛili - "Australia"
má ə̀mɛɻək - "America"
bonus: quotations
kot wawa uses the nimisins te and to (as tɔ) for quotations.
mí li dòk-té ále li bòn tɔ lòn-pi tém mùt. - "mi toki e ni lon tenpo mute: ale li pona"
The tɔ is optional if it's clear the quote has come to an end.
mí li nòp-án dòk-té ále li bòn - "I like saying 'ale li pona'."
kót-mí li dè dàn-sém? - "The thing I said was 'why?'"
Verb/noun inflection goes on the te.
Or you can open with a quote with no te, and end it with a tɔ, and put the quotation on that:
ále li bòn tɔ́ li gòt-mí - "ale li pona,' is what I said."
basics
sentence structure
toki pona's basic sentence structure is
X li Y [e Z]
This structure exists in kot wawa, but it's possible to get more basic than that.
If Z is just one word, you can leave out the e:
X li Y-Z (by convention, I write a hyphen, or sometimes even remove the space betwen Y and Z.)
And just as the object is optional, so is the subject:
Y. This asserts that the predicate is being done by something to something. That's it.
Or you can simply say a noun to mention the concept of it:
X. by default, this doesn't assert anything. It's just a way to mention things or answer questions.
So you can have
sówel li mòk e kíl - "soweli li moku e kili", or
sówel li mòk-kíl (same), or
sówel li mòk - "soweli li moku e ijo", or
mòk e kíl - "ijo li moku e kili", or
mòk-kíl (same), or
mòk - "ijo li moku e ijo", or
sówel - "mi toki lon soweli"
With é, you can even drop the predicate:
sóweli li é-kíl - "soweli li pali e ijo tawa kili"
phrases
kot wawa uses the same broad semantic spaces as toki pona. It also combines them into phrases, but the rules are different.
There are two levels of phrase-building: application of nouns, and application of verbs.
Nouns bind more tightly than verbs. Applying a noun provides a direct object to the word it is applied to.
tóm-wás - "tomo waso"
This is not just a house of birdness, but tomo is defined to mean a structure that is home to its object.
A noun-compound can take another noun as an object, or be supplied as an object to another word, e.g.
mí li bàl-tóm-wás - "mi pali e tomo waso".
pál-tóm-wás - "birdhouse builder"
mí li dòk dàu-pál-tóm-wás - "mi toki tawa jan ni: ona li pali e tomo waso"
Dropping e for a single-word object or supplying an object to a preposition is just application of this rule.
The next level of modification is application of verbs.
tóm zùl - "tomo suli"
Each verb added applies to the first word in the sequence - the head word.
tóm lòi zùl mùt - "tomo loje zuli mute"
The head word and the modifying verbs can each have nouns applied to them.
tóm-wás lòi zùl mùt làp-mí - "many big red birdhouses made by me"
negation
The most natural way is to use the negation inflection. It takes some learning, but for me it's a fun part of the language.
e.g.
mí li ɟʉ̀ɰ - "mi pali ala"
negating a noun doesn't have the same effect as applying "ala" to it:
ʋʉ̀ŋ li lòn e tóm nì - "ijo li lon tomo ni. ona li jan ala"
instead you negate the verb and apply àle to the noun.
ján àle li ɰɛ̀ŋ e tóm nì - "jan ale li ni: ona li lon ala tomo ni", i.e. "jan ala li lon tomo ni".
sína li æ̀kʉɰ e wás zùl - "sina utala ala e waso suli"
ílo li ŋʉ̀k-án wàt e ján àle - "ilo li tawa e jan ala"
Another way is to use ɰɒ̀. This is lì ("do") with the negation inflection applied to it, and it can be used with án to function as a negating pre-verb.
mí li ɰɒ̀-án bàl - mi pala ala
mí li ɰɒ̀-án wìl-án dòk-án ɰɒ̀-na bèke-án ànt-kálam-ním - "mi wile ala toki e ala kepeken ante pi kalama nimi"
multiple modifiers
I've already described the two levels of modification and how they can be combined.
As for the order of modifiers.
Every noun-level modifier applies to the word just before it, so the order is important.
With verb-level modifiers, they all affect the head word of the phrase, so the order they go in has no effect on the meaning, but it still affects the focus.
sówel zùl bìmei - "dark big animal"
sówel bìmei zùl - "big dark animal"
In these constructions, there is sort of a core meaning and then an extra word bringing relatively new information that colours it.
sówel zùl bìmei is a big animal that happens to also be dark in colour.
sówel bìmei zùl is a dark animal that is large, perhaps unusually so for the kind of animal it is.
And kot wawa takes this further than that.
Nouns are agnet nouns of the verbs they are related to, so you can even swap the underlying verb of the head word with other verbs from the phrase.
súl zòwel bìmei - "a large thing that is an animal and dark in colour"
pímei zùl zòwel - "a large dark thing that is actaully an animal"
pi
Both kinds of modification can use pi.
pi starts a new phrase in the place of a single word.
tóm-pi wás zùl - "a house for large birds"
tóm pi wàlo lòi - "a house that is a reddish white"
tóm-pi wàs zùl wàlo lòi - "a house for large pink birds", e.g. "flamingo house"
In kot wawa, pi phrases can be nested.
tóm-pi wás pi mùt zùl - "a house for very many birds"
And they can be closed by ip.
tóm-pi wás zùl-ip wàlo lòi - "a pink house for large birds"
"no objects in phrases"
Hah! In kot wawa, you can only use e within a verb phrase. You can't use it in a subject, or an object, or a pi phrase.
But
- you can use it in the argument of a pre-verb, and that pre-verb can be nominalised and used anywhere a noun goes
e.g.
án bàl e tóm mùt li bòn- "It's good to build lots of houses."
mí li àlas-kíl wìl-án bàl e pán zùwi- "I'm looking for fruit to make a cake with."
and
2. you can use the parallel content word forms è and é anywhere a verb or noun will go
pál è-tóm li bòn - "House builders are good."
pál è-pi tóm mùt li bòn - "People who build lots of houses are good."
bàl la é-pi tóm wàlo en é-pi tóm lòi li ùtal e sɒ́ ànt- "During the construction, those doing the white houses and those doing the red houses fought each other."
how to use prepositions
X li Y [e Z] <prep> W becomes X li Y [e Z] <prep>-W, I guess, with W being a single unit of word.
This single unit can be a noun-compound, a pi-phrase, or just a single word.
X li <prep> Y can be either X li <prep> e Y or X li <prep>-Y.
e is the only word left that has retained toki pona's prepositional privileges.
kás li zùl dàn-án àwau-sún - "kasi li suli tan wawa suno"
mí li zàm-sína - "mi sama sina"
ján nɒ̀ li bèke-ílo - "ona li kepeken ilo"
These last two sentences apply the preposition to the subject directly, as in toki pona.
It is possible to apply them another way, by applying
mí li sám-sína - "I do it like you." - "mi pali e ijo sama sina"
ján nɒ̀ li péke-ílo - "They're using tools to do something." - "ona li pali e ijo kepeken ilo"
negation of prepositions
Since prepositions are just verbal modifiers, negation of them is just negation of verbal modifiers.
mí li ɰɛ̀ŋ-tóm - "mi lon ala tomo"
sówel li gʉ̀ɻ-kás - "soweli li tawa ala kasi"
Oh, also, the preposition-like particle e can be negated, with the form ɔ.
mí li lùki ɔ nási - "There's a way I'm not seeing"
mí li lùki ɔ sína - "I'm looking but I don't see you."
how to use preverbs
X li <preverb> Y [e Z] becomes X li V-án Y [e Z]
negation of preverbs
To get an equivalent effect, you negate the verb that takes the pre-verb as an object.
mí li ɻɒ̀ɰ-án dòk - "mi wile ala toki"
wás li gʉ̀ɲ-án zùl - "waso li kama ala suli"
You can also negate án itself. This then creates a reference to a case of not doing the action described.
mí li wìl-ʉ́ŋ dòk - "I want to do something other than talk."
how to say "and"
multiple subjects
X en Y li Z - same as toki pona
multiple predicates
X li Y li Z - same as toki pona, except it also applies to mí and sína.
multiple direct objects
Yep.
A li B e C e D. same as toki pona.
multiple prepostional phrases
Either
A li B <prep>-C <prep>-D with single word unit C and D, or
A li B pi <prep> C ip-pi <prep> D.
wás li mùs bèke-án wàwa-na bèke-kón - "waso li musi kepeken wawa kepeken kon."
ján Bìn li zàm e ján Bɒ̀p li zàm e ján Ɽìko. - "jan Pin li sama jan Po li sama jan Kiko."
ján Bìn li zàm e ján Bɒ̀p ip zàm-pi ján Ɽìko. - "jan Pin li sama jan Po sama jan Kiko."
in pi-phrases
To apply many pi-phrases to a word, separate them with ip pi.
tóm pi zùl nàsa ip pi wàlo lòi - "mi toki lon tomo. ona li suli nasa. ona li walo loje."
in combination
ján li bàl li bàkal e tóm e ílo ip lòn-má bèke-lúka - "The person builds things and breaks houses and tools in a field by means of their hands."
ján li bàl àn bàkal e tóm e ílo ip lòn-má bèke-lùka - "The person builds and in doing so breaks houses and tools in a field by means of their hands."
(experimental:) ján li pi bàl en bàkal ip e tóm e ílo ip lòn-má bèke-lúka - "The person builds and breaks both houses and tools in a field by means of their hands."
ján li bàl e tóm e ílo ip bèke-lúka li bàkal-nɒ́ lòn-má - "The person builds houses and tools using their hands and breaks them in a field."
questions
X ala X
kot wawa does this by juxtaposing a word against its negation, with the negated form in mid-tone.
e.g.
sówel lòi li mòk ɲæk e kíl - "soweli loje li moku ala moku e kili"
yes: mòk
no: ɲæ̀k
If the verb has an immediate object, you can attach it to either the questioned verb, or its negation.
sówel lòi li mòk ɲæk-kíl - (same)
sówel lòi li mòk-kíl ɲæk - (same)
Not just that, the mid-tone negative form can go anywhere a verbal modifier of the questioned word can go.
sówel lòi li mòk-kíl mùt ɲæk - "Do foxes often eat vegetables?"
I personally like to put the negative form at the end of the sentence whenever possible.
kíl li gàm tʉɲ-án zùl - "kili li kama ala kama suli"
kíl li gàm-án zùl-na tʉɲ - (same)
ján li bàna cʉŋʉ pi wàwa zùl e sík - "jan li pana ala pana pi wawa mute e sike"
ján li bàna pi wàwa zùl e sík ip cʉŋʉ - (same)
sówel xɛɻɔɰ li nàsi èkep-sína - "soweli ala soweli li nasin e sina"
generalisation: X unu Y
The X ala(X) pattern can be seen as an abbreviated form of a X unu Y question form.
To use it, you have the content word you want to question, and then somewhere in the position of a verbal modifier for it, you have "unu" and then the alternative you want offer in the mid tone.
sówel lòi li mòk-kíl unu luki - "Did the fox eat the vegetable or look at it?"
sówel unu jan li nàsi èkep-sína - "Was it an animal or a person that led you?"
anu seme
From the X unu Y pattern, we can derive unu sem - kot wawa's version of anu seme.
X li Y unu sem
má-sína li lɛ̀t unu sem- "ma sina li lete anu seme"
lɛ̀t. sat sún nìp li zèli à - "lete. taso suna pini li seli a"
seme
This word works the same, except it's marked for whether it's a noun form or verb form.
sém li dòk - "Who/what is talking?"
ján zèm li dòk - "Who is talking?"
ján nɒ̀ li zèm? - "ona li seme?"
dàu-tóm-sɒ́ - "ona li tawa tomo ona"
sína li lùki-sém - "What are you watching?"
lùki-wás - "I'm watching birds."
e wás - "Birds."
wás - "Birds."
"relative clauses"
In kot wawa, noun phrases are already relative clauses. But toki pona's "ni:" pattern can still be used when it would make more sense to break a sentence up.
e.g.
ján nì li bòn-mí: nɒ́ li màma-kás - "jan ni li pona tawa mi: ona li mama e kasi"
ján màma-kás li bòn-mí - (same)
You can also use the connective in to make it clear in speech that the ní refers to the following sentence.
ján nì li bòn-mi in nɒ́ li màma-kás - (same)
Other strategies for breaking up the sentence are still valid.
ján li màma-kás. nɒ́ li bòn-mí
ján li màma-kás la li bòn-mí
ján li an màma-kás la bòn-mí
sówel li lùki e wás dàu lòn-pi má-kás - "waso li tawa lon ma kasi. soweli li lukin e ona"
wás li dàu lòn-má-kás. li ìkul-sówel - (same)
wás li dàu lòn-má-kás ìkul-sówel - (effectively the same; now the animal is watching the flight rather than the bird.)
ordinals
kot wawa doesn't have nanpa. Ordinals have to be done more creatively.
tóm nì nol sína li ján lòn-pi tém zìm - "sina jan nanpa wan lon tomo ni"
ílo lòn-sím li bòn. ílo pi lòn-móns ə̀n ip dàn-móns-nɒ́ li ɟɛ̀ŋ - "ilo nanpa wan li pona. ilo nanpa tu tu li pona ala"
comparisons
It's like toki pona. Lots of words are naturally relative. Their relatity depends on context.
ján Ìpe li zùl. ján Zùnsi li lìli - "jan Ipe li suli. jan Sunsi li lili"
tóm-mí la tóm-sína li lòi zùl - "tomo mi la tomo sina li loje mute"
Superlatives can use nanpa wan
kót nì li bòn àl-ále - "This language is good no matter what", "This language is the best."
transitives
kot wawa takes a different approach to transitivisation to toki pona.
There is a rule that if X li Y e Z then X li Y.
Every verb comes with a passive form that has the meaning Z li Y' e X, so then Z li Y'.
Otherwise, it's generally designed to preserve the kinds of transformations in toki pona, though you sometimes it's clearer to add something to clarify yourself.
So then, X li Y e Z can mean
- some sense already baked into the definition of the verb
e.g.mí li tóm e ílo íns-mí- "I am a home for my internal organs" XcausesZto beY'
mí li nòp e tóm- "mi pona e tomo" - "I make the house good"mí li mòt-wás- "mi tomo e waso" - "I turn the bird into a house."
XappliesYtoZ
mí li lùka e sówel nèl- "I pet the hidden dog."mí li lùka e sówel lèn- "I hit the plush toy."mí li dòm-wás- "I house the bird" as in "I put the bird into the house."
interjections
Some things that are interjections in toki pona, are well-formed sentences in kot wawa.
bòn à - "It's so nice!"
dàn-sém a - "Why is it?"
à - "That's really something."
wàwa dàu-sína - "There is strength going to you."
Some are nominal sentences - mentioning a concept
wás zùwi - "Cute bird"
in-depth
more info on sentence structure
So it's something like this:
[Cn]* [(NP|VP Cn)]* [(NP [en NP]*|VP)] [li VP]* [Cn]*
NP := (N[-N]* [AdVP]*|<prenoun> VP)
VP := AdvP [AdvP|e NP]*
AdvP := [<preverb>]? V[-N]*
Edit: 2024-11-05: corrected some formatting and translations.