About Toki Pona
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Minimalism
Toki Pona is a simple, complete language I created in 2001 in a personal quest
to understand the meaning of life in just 120 words. It draws on universal
patterns from dozens of languages I studied.
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Rapid growth
Today, there are
tens of thousands of community members. The core vocabulary ranges from
120 to 140 words, depending on the speaker or metric used.
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Popularity
Toki Pona is among
the
most successful constructed languages,
second only to Esperanto by most metrics, and surpassing it among the
younger generation.
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International auxiliary language (IAL)
Toki Pona: a Small World Language compares Toki Pona to
Esperanto and clarifies common misconceptions. Although Toki Pona wasn’t
proposed as an IAL, it has grown
into a language with a global community.
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University recognition
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Official status
In 2022, ISO 639-3 adopted the code
‘tok’ for Toki
Pona, officially recognizing it as a world language.
—Sonja Lang
Intro videos
Communities
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(thriving home of Toki Pona)
World map:
Telegram
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r/tokipona
(a lot of creative sharing, but sometimes dominated by beginners)
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Mastodon:
toki.social
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Facebook:
toki pona
(stagnating but some people still use)
Recent Bluesky post
Learn Toki Pona
Merch
Videos, music, podcasts, games
See also: music, videos, podcasts, games, audiobooks, dubs
Texts and publications
See also: literature, books, comics, magazines, poetry, and corpuses
Community-made toolbox
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o sitelen pona e mi! (name glyph chooser)
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toki tenpo (time talk), an example of a system for time terminology
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long-form semantic spaces dictionary
by lipamanka
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CEFR proficiency level scale for Toki Pona
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ilo Muni,
explore trends in Toki Pona word use
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telo misikeke (grammar checker)
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printable Toki Pona quick reference
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luka pona (sign language)
- lipu pi jan Ne
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sike pona pi toki pona (prev,
next)
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lipu sona pona (free Toki Pona course
available in German, Esperanto, Russian, Portuguese, Polish,
Spanish, etc.)
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Cheat Sheet, updated by jan Sa (also available in
many other languages)
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nasin toki pona—a good way to speak, a grammar reference by jan Juli
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lipu Linku, an independent
dictionary put together by kala Asi
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lipu nimi, a simple dictionary based on free ku data
Find a translator
Need a text translated or proofread? I highly recommend the
freelance work of:
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jan Sonja:
(French and
Esperanto also)
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jan Tepan:
(German also)
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jan Ke Tami:
(German also)
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jan Ne:
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jan Apikela:
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jan Tepo:
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jan Pensa:
(Esperanto
also)
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jan Kekan San:
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jan Sepulon:
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jan Polijan:
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jan Asiku:
There are many more competent Toki Pona writers and speakers you can
find! The ones listed above have been vetted through an anonymous
evaluation process.
In the news
Read about Toki Pona in
World Literature Today,
NY Times,
Gizmodo, Radio-Canada,
Business Insider,
The Guardian, Wikipedia,
TV Tropes, The Globe and Mail,
The New Yorker,
ساسة بوست, and
more.
Other conlangs
-
LCS: a society that promotes
and supports conlang creation