FAQ
The grammar seems very simple. Am I overlooking something?
✅ It is simple! You do not need to learn a lot of rules to be able to say a lot. More bang for your buck.
How many tones are there?
✅ 7 full tones and 1 neutral tone.
What does tone X do?
✅ See the following table:
# Name Mark Creates/Used with 1️⃣ Even tone :t1: compound 2️⃣ Rising tone :t2: argument phrase 3️⃣ Rising glottal tone :t3: relative clause 4️⃣ Falling tone :t4: predicate phrase 5️⃣ Rising-falling tone :t5: content clause 6️⃣ Low tone :t6: preposition 7️⃣ Low glottal tone :t7: adverbial phrase 8️⃣ Neutral tone :t8: particle
How do you pronounce X?
✅ Please refer to this tool: http://toaq.org/letters/
Is there a way to check whether my sentence is correct?
✅ Yes, using one of the online parsers:
If you're on Discord or Telegram, you can also use the %miu command to talk to the parser bot.
How do I type the tone marks/symbols/diacritics?
✅ Please see http://www.toaq.org/#autohotkey and https://github.com/acotis/autokey-toaq-tones
Where does the Toaq logo come from?
✅ It's original.
Is "Toaq" based on the word "tongue" or "tone"?
✅ It is not, in fact. But that's an interesting coincidence. Might be a good mnemonic.
How are roots created?
✅ A priori, based on my intuition. I usually have to think long and hard and feel my options out before I decide what root to assign to a concept.
Where can I find a dictionary?
✅ Here: http://www.toaq.org/dictionary/ and here: https://uakci.pl/toadua/#. The latter is a collaborative dictionary to which everyone can contribute.
How do I answer a yes/no question in Toaq?
✅ In ascending order of verbosity and formality:
Yes No jẽo bũ Jẻo hóq da. Bủ hóq da.
Is Toaq easy/difficult/hard?
✅ If you can handle the tones, which I believe anyone can, then it's really not a difficult language to become decent at.
X seems to be missing from the language. Why does Toaq not have X?
✅ Part of the philosophy behind the initial design was that I didn't want to over-engineer the language. Lojban (to name a random example) started out with a boatload of complicated rules that turned out not to be beneficial. I would rather start out with too few rules and only add extensions when it's clearly needed, avoiding clutter. In doing so, I'm also giving the language the chance to grow organically with the help of its speakers.
Is there really a glottal stop in the ã-tone?
✅ Yes.
How new/old is Toaq?
✅ The current version was published in September 2017. The very first version alpha version was published in 2013.
What's the difference between ceo and sho?
✅ sho means something undergoes a change such that it ends up satisfying the second place.
ceo says that a thing begins to be the case, which can be said of things that don't priorly exist or are the case. sho on the other hand can be said of things that already exist; they merely undergo a change that makes them become such that they now have a certain property they previously did not. Both are appropriate in most situations.
What's the process for creating taxonomic vocabulary (animals/plants)?
✅ The process follows these steps:
- Find the scientific name of the animal or plant
- Let's use butterfly and spider as examples.
- Check the etymology of the name.
- For "butterfly" the order is called "Lepidoptera", for "spider" we get "Araneae"
- If the name is a compound, make a calque of the compound.
- This is the case for "Lepidoptera", which is put together from λεπίς (lepís, "scale") and πτερόν (pterón, "wing").
Translating "scale wing", we arrive at the Toaq word for butterfly: tiqshōaı.
- If the name is not a compound, follow the etymology as far back as possible, then borrow that word.*
- This is the case for "Araneae", which can be traced back to Ancient Greek ἀράχνη (arákhnē). Toaq-ifying yields arānē, which is our word for spider.
What's the vowel order?
✅ A U I O E Y
How can I join the discord server?
✅ Use this invite link: https://discord.gg/qDqDsH9
How can I join the Telegram groups?
✅ Use these invite links:
- ☑ general
- https://t.me/joinchat/CWpuWUMl0JeW7-TdO6PnAQ
- ☑ chiejio
- https://t.me/joinchat/CWpuWUPKUdAiT7KR6SiE7w
- ☑ toaq-only
- https://t.me/joinchat/CWpuWUSC9pqnzPyufkQsrA
- ☑ toashuaq
- https://t.me/joinchat/CWpuWUvrHSdLL3JneDjp9Q
- ☑ off-topic
- https://t.me/joinchat/CWpuWVJC8_-EMukIAjMfYQ
What's a tonal pangram?
✅ In the broadest sense, a tonal pangram is a sentence that contains each tone at least once. In a more narrow sense, it is a sentence that contains each tone exactly once. The latter is a form of Toaq poetry.
What's the terminator of X?
✅ Please refer to this table:
Structure Terminator mı ga po ga mo teo kıo kı lu ceı prenex bı / pa statement na
Is there an automatic interpreter of Toaq? Is there a translator from Toaq to logic notation?
✅ Indeed there is! Go to http://toaq.herokuapp.com/, hit the blue button, then select LOGIC.
How do you say "I'm making some coffee" in Toaq?
✅ 404
What does ku ("focus") mean?
✅ Here's an explanation: https://toaqlanguage.wordpress.com/2018/06/01/on-the-logic-of-ku/
Is there a way to mark contrastive focus or emphasis?
✅ Yes, by using beı in front the word.
What's the system for referring to nationalities/languages/countries?
✅ This is the system: Take the country's native name or the native adjective describing the nationality and borrow it. This borrowing now refers generically to anything having to do with the country or its culture.
- For example, Juqgūo ("China") means "to be Chinese, to be of China, its languages or people".
- Farāqsē means "French".
To refer more specifically to the country, add gua ("country").
- Juqgūogūa, "China".
- Farāqsēgūa, "France".
To refer to a language, add toaq ("language").
- Farāqsētōaq, "the French language".
- Juqgūotōaq is ambiguous between the many languages of China, "a Chinese language".
What are the numbers from 1 to 10?
✅ They are as follows:
1⃣ shı 2⃣ gu 3⃣ saq 4⃣ jo 5⃣ fe 6⃣ cı 7⃣ dıaı 8⃣ roaı 9⃣ neı 1⃣0⃣ heı
What are the numbers from 20 to 99?
✅ They are as follows:
20 = guhēı 30 = saqhēı 40 = johēı 50 = fehēı 60 = cıhēı 70 = dıaıhēı 80 = roaıhēı 90 = neıhēı 21 = guhēıshī 34 = saqhēıjō 83 = roaıhēısāq
What's with the ı / i without dot / dotless i?
✅ Writing ı without the dot distinguishes it more from an i that carries a tone mark, it also makes more room for an adjacent tone mark. Overall, it just makes things easier to read.
How do I do an indirect quote?
✅ Use lû or the fifth tone (:t5: tone) on a predicate and use it with ruaq or duatūa for indirect assertions and duasue for indirect questions: Examples:
- Rủaq hó bû tỉ hó chíejīo "She says [that] she isn't at school."
- Dủatūa hó jí tî hó hı ráı "He told me where he is."
- Dủasūe hó jí bûa jí hı ráı "They asked me where I live."
Is there a memrise deck?
✅ There is: https://www.memrise.com/course/1974691/toaq-simple-predicates-2018-06-03/
Is there a frequency list?
✅ Why yes! Look here: http://toaq.org/chatlogs/frequencylist.txt Newer frequency list (2019/02/02): https://gist.githubusercontent.com/ciuak/d233979c99f83017158e8b97fbbda8f9/raw/f09ec94dc01f3a9cd017f744639f874494d7e451/freqlist-2019-02.txt
What is the meaning of an m with a tone mark?
✅ If you see an m with a tone mark, chances are it's used as an interjection of sorts. We're still experimenting with it. One suggestion was the following:
m̄ > uhm, thinking... ḿ > huh?, wonder, surprise m̌ > yeah, agreement m̉ > roger, gotcha, ok m̂ > aha!, discovery m̀ > slight disappointment m̃ > no, disagreement
Is there a list of translated sentences?
✅ We are working on it! See: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bCQoaX02ZyaElHiiMcKHFemO4eV1MEYmYloYZgOAhac/edit#gid=1395088029
Is there a subreddit?
✅ Yes: https://old.reddit.com/r/Toaq/
What's the hashtag?
✅ We're using #miToaq for now.
What are the personal pronouns?
✅ Toaq's 'pronouns' are verbs. Instead of a word for "I/me", there's a verb meaning "to be me". These are the personal reference predicates:
jı "to be me", jí "I" suq "to be you", súq "you" ho "to be him/her/them", hó "he/she/they" maq "to be it (the object)", máq "it" hoq "to be it (the situation)", hóq "it" suqjī "to be us (you + me)", súqjī "we" suqhō "to be you (you + him/her/them)", súqhō "you"
súq, hó, máq and hóq can be singular or plural. When necessary, plurality can be expressed by using puq (e.g. púq hỏ "they").
How do you make a plural? How do you pluralize a noun?
✅ Toaq nouns are not inflected for grammatical number. Any noun can refer to one or more things. When necessary, singular and plural can be made explicit:
- To specify a singular, use shı ("one") as the head of a serial predicate.
- Example: shí jỉo "the [one] building" (explicit singular)
- To specify a plural, use puq ("multiple") as the head of a serial predicate.
- Example: púq jỉo "the [more than one] buildings" (explicit plural).
Marking number is never required. It is usually obvious (or not terribly important) whether something is one thing or more than one thing. When in doubt, read a bare noun as plural unless context suggests otherwise.
Why do I sometimes see words ending with consonants other than q? / What is vietoaq? / What are these weird word shapes?
✅ Vietoaq is a way of encoding tones without diacritics. Each tone is marked via a specific consonant at the end of a syllable. For closed syllables (q in the coda), the voiced equivalent of the same consonant is used.
- See
- https://uakci.pl/wiki/vietoaq
- Lıq's Vietoaq practice tool
- http://foldr.moe/vietoaq/
Why are some tones missing from this text and some are not? Sparse tonal marking
✅ It was discovered that it's possible to write Toaq without explicitly distinguishing :t1:, :t4: and :t8:. Each of those three tones can be written as a diacritic-less syllable and the tone of the syllable can be deduced by the following rules:
- If the syllable is not the first syllable of a space-separated block, it carries the :t1: tone.
- If the syllable is a contentive (predicate word / root word), it carries the :t4: tone.
- If the syllable is a particle, it carries the :t8: tone.
Examples:
- Kaı jí da -> Kảı jí da ("I write")
- Kaqgaı súq hı ráı moq -> Kảqgāı súq hı ráı moq ("What do you see?")
- De ní rua -> Dẻ ní rủa ("This flower is beautiful")
As long as the text retains spaces between words, it remains fully unambiguous. This style can be seen as a less formal way of writing, useful if one is lazy or if one doesn't have easy access to :t1: and :t4: diacritics on one's input device.
What does it mean when a function word is written in all caps? / What function word classes are there?
✅ In discussions about Toaq grammar, a function word in all caps usually refers to a function word class. Function words that share the same grammar are grouped together in a class. This class is usually named after its most prominent member. For example, the words da, ba, ka and moq have the same grammar, and their class is named DA. We say, for instance, that "moq is in DA".
Knowing these classes is useful, because once you have learned how to use one member of a class, you automatically know how to use every other member of the same class, too (syntactically speaking). If a sentence is grammatically correct with one member of a class, then substituting it with any other member of the same class will retain the same grammatical structure. The grammar does not distinguish between individual members of a class.
These are the classes and their members:
- DA (da, ba, ka, moq)
- SA (sa, sıa, tu, ja, ke, hı, co, baq, hoı)
- RU (ru, ra, ro, rı, roı)
- TO (to)
- LU (lu, lı, ma, tıo)
- JE (je, keo, tıu)
- BI (bı, pa)
- PO (po, jeı)
- JU (ju, la)
- GO (go, cu, ta)
- KU (ku, beı)
- HU (hu)
- KIO (kıo)
- KI (kı)
- MI (mı)
- MO (mo)
- TEO (teo)
- SHU (shu)
- NA (na)
- GA (ga)
- CEI (ceı)
What's up with the letter ⟨q⟩ in this language? Pronunciation / allophones of ⟨q⟩
✅ ⟨q⟩ is somewhat special and its pronunciation may not be immediately obvious. It is usually pronounced like English ⟨ng⟩ (IPA [ŋ]), but it has the optional allophones [n] and [m], following these rules:
- The default pronunciation is IPA [ŋ], and it keeps this pronunciation before k, g, l, m, n, r, f, h, s, sh, and at the end of a breath group.
- Before t, d, c, ch, j, it is pronounced [n].
- Before p, b, it is pronounced [m].
- Examples:
- kaqgaı -> [kʰaŋ.gaɪ] ("to see")
- jaq de -> [d͡ʑan.dɛ:] ("to be very beautiful")
- baq bego -> [bam.bɛ.go] ("beech trees in general")
Again, these allophones are optional; it is acceptable to use [ŋ] in all positions.
What are the words for the days of the week and for the months?
✅ The names for the days of the week are based on the colors of the rainbow, starting with red on Monday and ending with purple on Sunday:
- Mon
- kıachāq
- Tue
- narāqchāq
- Wed
- luechāq
- Thu
- riqchāq
- Fri
- kuaochāq
- Sat
- miochāq
- Sun
- loachāq
The months use compounds of the number of the month + jūe ("month"):
- January
- shıjūe
- February
- gujūe
- March. saqjūe
- April
- jojūe
- May
- fejūe
- June
- cıjūe
- July
- dıaıjūe
- August
- roaıjūe
- September
- neıjūe
- October
- heıjūe
- November
- heıshījūe
- December
- heıgūjūe
What's the difference between an indirect question and a "lú" phrase?
✅ The distinction is extremely important logically speaking, but English usually conflates the two, so many people overlook the difference. The following example illustrates the difference:
- 1) Dủa jí chî súq hı rảı - I know what you believe
- 2) Dủa jí lú chỉ súq hóa - I know what you believe
Let's say that what you believe is [God exists].
- 1) says that I know that you believe [God exists], because I know what it is that you believe
- 2) says that I know [God exists], because I know that which you believe.
Does Toaq have a flag?
✅ This is a candidate design:
