Appendix:Toki Pona/la

Toki Pona

la in sitelen pona

Etymology

Unknown. Possibly from Acadian French -la (“proximal and topical suffix”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /la/

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -a

Particle

la

1. Follows a context phrase or clause
   1. Used to form conditionals; so; therefore

      mi ken ala toki pona e ijo la mi sona ala e ijo.

      If I can't express a thing in Toki Pona, I don't understand that thing.

   2. Used to express tense-like or adverb-like information

      tenpo kama la… ― In the coming time…

      ken la… ― Maybe…

      pona la… ― Happily…

   3. Moves a prepositional phrase to the start of a sentence, either preserving or replacing the preposition

      (lon) tenpo lili la… ― In a short time…

      (tawa) mi la… ― To me…

      (tan) seme la… ― For what reason…

Usage notes

• In the Latin script, la is often preceded or followed by a comma to increase legibility.
• As conjunctions, kin and taso are often used without la, despite also being sentence-initial.