World Language

World Language is a universial auxiliary language created in 2022-2026 by Atmano. It has a simple phonology, its words are not inflected and its vocabulary is derived from a wide range of language across the globe.

Alphabet

A a B b D d E e G g H h I i K k L l M m N n O o P p R r S s T t U u W w Y y

C, f, j, q, v, x, z and others occur in proper nouns. They are pronounced as in the source language.

Phonology

Vowels

There are 5 vowels. There are no diphthongs. When two vowels are written next to each other they belong to separate syllables. The vowel combinations ai and au occur in the language. They can be pronounced separately /a.i/, /a.u/ or as diphthongs /aj/, /aw/. The vowels have the following IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) values:

	Front	Back
Close	i [i]	u [u]
Mid	e [e̞]	o [o̞]
Open	a [ɐ~a]

Common vowel allophones:

a ≈ [a] [ɑ] [ʌ] like English TRAP or PALM or STRUT

e ≈ [e] [ɛ] like English DRESS

i ≈ [ɪ] like English FLEECE

u ≈ [ʊ] [ʉ] [ɯ] like English GOOSE or FOOT

o ≈ [o] [ɔ] like English THOUGHT

Consonants

The 14 consonants have the following IPA values:

	Bilabial		(Denti-) Alveolar		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Nasal	m [m]		n [n]
Plosive	p [pʰ]	b [b]	t [t̪ʰ]	d [d̪]			k [kʰ]	g [ɡ]
Fricative			s [s]						h [h]
Trill			r [r]
Approximant	w [w]		l [l]		y [j]

• The letter h can be silent and simply mark a syllable boundary (hiatus) between vowels. This is its primary function in the language, e.g. wahe [ˈwɐ.he̞] ~ [ˈwɐ.e̞], sakiti-hala [sɐˈ.ki.tiˌ.hɐ.la] ~ [sɐˈ.ki.tiˌ.ɐ.la]. The are no minimal pairs that are distinguished only by the presence or absence of h.
• There are no r/l minimal pairs which means that failing to produce different sounds for these letters cannot lead to misunderstanding due to the swapping of r and l, e.g. because the word kara ’to do’ exists, a word like *kala is not allowed in the language.

Common consonant allophones:

p ≈ [p] like English PIT

b ≈ [b̥] like English BIT

t ≈ [tʰ] [t] like English TIME

d ≈ [d] [d̥] like English DIME

k ≈ [k] like English COAT

g ≈ [g̥] like English GOAT

s ≈ [s̪] like English SIP

h ≈ [ɦ] [x] [ç] [Ø] like English HIP

l ≈ [ɫ] like English LOW

r ≈ [r] [ɹ] [ʀ] like English ROW or LETTER

w ≈ [ʋ] [v] like English WELL

y ≈ [ʝ] like English YELL

m none like English MOON

n ≈ [n̪] like English NOON; [ŋ] before k/g like English SINK and FINGER

Syllable Structure

The following syllable structures are allowed: (C= consonant, V = vowel)

V i ’and’

CV pu ’tree; wood’

CVC sim.ba ’lion’

The initial consonant can be any of the consonants. The final consonant cannot be h. Not all consonant clusters are allowed to form between syllable boundaries. If you cannot pronounce any given consonants cluster insert a very short i sound between the consonants.

Typical consonant clusters include: mp mb nt nd nk ng sk sp st ks ps ts rm lm rn ln rk lk rk lp rp lt rt ls ns (rs)

Word Stress

The stress falls on the second to last syllable (penultimate stress). In other words, stress the last vowel that is followed by a consonant, e.g. mana, gaskiya, sokolate. Note however that stress is not phonemic so misplacing the stress never changes the meaning of a word.

Morphology

Words are not inflected but adpositions, adverbs and grammatical markers are used instead of inflection.

Nouns

Nouns can be identical in singular and plural. There is no grammatical gender, case or definite/indefinite forms.

• adamu ’man, men’

• kota ’house, houses’

If necessary a word can be pluralized by compounding. If the noun refers to a person the plural is formed by adding the word loka ’people’ after the word. For other words the word samu ’group’ is used. Note that this word is only added to one word per phrase.

• adamu-loka ’men’ lit. men-folk

• kota-samu ’houses’ lit. house-group

• hada-samu kota ’those houses’ lit. that-group house

• or hada kota-samu ’those houses’ lit. that house-group (Samu and loka should not be repeated: hada-samu kota-samu)

While definiteness is not regularly marked the definiteness or indefiniteness of something can be shown (when absolutely necessary) with the word eka ’one’ and hada ’that, those’. Especially for uncountable nouns the word neho ’some’ can be used.

• eka kota ’one house’; ’a house’; ’some house’

• hada kota ’that house’, ’the house’

• neho kawa ’some coffee’

Adjectives

The language uses a concept taken from Persian that’s called ezafe in Persian but a more appropriate name for it in this context would be yazafe. Adjectives (including possessive adjective such as my) are attached to the head noun with the adposition ya ’of’ which they follow. The possessive pronoun comes last. kota ya dai ya kirmisi ya mana ’my big red house’ house YAZ day YAZ red YAZ Sg1

Comparison is formed by placing the word po ’-er’ or en ’-est’ before an adjective. Nothing can come between po/en and the adjective and the markers can even be hyphenated. dai ’big’ po dai ’bigger’ = po-dai en dai ’biggest’ = en-dai

Adverbs There is a small number of independent adverbs but most adverbs are formed from nouns and adjectives with the prefix bi-. These adverbs can denote manner, time or instrument. hamise ’eternal’ > bi-hamise ’forever’ haraka ’hurry’ > bi-haraka ’quickly; fast’ erte ’morning’ > bi-erte ’in the morning’ kalamu ’pencil, pen’ > bi-kalamu ’with a pen’ busi ’bus’ > bi-busi ’by bus’

Independent adverbs include: indi now, anda then, baragi almost, hidihari today, mono only etc.

Adverb comparison works just like adjective comparison: bi-haraka ’fast’ po bi-haraka ’faster’ en bi-haraka ’fastest’

Pronouns Personal Sg 1 mana I, me, my 2 sina you, your (sg) 3 una he, him, his; she, her; it, its Pl 1 mana-loka we, us, our 2 sina-loka you all, your (pl) 3human una-loka they, them, their (people only) 3nonhuman una-samu they, them, their (other than people)

Demonstrative Proximal Distal Sg hidi hada this, (these) that, (those) Pl hidi-samu hada-samu these those

Reflexive itse self, -self, oneself Reciprocal eka-kitu each other, one another Relative ku that, which

Correlatives Correlatives are related words that are formed by changing vowels, prefixing and suffixing. The vowel u is used for questions (with k(u)- prefix), i is used for proximal and a for distal reference. The affixes wisu- every- , ne- no- and -wela any-/-ever are used to form compound words based on the question words.

ku ku-manu ya ku(-manu) kuku iki aka 1) what, which who whose where here there 2) who

hidi hada kusu isi asa this that how like this so, like that

kundu indi anda when now then

kusu boho isi boho asa boho kusu eski how much, how many this much/many that much/many how old

kuhudu loye (ya) hidi loye (ya) hada loye (ya) what kind this kind that kind, such

wisu-manu wisu-ku wisu-kundu etc. everyone everything always ne-manu ne-ku ne-kundu etc. no one nothing never manu-wela ku-wela kundu-wela etc. whoever whatever whenever anyone anything anytime

Quantifiers & Numerals

pari a few, a couple boho many, much, a lot kitsi a little po boho more (= po-boho) neho some, any en boho most (= en-boho) kitu (an)other, else wisu all, every, each

0 sero 1 eka 11 desi-eka 2 du 12 desi-du 20 dudesi 3 tini 13 desi-tini 30 tinidesi 4 keturi 14 desi-keturi 40 keturidesi 5 penki 15 desi-penki 50 penkidesi 6 sesi 16 desi-sesi 60 sesidesi 7 seti 17 desi-seti 70 setidesi 8 asti 18 desi-asti 80 astidesi 9 nau 19 desi-nau 90 naudesi 10 desi 100 sata 1000 tusanti

Ordinal numbers are formed by putting any numeral in the yazafe construction, e.g. hari ya eka the first day (lit. day YAZ one).

Weekdays and months are based on numerals: eka-hari Monday eka-menese Jan seti-menese Jul du-hari Tuesday du-menese Feb asti-menese Aug tini-hari Wednesday tini-menese Mar nau-menese Sep keturi-hari Thursday keturi-menese Apr desi-menese Oct penki-hari Friday penki-menese May desi-eka-menese Nov sesi-hari Saturday sesi-menese Jun desi-du-menese Dec seti-hari Sunday; week Verbs Verbs can be modified by adverbs. The unmarked forms can be used to refer to any tense or mood if they are clear from the context. If you are using an adverb that refers to the past (e.g. yesterday, last year, earlier…) or future (e.g. tomorrow, in two weeks, later…) the past or future tense marker can be omitted in most contexts. There is only one past tense form so the way you translate it into English depends on the context. It is possible to emphasize the continous aspect by placing the word hamba ’on-going’ before the verb (and its markers) or saying that you just did something by using the word tiko ’just, recently’.

Unmarked: Ø Mana karanta kitabu. ’I read book(s).’ ne Mana ne karanta kitabu. ’I don’t read books’ Imperative: – Karanta kitabu! ’Read a book/books!’ ne Ne karanta kitabu! ’Don’t read books!’

Past: di Mana di karanta kitabu. ’I have read a/the book’ ne di Mana ne di karanta kitabu. ’I didn’t read books.’ Future: sa Mana sa karanta kitabu. ’I will read a book.’ ne sa Mana ne sa karanta kitabu. ’I won’t read books.’ Conditional: inki Mana inki karanta kitabu. ’I would read a book.’ ne inki Mana ne inki karanta kitabu. ’I wouldn’t read books.’

Continuous: Mana hamba karanta hada kitabu. ’I’m reading that book (right now).’ Recent: Mana tiko di karanta hada kitabu. ’I just read that book.’

Modal verbs go before the main verb but after the verbal markers. They include: munkini can, may inki munkini could, might lasima must, have to inki lasima should wayaga need to ne wayaga not have to wela want to inki wela would like to danga dare ne danga dare not

Mana ne di wayaga ta-basari tiketi. ’I didn’t have to buy a ticket.’ Ka sina-loka wela nomi neho kawa? ’Do you all want to have some coffee?’

Copula: wa be Hada adamu wa aku ya mana. ’That man is my brother.’ Ku una wa? ’What is it?’ Wa boho auto na ruga hidihari. ’There are many cars on the street today.’ Ne wa baridi hidirame. ’It’s not cold tonight.’ Grammatical Markers

Phrasal pe (optional) marks the object of a sentence when it’s ambiguous; ka question particle, begins a yes/no question ke that; subordinates a clause to a main clause

Adjectival (Yazafe) ya turns other words into adjective complements; mana ’I/me’, kirmisi ’red’, kota ’house’ > kota ya kirmisi ya mana ’my red house’

Adverbial bi- forms adverbs; (noun) bahati ’fortune, happiness’ > bi-bahati ’happily, fortunately’ (adjective) eye ’good’ > bi-eye ’well’ (pronoun) mana ’I/me’ > bi-mana ’my way; in my opinion’

Verbal For negation, tense, mood and aspect marking see the section Verbs. ta- forms action verbs ”does X”; bairami ’feast’ > ta-bairami ’to celebrate’

bunda forms inchoative verbs ”becomes X”; hami ’hot’ > bunda hami ’to get hot; to become hot(ter)’

kara forms causative verbs ”makes something X”; hami ’hot’ > kara hami ’to heat up; to make hot(ter)’

Prepositional na locative; in, on, at ko lative; to, for, towards se separative; from, off, out of kupa 1) topic, circumessive; about, around, on 2) all-purpose preposition

ili ya over, above ala ya under, below mise ya between, among, amid itri ya before, in front of atra ya after, behind tepe ya on the top of, atop

Word Derivation New words can be formed by compounding. In true compounds the head noun comes last. News words can also be formed using yazafe. If an existing word cannot be used and a compound word is not possible the word takes in a new loanword from any of the world’s languages adapted to the phonology of the language.

Compounding: susu ’milk’ + mai ’fat’ > susu-mai ’butter’ ”milk fat” sakiti ’sick’ + manu ’person’ > sakiti-manu ’patient’ ”sick person”

Yazafe: susu ’milk’ + mai ’fat’ > susu ya mai ’cream’ ”fatty milk” kulitsa ’cake’ + alma ’apple’ > kulitsa ya alma ’apple pie, apple cake’ ”cake of apple(s)”

Word Order (SVO) Subject – Adverb – Verb – Object – Adverbials

Mana ne karanta kitabu bi-haraka. SG1 NEG read book ADV-hurry ’I don’t read books fast.’