Articles
Articles are words that identify and specify a noun, such as "the", "a", "an", and "some".
Toki Pona has no articles. Usually, "a thing", "the thing", "things", "some things", "the things", and even "something" are all simply translated as ijo.
While English speakers may find it strange not to specify this information, plenty of languages do fine without articles. A comparison is how the Romance languages require the speaker to specify the grammatical gender of every noun, whereas English manages just fine without this feature.
The[edit | edit source]
The English word "the" indicates that its noun should already be known from context. Its function is similar to words like "this" and "that", so you might translate "the thing" as ijo ni if necessary.
A(n)[edit | edit source]
The English word "a(n)" also marks its noun as singular. You might translate "a thing" as ijo wan if this is important.
Some[edit | edit source]
The English word "some" can often be dropped:
tenpo la jan en ijo li lon matenpo la jan en ijo li lon ma.
For (some) time, (some)one and (some)thing were (some)where.
The idea of "some, but not necessarily all" can be communicated by negating ale ("all") with ala ("not").