eliki

The subject of this article is nonstandard and will not be understood by most speakers.

If you are a learner, this information will not help you speak the language. It is recommended to familiarize yourself with the standard style, and to be informed and selective about which nonstandard styles you adopt.

eliki
Pronunciation	/ˈe.li.ki/
Usage	2023: Obscure (3%) Most speakers don't understand this word.
Book and era	No book
Part of speech	Content word

eliki is a nimi sin coined by kulupu telo mun.

Semantic space

eliki is defined as:

trial, adversity, challenge; bittersweet; an experience with the quality of being deeply felt or important to oneself while defying classification as positive, negative, or a simply described admixture of positive and negative

It is intended "to help people describe a range of identities and experiences important to them" that may not be sufficiently described by pakala, pona, ike, nasa, or other words. As such, specific usage varies between speakers.

eliki generally describes immutable things that can cause pain or distress, but should be viewed as value-neutral or have become part of one's identity. It is often used for disabilities for which a cure is unpresent or unwanted. The philosophy of eliki is similar to identity-first language (for example, "autistic person, "Deaf person"), which certain disabled communities prefer to person-first language ("person with…") because their eliki are an inseparable part of who they are.

According to a document edited from July 14 to August 5, 2023, "the factors that determine eliki seem to be":

• chronicity
• the long term effects of the experience
• the importance of the experience to identity
• nature vs nurture
• not implicitly having negative connotations, (more comfortable for some speakers?)
• moving away from implicitly negative language to describe body and behavior traits, combating ableism and internalized ableism
• being able to speak about deeper things such as poverty or systemic oppression with a focus on how they effect the person and how that can be mitigated
• still leaving room for the user to describe it as ike, pona, pakala, nasa, etc however they like

sitelen pona

As of summer 2023, most fonts have not updated to support eliki yet.

These images are examples of the intended glyph from kulupu telo mun:

sitelen sitelen

(todo import from https://discord.com/channels/301377942062366741/1136414293638795305/1137592561775677491, permission https://discord.com/channels/301377942062366741/1136414293638795305/1146163384207806524)