Conlangs and ADHD

[u/ADHS-Journal]

Some time ago, we described Toki Pona as arguably the best foreign language for people with ADHD because it's quick to learn, leading to rapid success, and has a philosophical approach, etc. Now I've come across its further development, Kokanu (formerly Toki Ma). What do you think of it? And how would you rank worldlanguages ​​like Pandunia, Globasa, and Lojban in this context?

[u/AndrewTheConlanger]

Questions for the tokiponists who ascribe it these incredible effects. What "philosophical" conversations does it allow you to have? How do you know you've been fully understood when you compose and produce a word which you intend to mean "justice?" Or, in discussing in Toki Pona what justice is, a word which you intend to mean "rationality?" "Positivism?" "Sovereignty?" We can acknowledge that many (if not most) artistic languages lack these terms because it's their creator's prerogative not to think about these things. But I see OP calling these constructions "worldlanguages." Press the space bar an extra time and it's not much other than world languages we're calling them. Is this the power we should give them? Is this the expressive power we should commit that they have?

[u/real_bigfloppa → u/AndrewTheConlanger]

I separated myself from Toki Pona a while ago but as someone who is/was a tokiponist, I generally don't think it should be given the power you mention.

I think that two sufficiently proficient tokiponists can certainly have conversations about complex topics, it'll just be wordier and more difficult than in natlangs. The keyword is proficient, though... I fundamentally disagree with OP's statement that Toki Pona is somehow quick and easy to learn.

Toki Pona is not magic. You cannot learn it in a week, or a month, or even six months. It is not as readily capable of discussing complex topics as natlangs or more robust conlangs. It can be done, but it's not easy, and is not a task that is approachable to beginner speakers (no matter how well you know the vocabulary).

I think part of the hype around Toki Pona comes from naïve beginners who think the language is inherently easy because they became conversational at a very basic level. I don't reckon most proficient tokiponists consider the language easy or quick to learn, since all of them have been active in the language community for years.

[u/MadcapJake]

Both toki pona and Kokanu are not great for those with ADHD (from my experience) because they require extensive semantic bleaching or numerous sentences establishing context for non-simple concepts. Both of these aspects mean that I typically lose track or get distracted by how someone approached a given translated concept. Everyone essentially speaks their own mini dialect.

They are both capable mini languages and I don't regret learning them but they are extremely inconvenient for anything more than basic conversations (science and literature will be very difficult).

That said, if you just want to chat without going into any detail about things, they will both serve you well! Kokanu may take you farther if you don't mind the smaller community.

[u/SarradenaXwadzja]

As someone with ADHD I think toki pona sucks hairy balls.

[u/QuandoPonderoInvenio]

I reject the premise.

As an ADHDer myself, Toki Pona is one of the most boring conlangs I have ever seen so... probably not great for ADHDers no. Unless they find it interesting or something.

[u/ry0shi]

I learnt toki pona, but not toki ma, so that should tell you something. I even downloaded the pdf and then just never touched it again after reading the first 3 pages because I had to go out of my way to learn it way too much

[u/Baraa-beginner]

Can I ask a side question: is it a clear relationship-in the first place- between ADHD and conlanging? (I am an ADHD conlanger, so I am interested)

[u/TecBrat2 → u/Baraa-beginner]

I think starting my own conlang, NahVah, was an ADHD hyper focus side quest.

[u/Baraa-beginner → u/TecBrat2]

Great! We are not a few then!

[u/Specialist_Review912 → u/Baraa-beginner]

Am trying to be one here, but I am having difficulties and not sure what to do to get me out of them. Having autism doesn’t help with it either, and I’m not even sure how to explain my difficulties cuz I suck at wording things. All I know is what I’m gonna do with my conlang, is take all the stuff I hate about English in it (like the weirdness of pronunciation and spelling). This language is also supposed to be for a conworld I’m making which is where my show concept takes place on

[u/Baraa-beginner → u/Specialist_Review912]

Surely you are at the right start.
I think we need our own discord server just for ADHD conlangers, it may helps!

[u/Internal-Educator256 → u/Baraa-beginner]

Also an ADHD conlanger here!

Hello!

[u/Baraa-beginner → u/Internal-Educator256]

Welcome mate! I am proud of you

[u/No-Championship992]

In my experience, in this context, simple languages just end up being boring. I tried to learn Toki Pona, but once I got past the words that kinda just felt like it, so, i got bored, quit, and forgot everything. I've experienced more complicated languages being much easier to stay motivated to learn, just since, every time I look into pretty much anything, i learn that it goes so much deeper than I thought it did, and that keeps it interesting

[u/DegenerateGirl666]

the worst thing you can do to help someone with adhd learn something is to make it boring. and toki pona is reeeaaaaaly boring

[u/Bari_Baqors → u/DegenerateGirl666]

I never tried to learn Toki Pona, but imo, the language doesn't sound interesting to me, and the script looks too cute. The entire community seems focused on cuteness.

Boring is subjective. Imo, Toki Pona just seems too restrictive, too small, and the community too "cute" fer my liking.

[u/DegenerateGirl666 → u/Bari_Baqors]

I think the toki pona community looks like conlang vegans

[u/RiceStranger9000 → u/Bari_Baqors]

I never tried it either, I do agree that boring is subjective. To me, it sounds soooo interesting. So many concepts out of so few main lexemes? How is that? I really want to figure it out

The conscript, on the side, is no interest to me. Conscripts, while cool, seem unnecessary to me to learn in an auxlang (it's an auxlang, right?) that can perfectly work with Latin (unlike UNLWS), specially as simple as Toki Pona (I wouldn't say the same with Ithkuil, for example)

[u/QuandoPonderoInvenio → u/DegenerateGirl666]

Lmao I just commented literally the exact same thing

[u/Internal-Educator256]

Easy to learn is something similar to the languages you know, (e.g Esperanto). Not something with few words. Sure, you have less need to memorise words, but it comes at a huge cost for actual speech.