lipu lawa pi esun kama

Aug 2, 2012

lipu lawa pi esun kama

see it larger

ink on paper, 11” x 14”, 2009

lipu lawa pi esun kama: a contract for future sales

This conceptual piece was born when Matthew Martin (jan Mato) proposed writing up a sales contract in toki pona. He reasoned that if contracts in foreign languages could be held valid, than one in an artificial language should be valid as well. As a challenge, he asked if anyone wanted to sell him something using a toki pona contract.

I proposed that we write a contract in toki pona for the sale of a sitelen sitelen drawing. The negotiation took place in toki pona in a forum, and the final contract was then drawn in sitelen, describing the sale of itself.

Here is the contract as written:

lipu lawa pi esun kama

jan Mato li jan pi wile jo. jan josan li jan pali. jan pi wile jo en jan pali li wile e esun.

nanpa wan la, jan pi wile jo en jan pali li sitelen e lipu lawa pi esun kama.

nanpa tu la, lipu lawa pi esun kama li pona tawa ona tu la, jan pali li pali e sitelen. sitelen ni li kepeken e toki sama toki pi lipu lawa pi esun kama. jan pali li pali e sitelen tu. sitelen tu li sama.

nanpa tu wan la, jan pali li pana e sitelen tu tawa jan pi wile jo.

nanpa tu tu la, jan pi wile jo li pana e linja nimi ona lon sitelen nanpa wan en sitelen nanpa tu. jan pi wile jo li awen jo e sitelen nanpa wan. jan pi wile jo li pana e sitelen nanpa tu tawa jan pali, li pana e mani Mewika pi nanpa ale tawa jan pali.

nanpa luka la, jan kama jo li jo e sitelen nanpa wan. jan pali li jo e sitelen nanpa tu li jo e mani. ale li pona.

namako:

jan pi wile jo li pana e lipu toki kepeken nimi nanpa mute mute mute (mute anu weka) kepeken toki pona la, jan pali li sitelen e sitelen namako kepeken toki ni.

jan pi wile jo: ______

jan Mato

jan pali: ______

jan Josan

Translation:

Seth Schoen made a quite thorough translation of the contract a number of years ago:

Governing page of future sale

jan Mato is the person that wants to have. jan Josan is the maker. The person that wants to have and the maker want a sale. First, the person that wants to have and the maker wrote a governing page of the future sale. Second, if the governing page of the future sale is good for those two, the maker will make a document. This document will use the same language as the language of the governing page of the future sale. The maker will make two documents. Both documents will be the same. Third, the maker will give both documents to the person that wants to have. Fourth, the person that wants to have will put his linear name on document number one and document number two. The person that wants to have will continue to have document number one. The person that wants to have will give document number two to the maker and will give American money of the universal number [one hundred] to the maker. Fifth, the getting person will have document number one. The maker will have document number two and money. Everything will be good.

Extra: When the person that wants to have gives a linguistic document using many many many (more or less) words in toki pona, the maker will create an extra document using this text.

Person that wants to have: ______ jan Mato

Maker: ______ jan Josan

Reflections

One of the most absurd things for me in the exchange was the absence of numbers in toki pona. The unofficial convention for 100 is to use ale but this also means all. So where the contract says “mani Mewika pi nanpa ale” it could mean $100 but it could also mean all the numbers of American money. Toki pona would probably the better in a barter economy, but at some point, aren’t you still going to have to say “100 sheep for your house”? There’s a joke out there that evey new toki ponan says at some point mi wile e nasin nanpa. Maybe numbers should be a non verbal exchange – you throw down the number your are talking about in beans.

Original forum discussion

Here is the forum post where Matthew proposes creating a contract.

Here is the forum where the contract was publicly negotiated.

Here is a forum where Matthew describes his experiences in the exchange.