Pandunia's grammar

Principles

Pandunia's words are unchanging and the word order is free. It favors freedom of expression and avoids grammatical difficulties such as declension, conjugation, inflection and fixed syntax. All in all, Sanua's grammar is greatly reduced compared to most other languages. Yet it is very flexible and provides diversity for expression.

Pandunia's grammar is designed to be as accessible as possible for everybody. That's why it lacks such features as articles, all types of inflection, singular-plural distinction and fixed word order that some people could take for granted. People can start speaking Pandunia without fear of being ungrammatical.

Free word order

Pandunia's word order is free concerning sentence constituents.

There are four basic methods for defining the roles of verb arguments.

  1. Context: The meaning that fits to the context is likely the correct one.
  2. Animacy: Living beings usually treated as subjects whereas dead things are treated as objects.
  3. Word order: s(Vo) and s(oV) word orders are the most common ones in the languages of the world. That's why they are likely to occur more often in Pandunia as well.
  4. Division by verbs: Parsing or expressions is facilitated by the fact that predicates and arguments are paired.
  5. Division by grammar words: "sama bulu i maron bumi" (blue sky and brown ground)

First, there are phrases where the word order doesn't matter because the verb equates its arguments.

1 + 1 vale 2. = 1 + 1 equals 2.
2 vale 1 + 1. = 2 equals 1 + 1.
safari dura 2 din. = The trip lasts 2 days.
2 din dura safari. = 2 days lasts the trip.

Second, in many cases it is clear without further indication, which word is subject and which word is the object. It is not necessary to mark the obvious.

sinema mi suka, no buku. = Movies I like, not books. (I like movies, not books.)

Coordinating particles

There are two coordinating particles in Pandunia that help to organize expressions. ke links modified to modifier in that order, and ja links modifier to modified in that order.

tcokola ke keke = chocolate cake
keke ja tcokola = cake of chocolate

In addition to noun phrases the coordinating particles are used to coordinate verb phrases as well.

reza kana keke bada ja je bana je. = Reza eats the cake after he makes it.
reza bana keke ke bada je kana je. = Reza makes the cake and after that he eats it.

Compounding

Pandunia relies heavily on compounding as the means to make new words. Most "compound words" are just ordinary noun or verb phrases.

a: tu rabota kua? = What do you you do for living?
b: mi repara auto. = I repair cars.
a: so tu e jan repara auto ka? = So you are a car repair man?
b: ja, mi rabota na hane repara auto. = Yes, I work at the car repair shop.