tonsi

[AcipenserSturio]

tonsi

sona pu

sona Linku pi toki Inli

non-binary, gender-non-conforming | ALT trans, non-cisgender

sona Linku pi toki pona

jan li mije ala li meli ala la, ona li tonsi. jan li mije tawa meli anu meli tawa mije la, ona li tonsi.

sona ku

non-binary person³, transgender person³, gender non-conforming person³, intersex person²

sona sin

[AcipenserSturio]

Discussion starters from me:

I would do "non-binary, gender-non-conforming, intersex, transgender" - but i understand listing adjectives and not nouns is debatable

[lipamanka]

I think listing adjectives is cool and nice, because the pu derivation system says that if the definition lists adjectives, the derivation to nouns is "that which is," so like sewi is that which is sewi. tonsi is that which is tonsi.

re: intersex. I have had conversations with intersex people and while intersexness is inherently under the queer umbrella and queer struggles, it relates to biological sex, not gender. this would be the equivalent of using mije to describe a "male" biological gender. I think for pedagogy's sake we should not encourage any mixing of the ideas of gender and genetics/biology in toki pona. non-binary, gender-non-conforming, transgender, genderqueer I think it's important that all of these relate to gender, because tonsi in essence describes some type of divergence in gender, and that's it.

[lipamanka]

tonsi

sona pu

sona Linku pi toki Inli

non-binary, gender-non-conforming | ALT trans, non-cisgender

sona Linku pi toki pona

jan li mije ala li meli ala la, ona li tonsi. jan li mije tawa meli anu meli tawa mije la, ona li tonsi.

sona ku

non-binary person³, transgender person³, gender non-conforming person³, intersex person²

sona sin

non-binary, gender-non-conforming, transgender, genderqueer

[mazziechai]

I personally have an issue with the transgender definition of tonsi but it's what's used so it wouldn't make sense to inject my personal philosophy around tonsi into this.

[AcipenserSturio]

It's a valid concern and I'm retracting my :rocket: until we properly address it. I think our options are

1) leave everything as is,

2) move transgender to the end with a semicolon in between (indicating it as a secondary meaning of sorts),

3) removing it entirely

I think (2) is by far the best option, what do you all think?

[KelseyHigham]

i like 2

maybe lead with gender non-conforming, since all the definitions are related to that

[lipamanka]

i think we should leave it as is unless there's a specific argument for why we shouldn't grounded in either descriptivism or pedagogy

[mazziechai]

So, for further elaboration, the transgender definition of tonsi makes me uncomfortable because it's originally a word for breaking the dichotomy of gender words of meli and mije. When people use tonsi as "transgender", it's adding "transness" as a third gender, and erasing the nonbinary aspect. I'm not necessarily trans but I'm definitely nonbinary so having to share a word originally made for me as a broader trans people thing is uncomfortable.

[KelseyHigham]

descriptively there's a group of people who use the word exclusively to mean transgender

pedagogically it would be cool to make it very clear that it can mean more than that

[lipamanka]

i agree that pedagogically we should encourage tonsi to mean things that aren't "transgender," but i don't think that means we should teach people to not use it to mean transgender at all

[mazziechai]

I'm just afraid that, by including it as a "non-alternate" definition, it'll be adopted as the "official" way people use tonsi, which isn't true at all. Some people stick to the nonbinary meaning (me), some people use both, and some people use it as exclusively transgender. And we have to be careful as to how we go about this because there's conflict in the usage and we would be inherently choosing a side.

[lipamanka]

(i am fine with putting transgender after a semicolon, but i'm worried that the semicolon won't be doing much and might be confusing)

[mazziechai]

I don't know if an elaboration section (further descriptions) is part of this project, but I think if there was tonsi should be elaborated on with its varied usage.

[AcipenserSturio]

I think nano is right: we need a way to provide a definition while specifying that its not supported by all speakers. We used to do that with | ALT, but this mark was loaded with other meanings. Any ideas how we can mark it instead?

[KelseyHigham]

i think semicolon and ALT are both good ways to address this, assuming that we make usage of "ALT" more consistent.

are there any parallels in natlangs, where we can look up what they do? i think i usually see like, numbered definitions

[mazziechai]

are there any parallels in natlangs, where we can look up what they do? i think i usually see like, numbered definitions

Yeah, numbered definitions are common. I think this would be cool to have

[AcipenserSturio]

semicolon la, its too easy to overlook, and we might end up using it for other things too

ALT is just not clear on what ALT means - we are better off giving a full word, perhaps

[lipamanka]

what if we put an asterisk after transgender and then added more in the notes section about tonsi's usage? we could make a habit of doing this and it might end up being really useful. so like non-binary, gender-non-conforming, genderqueer; transgender*

and then nano can write the "notes" section to include more nuance there. how's that?

[AcipenserSturio]

Copying this from my investigation on Discord:

broadly Indicates a less precise (wider) use of words; short for broadly speaking. For most practical purposes, synonymous with loosely. Contrast strict (narrow) senses. uncommon A term or sense that is attested but not used commonly either in spoken or written language, but more commonly than rare terms. i would also consider "by extension" mi la, one of the three is enough to signify "transgender" isn't quite the core meaning of the word i prefer "by extension" over "broadly" and i think "uncommon" in this case would be untrue

I think the asterisk proposal is tolerable, but would get clunky if there's more than one word in the "special" segment (e.g. transgender*, trans*, and it would look ugly (e.g. kule -> kind*, lgbtq**) if there are more than one separate comments given

[gtbot2007]

I don't see why the word wouldn't mean transgender so as long as that's not the only meaning listed I don't see why there would be a problem?

[lipamanka]

nano made some good points about why it doesn't use tonsi to mean transgender and if we're being descriptive of usage, i think a lot of people hold nano's views on tonsi and use it the same way

[gtbot2007]

That's why it should not be the only definition listed, but it should still definitely be one.

[AcipenserSturio]

@gtbot2007 if you scroll up, you'll see we are not considering removing it in the first place; rather, finding ways to appropriately signify its less accepted state

[gtbot2007]

But is it less accepted?

[AcipenserSturio]

Everyone else in the conversation seems to be in agreement about that

[mazziechai]

I think the asterisk proposal is tolerable, but would get clunky if there's more than one word in the "special" segment (e.g. transgender*, trans*, and it would look ugly (e.g. kule -> kind*, lgbtq**) if there are more than one separate comments given

I think the alternative to this could be footnotes.

[lipamanka]

i was thinking more like, asterisk just means "check the notes" and then the notes explain. and we don't need both trans and transgender in our definition here. likewise i don't think it's reasonable to assume we'll include "type" for kule. some meanings, like lgbtq for kule, imo shouldn't be in the main definition and only in the notes. but that one's up for debate and i'm not actually sure how much i've seen that used.

[RetSamys]

I was about to ask if the asterisk (specifically after or before "trans") had a specific meaning - but I think I'm confusing that with German usage. Leaving this here in case it does have extra meaning in English

I like the "by extension: trans", and it makes me think of a tiny difference between the French and English version of lipu pu: there are colons

objet rond : ballon, cercle, cycle, sphère, roue, anneau

So if we want a precedent for using broad concept: example or specific thing we kind of do

[lipamanka]

oh! that's awesome! i like that a lot, it would be nice to use that in some definitions. i don't think that's super relevant to tonsi because we can't do it here the way it was done it pu but it might be useful for soweli. as for the asterisk, in english it just means that somewhere below there will be a footnote of sorts that starts with

* like this

[AcipenserSturio]

I'm going to provide two options which seem to be where we are headed, so you can compare and contrast:

Option 1:

non-binary, gender-non-conforming, genderqueer; (by extension) transgender

Option 2:

non-binary, gender-non-conforming, genderqueer; transgender*

* - broader in meaning, somewhat less commonly accepted

@lipamanka if this is not how you imagined option 2 looking like, please correct me

I especially want opinions from the people who have not participated in the discussion so far

[berrymot]

haiiii i prefer (by extension) mostly because it's just shorter

[tbodt]

nimi By Extension li pona tawa mi. sona mi la, kon Transgender li kama ken tan ni: sina ante Trans e kule Gender la sina pakala Non-comforming e nasin pi kule Gender. pakala nasin Nonconforming li lon nasin nimi mama, la kama Trans li ken tan "by extension" ni. taso mi tonsi ala, la jan tonsi li pilin ante , la pilin mi li suli ala

[lipamanka]

hm i would like to see what @mazziechai has to say. i prefer option two but i don't have a strong preference

[mazziechai]

I prefer option two

[lipamanka]

in that case, let's go with option two, and nano can write the note? does that sound good? if we decide later that we don't want to use an asterisk like this we can always go back and change it.

[RetSamys]

I like option one, but the other works fine

[gregdan3]

I'm going to provide two options which seem to be where we are headed, so you can compare and contrast:

Option 1:

non-binary, gender-non-conforming, genderqueer; (by extension) transgender

Option 2:

non-binary, gender-non-conforming, genderqueer; transgender*

* - broader in meaning, somewhat less commonly accepted

@lipamanka if this is not how you imagined option 2 looking like, please correct me

I especially want opinions from the people who have not participated in the discussion so far

personally i don't really know how to engage with the conversation around tonsi because i don't use the word to describe myself, so i don't think my opinion should be weighted the same as those who do use it

but from a formatting standpoint: why is option 2 being considered at all when this just looks like a commentary entry? edit: arguably this breaks api since we don't currently have newlines and suddenly downstream dictionaries would have to format with consideration for newlines

we did discuss not really tackling the commentary during this project but i can't imagine we'll go the whole project without needing it, and this seems like a good place to do option 1 or similar and add commentary, no?

my last concern is that this definition probably needs community input more than most (relates back to my initial comment about the weigth of my opinion on the meaning of the word)

---

also i wrote this an hour ago or so and did not post on accident, oops

[mazziechai]

I agree with having community input for this word.

[AcipenserSturio]

Yeah we're adding to commentary regardless of which formatting we choose

[lipamanka]

I thought that the footnote was going to be the commentary? if that wasn't clear already then that's what I think it should be

[Daenyth]

relates to biological sex, not gender. this would be the equivalent of using mije to describe a "male" biological gender. I think for pedagogy's sake we should not encourage any mixing of the ideas of gender and genetics/biology in toki pona.

I haven't read the whole conversation but I do want to point out that I think descriptively people do use the words mije and meli to talk about sex as well as gender. Even if we all agree that's not good I do think it's what happens and it we don't reflect that we are editorializing

That said I don't know that I've seen tonsi used for intersex but also it doesn't come up that often to begin with.

I'm happy with either definition kala Asi proposed

[gregdan3]

sona ni la o pilin:

non-binary, gender-non-conforming, genderqueer, transgender*

IMPORTANT NOTE: I have replaced the semicolon before "transgender" with a comma, to match the scheme we've been using in other definitions where the semicolon separates different functions of the word (preverb, particle, number, etc). "transgender" isn't a different function of tonsi, it is a different meaning. The * is still there though:

The following or similar will be added to commentary; it can be amended later, but we will have some clarification about this meaning in the commentary:

* - broader in meaning, somewhat less commonly accepted

[Th3Scribble]

if i remember correctly tonsi was originally proposed for non-binary as a counterpart to meli and mije. it would be good to note that this was the original proposal in the notes (assuming this is actually true)

[tbodt]

this is true (the sona nimi mama did not include transgender)

[lipamanka]

okay I spoke with an anonymous intersex person about this in VC with kulupu kasi, @Th3Scribble and @AcipenserSturio, and we came to the agreement that

1. wether or not intersex is in the definition of tonsi on linku is dependent on wether or not "biological male" and "biological female" are present in mije and meli, respectively.
2. we can't really put "biological male" or "biological female" in mije and meli's definitions without encouraging that usage for people who don't know enough about biological sex to be respectful and good about it
3. therefore we should not add intersex to tonsi's definition

Nothing has changed, but there is more nuance behind that reasoning. tonsi can mean intersex if mije can mean biological male.

[KelseyHigham]

i googled a bit and "gender nonconforming" is apparently written "gender nonconforming", with no hyphens

[mazziechai]

I've made the adjustments discussed in this issue to the PR. Therefore, I'm moving this word into a final comment period. Please review the attached PR #8. On 19 Aug at 00:00 UTC, the PR will be merged into main.