Wasona

Q: what is jan Sonja up to these days?

jan Sonja created Toki Pona in 2001. Since then, she has continued to play a soft guiding role in Toki Pona’s growth and practices.

In 2014, she published 󱤪󱥕 lipu pu — ‘Toki Pona: The Language of Good’. This book describes how she used Toki Pona, and it serves as a nice language course for learners, and it makes for a good style guide for proficient speakers. It also introduces sitelen pona, which is very popular.

During the pandemic of 2020, the online popularity of Toki Pona increased a lot. So in 2021, jan Sonja published 󱤪󱦈 lipu ku — the ‘Toki Pona Dictionary’. This book describes how the community uses Toki Pona, and includes a vast amount of translations submitted by speakers.

Later, jan Sonja expanded her work into creative writing. In 2023, she published 󱤪󱦦 lipu su — the ‘The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Toki Pona edition)’. The book is an abridged translation of the Wizard of Oz with full-page colour art, entirely in sitelen pona.

In 2025 and beyond, she is working on:

  • a second English edition of lipu pu,
  • a new book in the lipu su series,
  • helping the Sitelen Pona Publishers and Typographers Association, which aims to collaborate with Unicode and UCSUR on standardised representation of sitelen pona.

…and possibly more!

Where can I find jan Sonja’s work?

  • jan Sonja maintains the official Toki Pona site with the help of many other speakers, showcasing her books and other resources the community is working on.
  • jan Sonja sometimes posts on Bluesky!
  • If you’re worried you might miss a new book by jan Sonja, you can subscribe to our newsletter!

Etiquette

If you join Toki Pona communities, you might come across jan Sonja once in a while. You might see her answer learner questions, or post something she’s working on. Here are a couple tips to be polite with her:

  • Treat her like you would treat anyone else! She’s the creator of Toki Pona, but she deserves peace and privacy. We value her work, but we don’t need to idolise it.
  • As a public figure, jan Sonja often gets pinged (notified) for little things, questions here and there. There are thousands of learners, but only one Sonja. To help her stay productive, just talk to her when she’s already in the chat room.