When I was in high school German we had to write a children’s book, so we wrote a gory story called Tony die Krieghubshrauber (I think? It’s been a while since I studied genders of nouns). Basically Tony is a war helicopter that blows people away.
I sort of want to learn German. I took an impromptu trip to Berlin and did about a week of duolingo (but I hate it--it's *not* naturalistic or in context. It is in fact out of context--semi-nonsense sentences floating in the void with unrelated pictures. How is that supposed to teach you anything?), and now I'm slowly watching Babylon Berlin, which is nice for hearing language.
But it seems to me like if I focus on any language I should get better at Russian (...which at the moment I do by listening to Russian music, but that's definitely not sufficient and I think doesn't do much for me), or I should actually try for real to learn Korean. However, German has the appeal that it's wayyyyy easier (in all aspects except pronunciation, which I just have some real problems with), so maybe. I just need to find a way to learn it that isn't duolingo...
Years ago I was working at a fast casual restaurant. An older customer started speaking German to me. I couldn't understand, and asked them to repeat their self. "Oh, we thought you spoke German. "
I live in Southern United States. Have the accent of the region. Did not know these people. Apparently I must have said something that sounded German and it boggles my mind to this day.
If I ever get to a point where I can say I'm fluent in French I think German would be the next language I learn if only because aggressively saying things in German is incredibly satisfying.
For a very long time I've playing with the idea of making a game to teach Japanese. Every time I started, it flamed out as a matter of scope, but I go through the debris and pick out the bits that didn't work and the bits that did. I'm on my 5th iteration of trying to get something down and tooling it with a different story. The game itself is a cross between a visual novel and a text adventure / interactive fiction game. It actually marries the two genres quite well. I'm also using an open source engine, but tweaking it to suit the game better.
The idea is you, are the English speaker and have a Japanese friend who does not speak English. When I mean they don't speak English, there is not an iota of English in their speech, including the writing. Mediating between you is the Virtual translator A.I. who is cranky and only talks to you.
However you can request your friend in Japanese to help you as you navigate the world. Originally the game took place on an island, with this big overreaching story. Now I'm just hanging out in a small town.
Here's a transcript of me testing the Japanese parser The ">" Shows the input. When you speak English she does not understand you. If you write in Japanese, she will do the actions you ask (Within reason)
beach
You can see Kaori, a pen and a book here.
>kaori, take pen
"え? ごめんなさい、分かりません。"
>kaori, pen o totte
香、ぺンを取って。
Kaori picks up the pen.
>kaori, pen o kodadsai
"え? ごめんなさい、分かりません。"
>kaori, pen o kudasai
香、ぺンを下さい。
Kaori gives the pen to you.
>take book
Taken.
>give book to kaori
You give the book to Kaori.
>l
beach
You can see Kaori here.
>kaochan, hon wo otoshite
かおちゃん、本を落して 。
Kaori puts down the book.
I'm rewriting the engine now to give it graphical extensions and the parser needs work, but it's based on Inform 7 so I'm going to have lots of linguistical potential.
For fun, under the spoilers, I've pasted some of the code for the Japanese parser. Inform code is in English, so it's a trip to read though it. This the part handles how you deal with "kudasai" and "chodai"which is a very strange edge case for the verb meaning "to give" - Also included is the code to parse out "suru" (to do) and and "-te" (imperative) verb forms.
[Handle "Kudasai" and "Choudai" jrequest verbs]
If last word is "kudasai"or last word is "choudai":
If word number (last position - 1) in romaji input is "o" or word number (last position - 1) in romaji input is "wo":
do nothing;
otherwise:
If last word is "kudasai":
Increase friendship by 1;
now japanese output is "下さい";
now jrequest is true;
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input;
If last word is "choudai":
now japanese output is "ちょうだい";
now jrequest is true;
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input;
[]
[Parse the suru verb if it exists]
[***
The Verb will be either in -te or in imparitive form.
However, some will be a "suru" verb so we need to parse for this first, group and look up
suru -te form (plain - shite) (| imperative (plain - shiro)
***]
If the last word is "shite" or the last word is "shiro":
[grab the word previous]
now the root verb is "[word number (last position - 1) in romaji input] [word number (last position) in romaji input]";
if the root verb is not a te form listed in the table of sverb list and the root verb is not a imperative form listed in the table of sverb list:
now the root verb is "nil";
If the root verb is a te form listed in the table of sverb list:
now everb is the english verb corresponding to the te form of the root verb in the table of sverb list;
now jverb is the jte form corresponding to the english verb of the everb in the table of sverb list;
If the root verb is a imperative form listed in the table of sverb list:
now everb is the english verb corresponding to the imperative form of the root verb in the table of sverb list;
now jverb is the jmeirei form corresponding to the english verb of the everb in the table of sverb list;
now the check particle is p corresponding to the english verb of the everb in the table of sverb list;
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input; [chomp both words]
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input;
otherwise: [Parse the verb]
now the root verb is the last word;
I've been pretty unsuccessfully learning french for four years now. Still, four years is enough to pick up at least something. I mean, you'd hope to make at least a little progress, particularly if you'd been living in a primarily French-speaking region for two of those years.
En ce moment, je suis au Congo-Brazzaville. Certainement, un peu de competence dans la langue français est utile. A l'hôtel, je pense qu'il y a une personne seulement qui parle anglais.
There are a bunch of languages I'd like to learn. But seriously it's so hard. Even trying to get competent in french is massively difficult, and in theory, that's one of the simplest languages for English-speakers to pick up since it's so similar. I like the idea of learning languages, but I find the actual process so tiring. I'd also like to learn Italian, and my wife's family is Vietnamese so I should get back onto that one. I had some passing ability in Vietnamese a while back but I let it lapse.
Also I should learn some Amharic, at least to get past 'salaamno' and 'ferenji'. The ge'ez script is quite attractive, so that should provide at least a little motivation.
I don't know where he got the scorpions, or how he got them into my mattress.
Dark Raven XLaugh hard, run fast,be kindRegistered Userregular
I got up to the part in Duolingo Japanese where the syllables finally get mashed together to make a word. That's p.cool. Language is cool.
お - oh
は - ha
よ - yo
う - u
noice.
This is going to take me 27 years to learn, huh.
Oh brilliant
+4
Munkus BeaverYou don't have to attend every argument you are invited to.Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPAregular
I just remember that one as Ohio is for Good Morning.
I learned that word when I did my report on Japan in the 8th grade!
Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
I like that this thread ostensibly about all languages is now 90% about Japanese.
You fucking weeaboos.
I get called that because I was doing Matta Matta at people
So I have switched back to deutsch with Schnell! Schnell! weiter! blah blah blah {I forgot how to spell the next part :P }
I really know how to speak german far better than to spell it I am quite out of practice writing in it
I got up to the part in Duolingo Japanese where the syllables finally get mashed together to make a word. That's p.cool. Language is cool.
お - oh
は - ha
よ - yo
う - u
noice.
This is going to take me 27 years to learn, huh.
Wait to you figure that 「おはよう」(Ohayou) means "Good Morning"
Then learn that 「おはようございます」(Ohayou Gozaimasu) also means "Good Morning"
Then try and deduce what on earth "Gozaimasu" means and your 10,000 word pocket dictionary doen't have the word.
Assume that "Ohayou" means "Morning" and "Gozaimasu" means "good" and Japanese is just backwards sometimes.
After that, use "Ohayou" and "Gozaimasu" in that way for an embarrassingly long time until you are corrected by your laughing Japanese friend
Discover that "Ohayou" is just a polite form of 「早い」(hayai), which mean "quick/fast"
Learn that "Gozaimasu" is the archaic verb "Gozaru" 「ござる」which means "to be" and no one uses that word by itself anymore.
Puzzle for a while about how on earth did those sets of words became a morning greeting.
Then...
After waking up your Japanese friend at 4:00am to take her to the bus stop, hearing her say in an exasperated way 「オハヨゴザイマス!」(OHAYO GOZAIMASU!)
Realizing she just said. "IT'S EARLY!"
Finally you learn that "Ohayou Gozaimasu" means "It's early" and Japanese tend to drop words if the context is understood.
I just saved you about six months of pain. Thank me later
halkun on
+10
CaptainBeyondI've been out walkingRegistered Userregular
The horrible thing about languages is the rate you pick them up when immersed in them is infinitely quicker* than learning them by rote through duolingo** or wherever. My family holiday growing up was two weeks in France every year, and that fortnight I picked up more than the subsequent 12 months of class lessons. Similarly I lived in Sweden for 5 months, and got conversational at it fairly easily. Dropped away through lack of use now though.
*I appreciate my language learning experience is limited to Western/Northern European languages, it may well be different for much less closely related language groups.
**I do actually like duolingo, and use it in bursts to keep up my French and German.
+2
Dark Raven XLaugh hard, run fast,be kindRegistered Userregular
I'm up to the g and z characters in hiragana, and noticed pretty much all of em have that " up in the corner. What's that about?
Also, anyone got advice for learning these symbols? They're getting varied enough that I'm having a hard time keeping track. ;p
Also also, anyone wanna friend me on Duolingo? Want them cheevos!
I'm up to the g and z characters in hiragana, and noticed pretty much all of em have that " up in the corner. What's that about?
Also, anyone got advice for learning these symbols? They're getting varied enough that I'm having a hard time keeping track. ;p
Also also, anyone wanna friend me on Duolingo? Want them cheevos!
The double-ticks ('') change the characters in predictable ways. For example, putting it on one of the "K" characters (ka か, ki き, ku く, ke け, or ko こ) changes them to "G" (ga が, gi ぎ, gu ぐ, ge げ, and go ご).
I don't remember the history/reasoning behind it, but the short version is it simplifies the memorization because you just have to remember what the modifier does to the original sound, and you automatically unlock five new characters.
(There are a few exceptions, but you'll learn them as you go.)
Yeah. I can't speak to the more complex stuff at all, but it would help to know little things like, how an apostrophe changes the way a hiragana character is pronounced.
Generally, it adds voicing.
k and g are articulated in the same place In your vocal tract, one (g) requires the use of voicing, the other (k) does not.
The little circle is only used of はひふへほ and indicates labial interference: ぱ>pa, ぴ>pi you get the idea.
While on the subject of the name for things, I have never once got a straight answer on what to call a "々" mark. I know it's a repeater but none of my Japanese teachers could tell me it's formal name.
Turns out it's called a "kanji-gaeshi" 「漢字返し」and it literally means "Kanji Repeater"
I meant to post this yesterday, but I got side-tracked.
There are only... 4? Sets of syllables that take the addition of the dakuten:
か>が ka>ga and all the other Ks
さ>ざ sa>za
た>だ ta>da
は>ば ha>ba. which I realized is the voiced labial plosive, in contrast to
は>ぱ ha>pa the voiceless labial plosive
There is also ヴ, which stands in for “V” in loan words, but is a bilabial fricativa rather than an interdental fricative that is more like Spanish “b/v” than anything that exists in English.
You can hear it in Akihabara and other places that still have DVDs for sale, mostly. :P
Edit: し and つ are somewhat different in that the begin with phonetically adjacent sounds rather than the same sounds of their syllable groups (sh and ts respectively), but the upshot is that じ and づ are exactly the voiced variants of these (j and dz), though j is a plosive rather than a fricative.
Currently I am learning possessives. There are... a lot of them.
So before I get into possessives, in Māori you have different pronouns depending on who you are talking to and how many people you are talking about. You talk about 1 person, 2 people, or >3 people.
And there's different words that include/exclude the speaker and listener(s). Including the speaker and listener, excluding the listener, excluding the speaker, and excluding both. eg, tāua, "us two, you and I"māua "us two, but not you the person being spoken to", kōrua "you two" and rāua "them two".
The tricky part is that there's logic to it but its not totally logical, use of the words has smoothed the edges off. The word for 2 is rua. And you can see that in the two person words, the "r" is missing from most but you can see it there in the "ua". And rā means "away from the speaker and the listener", ie "that", so you can see how rāua is "them two" as it is referring to someone who is not the speaker or the listener. (disclaimer, maybe I'm just seeing things and this is not how it works at all, but it has helped me with most of the pronouns, but not all, there's a few idiosyncratic pronouns that don't seem to match the others)
Interestingly there is no pronoun for speaking to yourself. I'm not really sure what you'd do there. So there are 11 different pronouns.
Where was I? Ah, possessives!
So... the gist is, that there is superior and inferior possessives. It's not a hierarchical thing, though it can be. But at it's simplest there is "ō" as in "of (possessor is inferior)" and "ā" as in "of (possessor is superior)". You are inferior to your boss so when you say "my boss" you would use ō, your child is inferior so you would use ā because you're superior, stuff you own is inferior but not everything, eg your car is superior (because it carries you). In general, something you can pick up and carry is inferior.
So, layer the superior/inferior onto the 11 pronouns and you have 22 possessives. But... there is also singular and plural possessives. So you layer that onto the 22 possessives and end up with 44. Luckily, most of these are very easy to learn. For most of them, if you know the pronoun, you just put the standard possessive in front. Eg, tō tāua (our (us two's) thing that we possess but are inferior to, our boss maybe) or ō tāua (our (us two's) things that we own but are inferior to, our bosses maybe).
...But then there is also future and past possessives. However, again, once you know about the other previous stuff, it falls into place.
These are mā/mō (the equivalent of "for" in English) and nā/nō (which is the past tense version).
Disclaimer, this is stuff I am learning right now. So I may have some of it wrong. But, I find it very interesting. Even though I have said it is easy once you know the first bit I'm actually having difficulty. Which I think comes from not knowing the first bits well enough. I still don't have a total handle on the pronouns and the 44 possessives. It's just a matter of needing more practice. A month or so ago I was struggling with the possessives, now I'm struggling with the future/past possessives. Progress!
Posts
This will be here until I receive an apology or Weedlordvegeta get any consequences for being a bully
Hey
hey
hey
nothing, just hey.
*Looks at my gunpla on my shelf, fancy ramen in the pantry, and the fact I have time blocked off later today to watch sumo.*
Yeah that's fair.
en japonais, s'il vous plaît
Deutsch ist sehr gut!
...that about covers the two years I took in highschool. I had terrible teachers. :P
Oh and, of course:
Ich bin ein Auslander und sprechen nicht gut Deutsch.
(I am a foreigner and do not speak German well.)
I'd definitely like to learn more and visit Germany some day. Go see the HR Geiger museum, drink a beer in a movie theater...you know, german stuff.
Maybe go see the black forest gummy bear factory because I am a sugar dork.
“Die Leute lauftet, aber es ist zu spät.”
The people run, but it is too late.
Damn it’s been a long time.
Mein Blüt schmertz!
Which I think should mean "my blood hurts"
I was sitting in college algebra and the student in front of me was wearing a shirt that said
ich bin der weg, die wahrheit, und das leben
I already knew "I am" thanks to the JFK joke. And the formatting made it clear that der die das were variants on 'the'; und was clearly 'and'
so I just asked myself I knew any quotes that went "I am the x, the y, and the z"
and after a minute or two the relevant Bible quote surfaced.
Oh man, that reminds me of my favorite thing about German.
We learned the German alphabet, ah bay say day ay eff gay...
And at the end, where the English version goes, “Now I know my ABCs, next time won’t you sing with me?”...
The German version is “Kann ja nicht lernen das ABC?” which roughly translates to “Can’t you learn the ABCs?”
I sort of want to learn German. I took an impromptu trip to Berlin and did about a week of duolingo (but I hate it--it's *not* naturalistic or in context. It is in fact out of context--semi-nonsense sentences floating in the void with unrelated pictures. How is that supposed to teach you anything?), and now I'm slowly watching Babylon Berlin, which is nice for hearing language.
But it seems to me like if I focus on any language I should get better at Russian (...which at the moment I do by listening to Russian music, but that's definitely not sufficient and I think doesn't do much for me), or I should actually try for real to learn Korean. However, German has the appeal that it's wayyyyy easier (in all aspects except pronunciation, which I just have some real problems with), so maybe. I just need to find a way to learn it that isn't duolingo...
I live in Southern United States. Have the accent of the region. Did not know these people. Apparently I must have said something that sounded German and it boggles my mind to this day.
Schweinhund (pig-dog)
Käsekopf (cheesehead)
Arschgeige (ass-violin)
Gehirnverweigerer (Brain holdout; like somebody who is holding off on using their brain)
Pissflitsche (Piss squigee)
The idea is you, are the English speaker and have a Japanese friend who does not speak English. When I mean they don't speak English, there is not an iota of English in their speech, including the writing. Mediating between you is the Virtual translator A.I. who is cranky and only talks to you.
However you can request your friend in Japanese to help you as you navigate the world. Originally the game took place on an island, with this big overreaching story. Now I'm just hanging out in a small town.
Here's a transcript of me testing the Japanese parser The ">" Shows the input. When you speak English she does not understand you. If you write in Japanese, she will do the actions you ask (Within reason)
I'm rewriting the engine now to give it graphical extensions and the parser needs work, but it's based on Inform 7 so I'm going to have lots of linguistical potential.
For fun, under the spoilers, I've pasted some of the code for the Japanese parser. Inform code is in English, so it's a trip to read though it. This the part handles how you deal with "kudasai" and "chodai"which is a very strange edge case for the verb meaning "to give" - Also included is the code to parse out "suru" (to do) and and "-te" (imperative) verb forms.
If last word is "kudasai"or last word is "choudai":
If word number (last position - 1) in romaji input is "o" or word number (last position - 1) in romaji input is "wo":
do nothing;
otherwise:
If last word is "kudasai":
Increase friendship by 1;
now japanese output is "下さい";
now jrequest is true;
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input;
If last word is "choudai":
now japanese output is "ちょうだい";
now jrequest is true;
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input;
[]
[Parse the suru verb if it exists]
[***
The Verb will be either in -te or in imparitive form.
However, some will be a "suru" verb so we need to parse for this first, group and look up
suru -te form (plain - shite) (| imperative (plain - shiro)
***]
If the last word is "shite" or the last word is "shiro":
[grab the word previous]
now the root verb is "[word number (last position - 1) in romaji input] [word number (last position) in romaji input]";
if the root verb is not a te form listed in the table of sverb list and the root verb is not a imperative form listed in the table of sverb list:
now the root verb is "nil";
If the root verb is a te form listed in the table of sverb list:
now everb is the english verb corresponding to the te form of the root verb in the table of sverb list;
now jverb is the jte form corresponding to the english verb of the everb in the table of sverb list;
If the root verb is a imperative form listed in the table of sverb list:
now everb is the english verb corresponding to the imperative form of the root verb in the table of sverb list;
now jverb is the jmeirei form corresponding to the english verb of the everb in the table of sverb list;
now the check particle is p corresponding to the english verb of the everb in the table of sverb list;
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input; [chomp both words]
now the romaji input is the chomped romaji input;
otherwise: [Parse the verb]
now the root verb is the last word;
En ce moment, je suis au Congo-Brazzaville. Certainement, un peu de competence dans la langue français est utile. A l'hôtel, je pense qu'il y a une personne seulement qui parle anglais.
There are a bunch of languages I'd like to learn. But seriously it's so hard. Even trying to get competent in french is massively difficult, and in theory, that's one of the simplest languages for English-speakers to pick up since it's so similar. I like the idea of learning languages, but I find the actual process so tiring. I'd also like to learn Italian, and my wife's family is Vietnamese so I should get back onto that one. I had some passing ability in Vietnamese a while back but I let it lapse.
Also I should learn some Amharic, at least to get past 'salaamno' and 'ferenji'. The ge'ez script is quite attractive, so that should provide at least a little motivation.
http://newnations.bandcamp.com
Winner.
*chef-kiss*
お - oh
は - ha
よ - yo
う - u
noice.
This is going to take me 27 years to learn, huh.
I learned that word when I did my report on Japan in the 8th grade!
You’ll die before you learn it all. Japanese people die never knowing all there is to know about Japanese.
You can do usesbility in like a year or two, fluency in 3-10, depending on how often you practice.
I get called that because I was doing Matta Matta at people
So I have switched back to deutsch with Schnell! Schnell! weiter! blah blah blah {I forgot how to spell the next part :P }
I really know how to speak german far better than to spell it I am quite out of practice writing in it
Wait to you figure that 「おはよう」(Ohayou) means "Good Morning"
Then learn that 「おはようございます」(Ohayou Gozaimasu) also means "Good Morning"
Then try and deduce what on earth "Gozaimasu" means and your 10,000 word pocket dictionary doen't have the word.
Assume that "Ohayou" means "Morning" and "Gozaimasu" means "good" and Japanese is just backwards sometimes.
After that, use "Ohayou" and "Gozaimasu" in that way for an embarrassingly long time until you are corrected by your laughing Japanese friend
Discover that "Ohayou" is just a polite form of 「早い」(hayai), which mean "quick/fast"
Learn that "Gozaimasu" is the archaic verb "Gozaru" 「ござる」which means "to be" and no one uses that word by itself anymore.
Puzzle for a while about how on earth did those sets of words became a morning greeting.
Then...
After waking up your Japanese friend at 4:00am to take her to the bus stop, hearing her say in an exasperated way 「オハヨゴザイマス!」(OHAYO GOZAIMASU!)
Realizing she just said. "IT'S EARLY!"
Finally you learn that "Ohayou Gozaimasu" means "It's early" and Japanese tend to drop words if the context is understood.
I just saved you about six months of pain. Thank me later
*I appreciate my language learning experience is limited to Western/Northern European languages, it may well be different for much less closely related language groups.
**I do actually like duolingo, and use it in bursts to keep up my French and German.
Also, anyone got advice for learning these symbols? They're getting varied enough that I'm having a hard time keeping track. ;p
Also also, anyone wanna friend me on Duolingo? Want them cheevos!
The double-ticks ('') change the characters in predictable ways. For example, putting it on one of the "K" characters (ka か, ki き, ku く, ke け, or ko こ) changes them to "G" (ga が, gi ぎ, gu ぐ, ge げ, and go ご).
I don't remember the history/reasoning behind it, but the short version is it simplifies the memorization because you just have to remember what the modifier does to the original sound, and you automatically unlock five new characters.
(There are a few exceptions, but you'll learn them as you go.)
3DS Friend Code: 3110-5393-4113
Steam profile
If it’s got a ° instead, that’s called a handakuten.
ぱ Pa
ぴ Pi
ぷ Pu
ぺ Pe
ぽ Po
https://youtu.be/lyRQ3eJ-HuU
This will be here until I receive an apology or Weedlordvegeta get any consequences for being a bully
Turns out it's called a "kanji-gaeshi" 「漢字返し」and it literally means "Kanji Repeater"
There are only... 4? Sets of syllables that take the addition of the dakuten:
か>が ka>ga and all the other Ks
さ>ざ sa>za
た>だ ta>da
は>ば ha>ba. which I realized is the voiced labial plosive, in contrast to
は>ぱ ha>pa the voiceless labial plosive
There is also ヴ, which stands in for “V” in loan words, but is a bilabial fricativa rather than an interdental fricative that is more like Spanish “b/v” than anything that exists in English.
You can hear it in Akihabara and other places that still have DVDs for sale, mostly. :P
Edit: し and つ are somewhat different in that the begin with phonetically adjacent sounds rather than the same sounds of their syllable groups (sh and ts respectively), but the upshot is that じ and づ are exactly the voiced variants of these (j and dz), though j is a plosive rather than a fricative.
Currently I am learning possessives. There are... a lot of them.
So before I get into possessives, in Māori you have different pronouns depending on who you are talking to and how many people you are talking about. You talk about 1 person, 2 people, or >3 people.
And there's different words that include/exclude the speaker and listener(s). Including the speaker and listener, excluding the listener, excluding the speaker, and excluding both. eg, tāua, "us two, you and I" māua "us two, but not you the person being spoken to", kōrua "you two" and rāua "them two".
The tricky part is that there's logic to it but its not totally logical, use of the words has smoothed the edges off. The word for 2 is rua. And you can see that in the two person words, the "r" is missing from most but you can see it there in the "ua". And rā means "away from the speaker and the listener", ie "that", so you can see how rāua is "them two" as it is referring to someone who is not the speaker or the listener. (disclaimer, maybe I'm just seeing things and this is not how it works at all, but it has helped me with most of the pronouns, but not all, there's a few idiosyncratic pronouns that don't seem to match the others)
Interestingly there is no pronoun for speaking to yourself. I'm not really sure what you'd do there. So there are 11 different pronouns.
Where was I? Ah, possessives!
So... the gist is, that there is superior and inferior possessives. It's not a hierarchical thing, though it can be. But at it's simplest there is "ō" as in "of (possessor is inferior)" and "ā" as in "of (possessor is superior)". You are inferior to your boss so when you say "my boss" you would use ō, your child is inferior so you would use ā because you're superior, stuff you own is inferior but not everything, eg your car is superior (because it carries you). In general, something you can pick up and carry is inferior.
So, layer the superior/inferior onto the 11 pronouns and you have 22 possessives. But... there is also singular and plural possessives. So you layer that onto the 22 possessives and end up with 44. Luckily, most of these are very easy to learn. For most of them, if you know the pronoun, you just put the standard possessive in front. Eg, tō tāua (our (us two's) thing that we possess but are inferior to, our boss maybe) or ō tāua (our (us two's) things that we own but are inferior to, our bosses maybe).
...But then there is also future and past possessives. However, again, once you know about the other previous stuff, it falls into place.
These are mā/mō (the equivalent of "for" in English) and nā/nō (which is the past tense version).
Disclaimer, this is stuff I am learning right now. So I may have some of it wrong. But, I find it very interesting. Even though I have said it is easy once you know the first bit I'm actually having difficulty. Which I think comes from not knowing the first bits well enough. I still don't have a total handle on the pronouns and the 44 possessives. It's just a matter of needing more practice. A month or so ago I was struggling with the possessives, now I'm struggling with the future/past possessives. Progress!