I just had a crazy, but maybe kind of good, idea? I was rereading this post from 2010, in which I said:
20) And speaking of pronouns, I have a provisional decision. For a little while there I was doing singular/plural for all persons (ni/nu, se/so, ta/tu), but I don't think that's the way to go. Instead, I've kept nu for "we," possibly exclusive, on the grounds that it really does mean something different than "I," along with seni/senu for dual/plural inclusive. Also possible are ponu "we, all of us (exclusive)," poseni "y'all and me" and posenu "y'all and us." This then becomes the strategy for the other persons: "y'all" is pose, and "they" is pota.
What's uncertain is whether I really want to maintain an inclusive/exclusive distinction (my gut says probably not in an IAL, though seni is still a useful thing to have), and also what happens when these longer forms are used with verbs: i or no i?
Also, if there's seni, why not tani? A matter for further thought. Maybe I'm not as sure about the above after all.
Obviously many things changed (or failed to change) in the following 15 years. I retained nu "we," so "y'all" and tu "they" in use as the plural pronouns despite what I wrote above; seni "you and I," ponu "all of us," poso "all of you" and potu "all of them" have remained in the lexicon, but to my knowledge have never actually been used.
It just occurred to me...now that my tether to IALdom has begun somewhat to fray, what would it look like if all possible combinations of pronouns could be used as long forms? This would yield amazing, Polynesian-level specificity, or beyond:
1st Person Inclusive
seni "you and I"
senu "you and we"
soni "y'all and I"
sonu "y'all and we"
1st Person Exclusive
tani "he/she and I (but not you)"
tanu "he/she and we (but not you)"
tuni "they and I (but not you)"
tunu "they and we (but not you)"
2nd Person
tase "he/she and you"
taso "he/she and y'all"
tuse "they and you"
tuso "they and y'all"
That's a lot of roots to use up for such an experimental purpose, not even getting into the fact that some of them already have meanings. But...according to the accentuation rules I've since established, clusters of particles are typically accented on the final member whereas predicates have penultimate stress: thus soní "y'all and I" could exist unambiguously alongside soni "vein."
We could even combine the extended 1st- and 2nd-person forms into some wildly specific clusters:
1st Person Universal
tasení "he/she, you and I"
tasenú "he/she, you and we"
tasoní "he/she, y'all and I"
tasonú "he/she, y'all and we"
tusení "they, you and I"
tusenú "they, you and we"
tusoní "they, y'all and I"
tusonú "they, y'all and we"
How, though, would any of these forms actually be used? How do they fit into syntax? Let's see...
1) I think it's clear that they would need to fit into the category of pronominals we recently discovered that we have: that is to say, they would not take specifiers.
2) It should be unproblematic for these to show up in topicalized, focalized, and oblique positions. In the case of topicalization, the verb would still carry a pronominal prefix if the formal role of the pronoun in question is subject. These forms cannot, however, appear as pragmatically unmarked subjects:
ta.ní, nu-hui he lúlu.pai
she.and.I 1PL-meet TEMP Thursday
"she and I -- we met on Thursday" (topicalized)
se.ní sa luta ka lina kuo
you.and.I FOC find DEF city lost
"it was us (you and I) who found the lost city" (focalized)
ni.papa vo kau tea la se.ní
my.dad PRES.CL send letter DAT you.and.I
"my dad sent us (you and I) a letter" (oblique)
*ta.ní hui he lúlu.pai
she.and.I meet TEMP Thursday
"we (she and I) met on Thursday (unmarked)
3) What about object position, though? Do we say
ta-si.nae se.ní
3SG-saw you.and.I
"he saw you-and-me"
or
ta-si.náe-nu se.ní
3SG-saw-1PL you.and.I
lit. "he saw us you-and-me"
I believe it would be the former, because Koa doesn't have obligatory pronominal clitics for definite objects in other positions (like Macedonian would do in e.g. ја купив книгата "I bought (it) the book"). I think this spread of usages would thus mirror those of the emphatic pronouns nini, sese, etc., though I haven't spelled them out before. In fact, one could potentially regard these as a more specific, more marked category of emphatic pronoun!
Let's throw the "all" forms of the plural pronouns in there as well:
ponú "all of us"
posó "all of you"
potú "all of them"
I don't see any particular drawbacks to letting these all exist while we explore what they might feel like in actual usage. How neat!