Yes-no questions (also called “polar questions”) are formed by adding the particle ka at the end of the correspond statements.

Ya ga lai. – He/She will come.
Ya ga lai ka? – Will he/she come?

Ti no li fa it. – You didn’t do it.
Ti no li fa it ka. – Didn’t you do it?

The answer to such question typically consists in, or starts with, either wi ‘yes’ or no ‘no’ – hence the name.

As in English and many other languages, the pitch of one’s voice often rises at the end of questions. However, this is not required, and a rising pitch alone is never sufficient to turn a statement into a question – instead, ka or one of the question words covered below is used for this purpose.

Content questions (also called “open questions” or, in English, “wh-questions”) ask for some specific information. In Lugamun, such questions typically include one of the following question words:

ke – what, who, whom
ke jen – who, whom
ke ples – where
ke tem – when
ke xos – what
kese – how
por ke – why

(XXX Complete list.)

These question words are usually placed in the position where the corresponding word would occur in non-question sentences. In contrast to English, they are not moved to the front of the sentence (WALS 93; APiCS 12).

Ti li miru ke jen? – Whom did you see?
Mi li miru Tina. – I saw Tina.

Ke by itself is mostly used to ask about things (‘what?’), but it can also be used to ask about people (‘who, whom?’) if the context is clear.

Ke (jen) ga [volunteer]? – Who’ll volunteer?

In this example, jen can be omitted, since only people volunteer. But if you want to ask ‘Who’ll fix this?’, you should better say Ke jen ga [fix/repair] si?, since Ke ga [fix/repair] si? would likely be understood as ‘What’ll fix this?’

The expression ke xos ‘what’ can be used if you want to be very explicit about asking about a thing (or things) rather than about a person. But it’s rarely needed, since ke alone is generally fine.

XXX Examples for kese ‘how’ (in what manner, in what state, in which way):

… – How did you find me?
… – She showed her friend how to do it.
… – I remember well how I first met her/him. (used as conjunction)

If the answer will likely not contain a copula, no copula is used in the question either:

Ti kese? – How are you?
Mi hau. – I’m good.

XXX Explain how to express ‘which’ and ‘how many/how much’.