Learn Thai
Thai is a language so diverse in origin and dialect that it can be difficult to define how many speakers there are but there are certainly over 60 million who speak a form of Thai much like the Standard Thai. While in many provinces and areas around Thailand related Tai languages are the inhabitants native tongue, most speak Standard Thai since it is used in all educational systems across the country. Thai is an official language of Thailand and is regulated by the Royal Institute of Thailand.
Thai’s beginnings are in the late Dvaravati period, during the 10th century, when the rising powers of Khmer empire and the Lanna Kingdom began to influence the Thai language away from the tonal, monosyllabic language which drew heavily upon Chinese. Other major influences after this came in the form of religion with Brahmanism introducing Sanskrit influences and Theravada Buddhism bringing Pali terms. In 1283 the first Thai alphabet was created, based primarily on Mon and Khmer scripts, at the behest of King Ramakamhaeng of Sukhothai. This alphabet has remained the same over centuries making 13th century inscriptions entirely readable for current Thai speakers. The creation of this writing system gave rise to a Thai literature which, given the sing-song nature of spoken Thai, was heavily poetic. Since Thai is a language that can easily alliterate all Thai literature was in verse until 1850.
On Studying Thai
Thai words are very different in character than English ones. Most Thai words are a single syllable and are not inflected or modified to reveal tense, number, possession, etc. Instead, modifying words are added which change the meaning. Words such as adverbs and adjectives, for example, simply use repetition to show intensity with a fat (“uan”) person being a “khon uan” and a very fat person being a “khon uan uan.” Rather than using intonation as English does to indicate whether a sentence is a request or a demand, for example, particles are added to the end of the sentence to indicate how it is meant to operate. “Cha” at the end of the sentence indicates a request while “si” indicates the sentence is imperative.
Another different aspect of Thai is that it is a tonal language with five types of tones: mid, low, high, falling and rising. This means that the same word can be said in different tones giving it radically different meanings. This can pose a thorny issue for students of Thai but “Chang puak gird nai pa” (White elephants are born in the forest), meaning, everything valuable is hard to get at. Thai has a large alphabet with fourty-four consonant symbols and fifteen for vowels which can be combined into thirty-two combinations. All writing is also continuous with no separations to indicate words or sentences. Finally, Thai has different registers to be used in different contexts: Common Thai used mainly for speaking among friends and family, Formal Thai used mainly in writing and for official applications, Rhetorical Thai used in public presentations and speeches, Religious Thai used for discussion related to Buddhism and therefore influenced by Sanskrit and Pali, and Royal Thai used in conjunction with the royal family and influnced by Khmer. While Common and Formal Thai form the basis of most conversation, the other registers are taught across Thailand in schools so most speakers are comfortable with them all.
