Thai Language (Again)
Posted by Stuart at 02:29 PM on July 07, 2004Over breakfast on Sunday, Rupert asked me, "You've been living here how long?"
It's a question I get all the time. "Almost two years," I answered without thinking.
"And you still can't speak Thai?!"
Ouch.
I don't think he meant it as an insult, but he had a point. I would have thought that I would be much more proficient at the local language after two years than I am now. I rationalize it as: "No one speaks Thai to me" or "It's too difficult to pick up", or "I don't need it to survive".
But when I think about it, it is kind of ridiculous that I don't know more than I do. Sunday afternoon I resolved (again) to try to do something about it. If I can spend an hour a day studying Thai language, surely by the end of the year I should at least be able to communicate at an elementary level.
So, I gathered all of my Thai language flash cards that I have made over the past two years, removed the duplicates, and organized them into two piles: 1) monosyllabic words with no tone marks and 2) everything else. I then took Pile #1 and organized them into the seven main tone rules:
- High class first letter + Live syllable = Rising Tone
- High class first letter + Dead syllable = Low Tone
- Mid class first letter + Live syllable = Mid Tone
- Mid class first letter + Dead syllable = Low Tone
- Low class first letter + Live syllable = Mid Tone
- Low class first letter + Dead syllable + Short vowel = High Tone
- Low class first letter + Dead syllable + Long vowel = Falling Tone
Whew! Did you get all that?
Now I have 125 cards each with a monosyllabic Thai word with no tone marks organized into 7 categories. The way I figure it, I have 5 main tasks in starting to learn Thai, listed below along with test results to see how much I have learned in the two years so far:
- Learn all 44 Thai Consonants: 86%
- Class of all 44 Consonants: 66%
- Meaning of 125 simple Thai words: 46%
- Spelling of 125 simple Thai words: 51%
- Tone of 125 simple Thai words: 0%
Then, it seems like the course of action should be:
- Tone rules associated with 3 tone marks
- Meaning of simple words with tone marks
- Spelling of simple words with tone marks
- Then on to complicated words and grammar!
Ok, enough with the list-making, I've got some language to learn!
Stuart,
FYI - You don't have to learn the written language to learn to speak. Whatever route you choose though be sure and find someone to speak with. Find people who don't speak good English and who are not looking for someone to practice English with.
Good luck - choke dee.
I'm learning Thai as well, also without much reinforcement. Totally feeling you on this... it's so complex. Anyway, my Thai friends insist learning to read is too hard, so learn as many verbal skills as possible. (Though I'm learning both because I need the challenge)
Much luck to you, but I'm sure reinforcement would be easier for you to find in Thailand than here in the States.
-J.
Steve and Joe -- yes, I know that in general you don't have to learn to write to be able to speak. But for me, I almost have to. I have found out I am not very good at learning by listening. It goes in one ear and out the other (as my Mother was fond of saying).
In order to learn something, I have to SEE it and WRITE it. I heard an interesting talk at a conference yesterday that talked about the three learning paths: auditory, visual, and kinesthetic (i.e. motion, like writing). Although I am not a completely hopeless auditory learner, my strengths are probably in the order of 1) kinesthetic, 2) visual, 3) auditory.
Speaking of all that, it's time to hit those 125 flashcards again :)
when I last learned a language - swedish - i bought a lot of post-it notes and put the names of everything on them and stuck each note on the relevant item, from the fridge to the pasta and the toilet to the floor. the house looked stupid for months, but it really worked.
of course, with thai, you have the additional problem of first learning the actual characters as well...
you don't need to learn to read and write to speak properly- in fact in the beginning i'd advise against it as it can be discouraging as the alphabet is fairly complex.
learn the basics and then go out and practice practice practice. best strategy for me was to learn about 20 new vocabulary words per day and then make an effort to use them.
learning thai really made a huge difference for me- i've met people and had experiences i would never have been able to have had i not learned the language.
Jeremy, I'd give the exact opposite advice. For me, I absolutely do have to read and write to speak properly (since I have trouble with auditory learning as I mentioned above combined with the fact that the transliteration in the books is terrible). Sure the Thai system is complicated at first, but any language is difficult, you just need to spend the time to learn it.
Then again, now that I think about it, every single Thai language book I have (at least four of them) make learning the language much more complicated than it should be. At least that is my experience so far. Once I figured out the basic theory from the multiple books, I started teaching myself with flashcards and I ignore the books. I am having much more success this way. Perhaps I should write a book on "Stuart's Method for Learning Thai Language". haha.
In any case, one week after originally writing this post, I have learned the seven rules listed above. Now it's time to tackle the tone marks. I do agree with you that my life in Thailand will be very different once I learn to fully communicate in Thai. I can hardly wait!
(By the way, great website :)
hi stuart!
i figure my development is like that of a 5 year-old in that i can participate in most conversations but my reading and writing ability is... childish. =)
i guess it depends on what's the best way for each person to learn. i've got a good memory for sounds/music/etc so i can remember words and tones without so much difficulty.
the best way i learned to speak was by having a thai girlfriend who couldn't speak much english- so i was forced to learn to a functional ability. highly recommend that method of learning- especially if she is the attractive and intriguing type. ;)
take care,
jeremy
Jeremy,
Yeah, different people learn different ways. Take my post on food for example. My friend has told me the name of the chicken and noodle dish 20 times and I still don't really know how to pronounce it. And I am not that dumb!
And I know what you mean about having the SO who doesn't speak. I know that if I go live in Isaan I will be speaking another language within a month or two. Of course the problem there is that I'll probably be speaking something closer to Lao than what is spoken in Bangkok!
When I finish the "how to read and write" book I will send you a copy. hehe.
reading thai is hard, but once i got the hang of recognizing different letters and their sounds, my thai skills really took off. Soon you are trying to read signs, placards, names everywhere. Taking the time to learn the letters is really worth it in my books.
Tone rules i didn't memorize til i was there almost 3 years, but i try to mimick sounds of those around me and it worked for me.
my wife name is jirawadee and she just past i would like to know how to spell her name in thai so i can put it on her tomestome
a while back I was with a south american friend and he said "so, kevin, speaking thai yet?". before I blurted out a reply, saying how I planned to and all that, he said "yeah, me neither and I've been here 5 years".
*!*