Big Joke Translated

[Chao Lao Beach]

I see in the news a lot a gentleman called "Big Joke".

 

Clearly that is not an English name, or I would wet my self if it is, what does it mean in Thai?

 

"Joke" being a breakfast rice porridge ? Big Breakfast ?

 

Whats it'z mean ?

[DavidHouston]

Chao Lao Beach,

Are you, perhaps, referring to this headline in "ข่าวสด":

"‘บิ๊กโจ๊ก’ จับเด็กแว้น 56 คน ยึดจยย. 53 คัน พร้อมโจ๋วัย 15 แอดมินเพจชวนแข่ง"

Let's look at the elements: "บิ๊กโจ๊ก" is the nickname of "พล.ต.ต.สุรเชษฐ์ หักพาล รอง ผบช.ทท." [Police Major General Surachet Hakphan, the Deputy Commanding Officer of the Tourist Police]

"บิ๊ก" (derived from the English "big") is used as a prefix for powerful or high ranking military and police generals, among others.  It is described in Volume 1 of the "Dictionary of New Words" as follows:

"บิ๊ก ๑. น. นายใหญ่, เจ้านาย, เช่น บิ๊กการบินไทย. 

๒. น. ผู้มีอำนาจและมีอิทธิพล, คนใหญ่คนโต, คำนำหน้าชื่อเล่น ผู้มีอิทธิพบ ... 
๓. ก. มีขนาดใหญ่และสำคัญ  ... 
(อ.    big)..   

"โจ๊ก" - the nickname of General Surachet. My guess is that the nickname is derived from one of the Royal Society Dictionary meanings of the word: "(๒) ว. เสียงดังอย่างเสียงนํ้าไหล" [a loud noise similar to that made by flowing water]. I suspect the English equivalent would be "babbling". If this is his parent-given nickname, perhaps he was a noisy child.  

"เด็กแว้น" are young men who street-race motorcycles. "โจ๋วัย" or "วัยโจ๋" means "teenagers".   

"แอดมินเพจ" refers to the administrator of a page on social media. 

Other posters: Do I understand these terms correctly? Thanks.
 

[Oxx]

I'm a bit surprised that you plumped for "babbling", rather than the more obvious "rice porridge" or "joke".  The former would be an example of a nickname based upon foodstuffs, the latter of random English words and letters (e.g. "Bank", "Ple", "Big", "A"). 

 

The RID second sense of the word is an วิเศษณ์ (adverb).  Offhand I can't think of any nicknames that are adverbs.

[tgeezer]

Chao Lao Beach,

Are you, perhaps, referring to this headline in "ข่าวสด":

"‘บิ๊กโจ๊ก’ จับเด็กแว้น 56 คน ยึดจยย. 53 คัน พร้อมโจ๋วัย 15 แอดมินเพจชวนแข่ง"

Let's look at the elements: "บิ๊กโจ๊ก" is the nickname of "พล.ต.ต.สุรเชษฐ์ หักพาล รอง ผบช.ทท." [Police Major General Surachet Hakphan, the Deputy Commanding Officer of the Tourist Police]

"บิ๊ก" (derived from the English "big") is used as a prefix for powerful or high ranking military and police generals, among others.  It is described in Volume 1 of the "Dictionary of New Words" as follows:

"บิ๊ก ๑. น. นายใหญ่, เจ้านาย, เช่น บิ๊กการบินไทย. 
๒. น. ผู้มีอำนาจและมีอิทธิพล, คนใหญ่คนโต, คำนำหน้าชื่อเล่น ผู้มีอิทธิพบ ... 
๓. ก. มีขนาดใหญ่และสำคัญ  ... 
(อ.    big)..   

"โจ๊ก" - the nickname of General Surachet. My guess is that the nickname is derived from one of the Royal Society Dictionary meanings of the word: "(๒) ว. เสียงดังอย่างเสียงนํ้าไหล" [a loud noise similar to that made by flowing water]. I suspect the English equivalent would be "babbling". If this is his parent-given nickname, perhaps he was a noisy child.  

"เด็กแว้น" are young men who street-race motorcycles. "โจ๋วัย" or "วัยโจ๋" means "teenagers".   

"แอดมินเพจ" refers to the administrator of a page on social media. 

Other posters: Do I understand these terms correctly? Thanks.
 

How do you see ชวนแข่ง ? Challenge seems good to me so Is the page called ชวนแข่ง or is แอดมินเพจชวนแข่ง all one word, ‘administrator’?

*So they nabbed “hell- raise 56 person” and confiscated only “motorcycle 53 vehicle” (three pillion passengers) along with 15 teenage..... คน is missing I guess. *

I go along with oxx up to a point but my 2525 edition of the RID says that the English word ‘joke’ is a วิเศษณ์ , ตลกขบขัน so would have to go with the noun โจ๊ก , ตัวตลก (อ. Joker)

I think that English speakers who didn’t agree with the system might be seeing the man as ‘Big joke’ but that would be quite wrong in my opinion because it ignores the meaning of ชื่อเล่น and บิ๊ก as a Thai word.

Incidentally the second definition of โจ๊ก is difficult for me, as a วืเศษณ์ longdo gives an RID example which is helpful แกงนำ้ไสโจ๊ก Too watery (of curry)
เสียวนำ้ไหล how would that be used?

I can accept โจ๊ก as enough but I notice from longdo has the noun โจกเกอร์ when referring to card games and that may well have crept into everyday use. Can we assume that a person would get the nickname โจกเกอร์ rather than โจ๊ก nowadays?


*Is it helpful to try to make English ‘isolating’ or just hopelessly confusing? Is it helpful to add suffixes to Thai words or to ‘try to bring Thai closer to English.


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[Oxx]

51 minutes ago, tgeezer said:

I go along with oxx up to a point but my 2525 edition of the RID says that the English word ‘joke’ is a วิเศษณ์

 

Umm, I suggest you read again what I wrote.

 

4 hours ago, Oxx said:

The RID second sense of the word is an วิเศษณ์

 

It can mean "joke".

[tgeezer]

I thought that I understood.
My reference to what ชื่อเล่น means applies to your reference to "random English words" because it seems to suggest that a person would be given the name 'joke', it may well be a noun but can't serve as a nickname can it? Unless it is English, and I don't doubt that there will be those who think that it is, it could not have been prefixed with บิ๊ก when it was given him.


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[Oxx]

29 minutes ago, tgeezer said:

My reference to what ชื่อเล่น means applies to your reference to "random English words" because it seems to suggest that a person would be given the name 'joke', it may well be a noun but can't serve as a nickname can it? Unless it is English, and I don't doubt that there will be those who think that it is, it could not have been prefixed with บิ๊ก when it was given him.

 

Really don't understand you point(s).

 

Anyway, from Wikipedia "มีชื่อเล่นว่า โจ๊ก ทำให้บรรดานักข่าวมักเรียกว่า บิ๊กโจ๊ก".  In other words his original nickname was Joke.  The "Big" came later thanks to the press.

 

https://th.wikipedia.org/wiki/สุรเชษฐ์_หักพาล

[tgeezer]

I don’t blame you for not understanding, I do get confused with transliteration. The title of the thread is what I should be addressing “Big Joke Translated” . Translation is not possible because a name is just a name. Big Joke Explained would have been a better title and your last post does that adequately. The replies up to this point have concentrated on translation. Your earlier post had rice porridge or joke which I think should have been rice porridge or joker that is all.
I like to write more than the post calls for because I am aware that it isn’t just Thai speakers who read these posts, my comments are for them to ponder.


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[kikenyoy]

On 10/2/2018 at 7:29 AM, Oxx said:

Offhand I can't think of any nicknames that are adverbs.

How about เก่ง? It's a common nickname and can be used as an adverb.

[kikenyoy]

On 10/2/2018 at 7:29 AM, Oxx said:

I'm a bit surprised that you plumped for "babbling", rather than the more obvious "rice porridge" or "joke".  The former would be an example of a nickname based upon foodstuffs, the latter of random English words and letters (e.g. "Bank", "Ple", "Big", "A"). 

 

I agree. My ex-wife's nickname is "fried bananas" because that's all her mom wanted to eat while pregnant with her. I've heard other people with food nicknames say the same thing. Rice porridge seems like a likely candidate for that, but just a guess.

[tgeezer]

Have you seen the PM’s nickname, ตู่ short for ตุ๊ดตู่ and in the press บิ๊กตู่ . Now that is one easily misunderstood by those who don’t know the name.


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[AbeSurd]

Several threads on this already:

https://forum.thaivisa.com/topic/1075537-why-is-big-joke-called-big-joke/

 

Edited February 4, 2019 by AbeSurd
Activating link. I also see I've posted on the wrong thread. Sorry.

[tgeezer]

This is the only one in the language forum, which if you consider is the only valid place to be discussing the use of the Thai language.


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[bannork]

His father explained that as a kid, Surachate liked to play cards and his favourite was The Joker.

With his meteoric rise up the ranks of the police force due to his powerful patron, a man well known for having a lot of time on his hands, he acquired the prefix- Big, i.e. powerful.

Thus we have Big Joke.

[digbeth]

There's usually no stories attached to Thai nicknames, sometime the parent would've given a child one since birth and that's their 'official' nickname. The multisyllabic pali-sanskrit derived given names were a recent invention and the monosyllabic simplistic nicknames are more true to the typical Thai name. 

[tgeezer]

Many and various are the names, I know a หมูแฮม and a ต้นข้าว.  There will be many opinions on their origin, I was told that บิ๊ก is journalese also that there are more than a few people with บิ๊ก  before their nickname, I mentioned one in a previous post.

Also as bannork points out for the farang who like to think of "big" as the personification of whatever insulting characteristic it prefixes, that is not the case in Thai.