Speaking Thai

[DavidUK21]

I know the thai alphabet now and can read a lot of thai (although i dont know what most of it means)......but....... i cant speak it , i know this because if i try and change the tone of my voice then thai people dont understand me. my gf is thai, she doesnt really understand what i mean when i say that its the same word said in a different tone, she just seems to think its a completely different word, which i suppose it is to her. i can hear the tones on audio clips and stuff and can try to copy it, but i dont seem to get it right......so........ anyone got any tips about trying to speak the tones? is it just practise? will i get it eventually? would some private lessons help me?

PS what do thais think about us not speaking with tones? do they think thats a bit odd ?

[username2004]

Hello David,

That's actually my problem when I speak English. And I don't know how to change my tone. A teacher who successfully imitated the American tone/accent suggests that I listen to American movies and just simply imitate what I hear. I am not sure if that'll work. Just something to share.

PS what do thais think about us not speaking with tones? do they think thats a bit odd ?

As a Thai native speaker, I would say, not at all. Would you think my "Thai English accent" is a bit odd if I were to speak English to you???

Good luck!

[DavidUK21]

what i meant was, the english language not using tones. not me speaking thai without tones

[username2004]

Oh, sorry. If I understand your question correctly, tones, if mis-produced, could sometimes be confusing and thus either cannot be understood or can lead to a misunderstanding. (I don't think misproduced tones are odds; they are just confusing.)

For instance: Imagine you wanted to know who sells eggs, you would say, "ใครขายไข่ไก่" (Who sellss eggs?) But if you misproduce the tone:

Misproduced Tone: kai kai kai kai (read monotone-ly) = ไค ไค ไค ไค = ใครใครใครใคร (kRai kRai kRai kRai = who? who? who? who)

(Tone Produced correctly: ใครขายไข่ไก่ = krai kai kai gai = Who sells an egg/eggs?)

NOTE: I wrote "ไค ไค ไค ไค" because although we often do not pronouce the "ร" sound, we still understand that ไค (sweat) means ใคร (who).

[meadish_sweetball]

If I understand you correctly, David, you mean "Do Thai people think that it is strange that some languages do not have phonemic tones"?

Not in my experience, but that is of course limited.

Thais start learning English at age 7, and are aware of the differences, it is just that these differences do not seem to be stressed enough in the education of English (very little time in most Thai schools I have seen, apart from the better ones, is spent analysing and encouring students to come to the right conclusion through their own thinking).

As for advice for you how to better pronounce your tones, I think you need to try to strip your language of feelings, because it is most likely your wish to stress certain words and to convey how you feel about what you are saying that is causing you to mispronounce Thai.

Try to sound *as Thai as possible*, mimic exactly how you hear people speaking.

Do not worry about it sounding affected or overdoing it - because it is the right way to learn. If you really want to learn to speak another language, you have to leave your fears of sounding strange aside.

An added difficulty I seem to notice for speakers of English who try to learn Thai is that English does not really have a differentiation between long and short vowels. This difference is essential in Thai.

As Username2004 explains, "ขาย" should be distinctly longer than "ใคร", "ไข่" and "ไก่" (apart from the tonal differences).

With the tones, just keep practicing and don't give up. Maybe try to learn complete short sentences as well, and try to look at the tone pattern as a series of tones too, and not only the tones in isolation.

This is the best advice I can give. Hope it helps!

Cheers,

Meadish