Words Borrowed From Thai

[zora]

as a thai speaker, i've learnt about Tinglish (or Thailish or whatever it's called).

i'm so curious if there'd be some English words borrowed from Thai.

all i could think of are durian, stupa, chedi, tom-yum, wai(hand gesture)...

but i'd like to know more if there's any left.

thank you if you'd help me.

[DavidHouston]

as a thai speaker, i've learnt about Tinglish (or Thailish or whatever it's called).

i'm so curious if there'd be some English words borrowed from Thai.

all i could think of are durian, stupa, chedi, tom-yum, wai(hand gesture)...

but i'd like to know more if there's any left.

thank you if you'd help me.

How about "Pat Thai" !!

[RakJungTorlae]

as a thai speaker, i've learnt about Tinglish (or Thailish or whatever it's called).

i'm so curious if there'd be some English words borrowed from Thai.

all i could think of are durian, stupa, chedi, tom-yum, wai(hand gesture)...

but i'd like to know more if there's any left.

thank you if you'd help me.

How about "Pat Thai" !!

Muay Thai

[aanon]

australia's most famous racehorse ever was named "Phar Lap", which was borrowed from Thai (means 'lightning'). apart from food and place names, 'muay thai' is also widely known, as is 'tuk tuk'. i wonder what others people can think of...

all the best

ps. oops, somehow missed the previous suggestion of 'muay thai'

Edited July 26, 2008 by aanon

[Jay_Jay]

The word durian actually came from Malay Duri = Hard Spike + 'an' a suffix that turns it in to a noun - or something that is ___... so durian = something that is spiky. Then.. the origin of 'duri' i suspect is from Sanskrit .. which is linked to the same root in latin and greek to where we get the word durable etc.

Chedi is also Sanskrit. Aanon- just realised that about Phar Lap! .. amazing

[katastrophic]

I'm not so sure the O/P's words would be classed as English words. They may be used by regular visitors to Thailand, but apart from maybe durian, these words are not in common use outside LOS. The Thai words borrowed from English are far more widely spoken and understood by the Thais, albeit with their own unique pronunciation and phrasing.

[pampal]

I don't know of any words borrowed from Thai and used in other languages

[katana]

I remember the word KLONG/KHLONG คลอง - a canal [in BKK] once appeared on BBC2's Call My Bluff as a word for the contestants to guess the meaning of several years ago.

There's a reference to it in Tiscali's Difficult [English] word dictionary [Hutchinson's Dictionary of Difficult Words].

http://www.tiscali.co.uk/reference/diction...a/d0007343.html

Not quite sure if that one counts though.

[mangkorn]

That's an easy one: "bong" - for smoking ganja. (sorry, no Thai script on this computer)

The original ones in the West were made of bamboo - whence the word.

[katana]

Good one mangkorn, seems to be more on it here:

"The word bong is an adaptation of Thai baung (Thai: บ้อง),[3] a cylindrical wooden tube, pipe, or container cut from bamboo. The Thai word passed into the English language during the Vietnam War when five American military bases were located in Thailand. One of the earliest recorded uses of the word dates to a piece in the January 1971 issue of the Marijuana Review.[4]"

http://encyclopedia.tfd.com/Bong

[Galong]

How about "ladyboy"

[Tyke]

as a thai speaker, i've learnt about Tinglish (or Thailish or whatever it's called).

i'm so curious if there'd be some English words borrowed from Thai.

all i could think of are durian, stupa, chedi, tom-yum, wai(hand gesture)...

but i'd like to know more if there's any left.

thank you if you'd help me.

I have heard from a reliable source that the Thai word 'buri', meaning district or area or something similar as in Thonburi, Nontaburi, Singburi etc was incorporated into the English language as 'borough' or 'bury'. I don't know anything more but it sounds about right. It may have been incorporated from Sanskrit or Indian but apparently it happened long before India was discovered by the British!!!!! It is a very ancient word and may have come via ancient Indo Europeans.

[george]

tand means teeth in Swedish. Same word in Thai. Any connection?

[Slip]

That's an easy one: "bong" - for smoking ganja. (sorry, no Thai script on this computer)

The original ones in the West were made of bamboo - whence the word.

I think the word 'ganja' itself is also originally Thai.

[Rikker]

There are many, many correspondences between Thai and English--but this is virtually always because the word is a loanword in Thai, usually from Pali or Sanskrit.

Pali and Sanskrit are Indic languages, part of the (huge) language family Indo-European, which includes many Western languages, including English. Words like โท (two) and ตรี (three) are pretty immediately recognizable as being related. The relationship of others is obscured by centuries and millennia of language change and evolution. Other times it's a more recent word loaned directly from Sanskrit into English. But it creates a number of interesting correspondences to notice.

The -buri/-bury connection is incorrect, as Richard W has demonstrated to me before (I thought it was on this forum, but I can't find it now). To briefly summarize/restate (correct me if I'm wrong again, Richard), the English bury/burgh/burough is from Proto Germanic *burgs "fortress" and ultimately from Proto Indo European *bhrgh "high". It corresponds to Sanskrit bhrant. Thai บุรี (and, rarely, บุระ) is from Pali ปุร pura "town, city". It's the same word as in, say, Devapura "city of the gods".

Correspondences via Indic languages include กัญชา/ganja, คุรุ/ครู/guru, บัณฑิต/pundit, มนตร์/mantra, มหาราชา/maharaja, กรรม/karma, ธรรม/dharma, พุทธ/Buddha, พรหม/brahma, nirvana/นิพพาน. Even English "emerald" and Thai มรกต are etymologically related, through Sanskrit. And "swastika" and สวัสติกะ/สวัสดิ์/สวัสดี. Among many others that are less obvious. Jay_Jay could probably list a hundred more off the top of his head.

The origin of "bong" is news to me, but I think that's great that there's a real Thai loanword in English. I've wondered this myself. Other than that, though, we can make the case for ผัดไทย "pad thai", which is widely known in the U.S., and perhaps หมี่กรอบ "mee krob" (but then again, หมี่ is a Chinese loanword into Thai, too).

Edited July 27, 2008 by Rikker

[Pseacraft]

One I hear all the time is "Nit Noi" in the US and out here in the desert with the US military. It is used the same way. Sometime folks will say Nit Noid.

Eric

[meadish_sweetball]

I'm not so sure the O/P's words would be classed as English words. They may be used by regular visitors to Thailand, but apart from maybe durian, these words are not in common use outside LOS. The Thai words borrowed from English are far more widely spoken and understood by the Thais, albeit with their own unique pronunciation and phrasing.

Maybe not as borrowings into English used in the wider English-speaking world, but in a small society such as Sweden where there are now more Swedes who have been in Thailand than who have not, some words, like 'tom yum', 'pad thai' and 'tuk tuk' are definitely widely known. An obvious difference though is that they designate culture-specific things, whereas as you say, many English borrowings into Thai do not, they will not seldom replace or be used interchangeably with older borrowings from other languages, or 'truly' native words.

[mangkorn]

An obvious difference though is that they designate culture-specific things, whereas as you say, many English borrowings into Thai do not, they will not seldom replace or be used interchangeably with older borrowings from other languages, or 'truly' native words.

I agree that is an important distinction. If "pad thai" came to be used as a word for "noodles," or "tuk-tuk" for small engines, then they would be full-blown loanwords. Thus far, they are limited to what they describe.

"Bong" qualifies because it replaced the previous "water pipe," and is now a generic term for such devices, not just bamboo ones.

[appleman]

The word "bong" is now an English word that is borrowed from Thai. TheThai word itself has its origins in the Hindi word "bhang" and that came from the Sanskrit word "bhanga" meaning hemp.

[mr_hippo]

A Thai concept that has found its way into English is 'white elephant'

[mangkorn]

The word "bong" is now an English word that is borrowed from Thai. TheThai word itself has its origins in the Hindi word "bhang" and that came from the Sanskrit word "bhanga" meaning hemp.

Appleman: just curious, if the Sanskrit means "hemp," how did the Thai variation come to mean "bamboo stalk"? Does bamboo have some hemp-like properties? Perhaps because thin strips can be used to make mats, thatch, rope? (Sorry, I'm just a city boy...)

It's also interesting that a word derived from "hemp" ultimately became known as the device that the fruits of a certain hemp plant are consumed through. Coincidence, no doubt, but a fun one nonetheless.

Cheers.

Edited July 28, 2008 by mangkorn

[Newbee]

A slightly different case: What's about the word "soi"? It may not be well known outside of Thailand, but in Thailand this word made its way into the English language and I have never heard any farang using any English substitute for it.

[Rikker]

That raises a good question--in the expat community in Thailand, how many widely-used Thai words are there. To qualify, I think a word would have to be used by those who don't speak Thai much (if at all), or even by tourists.

Soi, tuk-tuk... I don't have a good sense of which ones are used generally.

Edited July 29, 2008 by Rikker

[eefoo]

Interestingly I recently came across 'tuk tuk' as the answer in an English national daily newspaper's cryptic crossword. That implies someone expects it to be well known in the English speaking community. I didn't name the paper as I can't remember which one it was, as I do the Telegraph, Mail, Daily Express and attempt The Times as and when they become available here in the middle of the desert.

[zora]

as a thai speaker, i've learnt about Tinglish (or Thailish or whatever it's called).

i'm so curious if there'd be some English words borrowed from Thai.

all i could think of are durian, stupa, chedi, tom-yum, wai(hand gesture)...

but i'd like to know more if there's any left.

thank you if you'd help me.

I have heard from a reliable source that the Thai word 'buri', meaning district or area or something similar as in Thonburi, Nontaburi, Singburi etc was incorporated into the English language as 'borough' or 'bury'. I don't know anything more but it sounds about right. It may have been incorporated from Sanskrit or Indian but apparently it happened long before India was discovered by the British!!!!! It is a very ancient word and may have come via ancient Indo Europeans.

well i'm not sure if it's from sanskrit or not

but i'm sure it's not connected with the word 'borough' or 'bury' cus the meaning is completely different.

buri - บุรี means city in thai

[Rikker]

The -buri/-bury connection is incorrect, as Richard W has demonstrated to me before (I thought it was on this forum, but I can't find it now). To briefly summarize/restate (correct me if I'm wrong again, Richard), the English bury/burgh/burough is from Proto Germanic *burgs "fortress" and ultimately from Proto Indo European *bhrgh "high". It corresponds to Sanskrit bhrant. Thai บุรี (and, rarely, บุระ) is from Pali ปุร pura "town, city". It's the same word as in, say, Devapura "city of the gods".

(Here's my response to that from #15.)

[astanhope]

I was told at dinner the other evening that speed tablets in the UK are commonly known as "Yaabaa" from the Thai. Being an American and not having visited my ancestral homeland in ten+ years I do not know how prevalent this is.

The popular iPhone app / Facebook game "Words with Friends" which is based on Scrabble allows the word "soi."

Edited February 3, 2012 by astanhope

[zzaa09]

Good one mangkorn, seems to be more on it here:

"The word bong is an adaptation of Thai baung (Thai: บ้อง),[3] a cylindrical wooden tube, pipe, or container cut from bamboo. The Thai word passed into the English language during the Vietnam War when five American military bases were located in Thailand. One of the earliest recorded uses of the word dates to a piece in the January 1971 issue of the Marijuana Review.[4]"

http://encyclopedia.tfd.com/Bong

Interesting tid-bit.

Thanks!