Tone Deaf

[buadhai]

I'm tone deaf, pure and simple. When I was in the 5th grade I was the only kid not allowed to sing in the chorus at the Christmas pagent. I learned how to play the clarinet, but after a few years my teacher abandoned me, saying that I just didn't have what it takes to be a musician. I once made the mistake of trying to sing at a karaoke bar in Tokyo. The Japanese were dumbfounded at my ability to sing "My Way" from beginning to end, all on one note. The microphone never again came "my way".

I've been traveling to Thailand since 1977. I've studied Thai for years. I can even read and write a bit.

But, I can't understand much spoken Thai and no one understands me when I talk.

My Thai girlfriend, a college educated professional, simply gave up. "Maybe you'll learn when we move there." The last time we had a lesson she was trying to get me to parrot two different tones. After many tries she just said, "Sorry Mike, I just can't hear any difference."

Trouble is, neither can I.

Please don't tell me I use tones in a different way when I speak English. I don't. People who talk to me on the phone say that I sound distant, or depressed, or angry and that my tone is flat. Since they don't have any visual clues and since I don't use tones, that I know of, it is very difficult to figure out the intent of my words.

Now, certainly there are Thai kids born with an affliction similar to mine. How do they learn to speak and understand their tonal language.

How can I overcome my handicap and learn to understand and speak Thai?

[slimdog]

Have a look at:

http://www.pattayamail.com/240/features.htm

cu

[buadhai]

Have a look at:

http://www.pattayamail.com/240/features.htm

cu

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks for the sarcasm. I think I made it pretty clear that people don't hear the speech contours that I supposedly use. That's why when people hear me on the phone they think something is wrong. I can't seem to properly use the "pitch contours" that English speakers use to express feeling. When I'm speaking with someone in person I can use body language to overcome that. But over the phone, I'm hopeless and tend to avoid the phone whenever possible because I tend to put people off with my flat, toneless speech.

Oddly, I can whistle in near perfect pitch....

Edited December 13, 2004 by mgnewman

[sabaijai]

The Pattaya Mail feature was spot on, I didn't note any sarcasm, just a humourous account of the facts.

Like the article says, there are no known speech pathologies for tone. Quite a number of empirical studies have also been undertaken to see if there's any correlation between musical ability, so-called 'tone deafness' and the learning of tonal languages. No positive correlation has ever been found.

I didn't find learning the Thai tonal system particularly difficult. More difficult than speaking without lexically-linked tones (as an adult learner), but not an insurmountable task. Learning to read and write was more difficult (although learning these skills improves one's understanding and execution of proper Thai tones immensely).

On the other hand I know several adult learners of Thai who just can't seem to get the hang of the tone system. I think 'language distance' explains that, ie, it's not something they've learned before so it's difficult. You may just have to accept that it won't come easy for you.

When I was undergoing Peace Corps Thai language training, one of my American classmates was fluent in English, French, Spanish, Italian and German. He had been one of the founders, in fact, of the famous School for International Training/Experiment in International Living (SIT/EIL) in Brattleboro, Vermont, a place known for its language training excellence.

Yet he couldn't get the hang of Thai, particularly the tones. He became the first volunteer in the history of Peace Corps Thailand to flunk the training program and be sent home because he couldn't attain the expected proficiency after three months of intensive training.

So there appears to be something about learning tones that's difficult for the adult learner. I don't think that aspect has been well studied yet.

Your problem with English tonal register suggests something else however. If I had to guess, I'd say the root of the problem is either sociolinguistic, ie a problem involving social identity and language. or psycholinguistic, a problem concerning personal identity and language. One factor that may relate to second language learning is ego permeability, which straddles both psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics.

Here's one of many references to this factor, from Reality Is A Belief:

http://newmedia.colorado.edu/cscl/87.html

"The language ego permeability hypothesis argues that adults have difficulty learning foreign languages, because they are reluctant to give up control over self-presentation. Giving up this control is necessary to learning a new language . In this paper, we present empirical data from two studies that confirm the findings of other researchers in this field, and support the language ego permeability hypothesis. "

And another:

"Whether you do or don't soak up accents is partly linked to a concept called "ego permeability". This lovely notion describes the strength or confidence of your sense of self. A person with a low self-conviction is said to have low ego permeability. A person with high self-conviction is said to have high ego permeability. LEP suggests high defensiveness and low receptivity to outside influences. HEP suggests low defensiveness and high receptivity to the same outside influences.

People who seem to have a natural talent for learning foreign languages are giveaway high-permeables. They're wont to warm to the accent, rub up against native speakers, feel comfortable in the culture, not worry about looking or feeling stupid. Generally, they're satisfied that near-enough is plenty good-enough."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/05/14/...s&oneclick=true

[buadhai]

Point taken.

But, I did pretty well in the Peace Corps learning Chuukese. And, my Japanese, while not fluent, is OK for a traveler. I spent relatively little time on Japanese. I've spent lots of time on Thai. The difference in results is remarkable. With Japanese I'm "satisfied that near-enough is plenty good-enough". With Thai, the progress is extraordinarily poor given the time devoted. Oddly, I do well with reading. I can handle a menu and have mastered the reading part of the Rosetta Stone CD's. But, when it comes to production of speech, the results are nill.

I have no explanation for the difference in results other than the tonality of Thai, bolstered by my difficulty with the tonality of English.

What I'm really interested in here is not a debate on the merits of my argument but suggestions on how to overcome the problem.

[gburns57au]

Dont feel too bad about it.....My ex gave my mate 5 different ways of saying Phout (speak)...and he never realised she was baiting him....I knew it straight away because I could hear the difference...he could not.

As a natural Monotone you need to think about how you structure your sentences. Try to include extra references to the message you are trying to get across.

[buadhai]

Thank you for the positive criticism. Just what I'm looking for.

And, I'm glad to know that I'm not alone in being an atonal speaker/listener.

I know that given the chance I can overcome this. I just need a little positive reinforcement and some suggestions on how to deal with what I think is not an uncommon problem

It's easy for those who have mastered a problem to be glib about their accomplishments. What is not so easy is to put yourself in the place of someone whose achievement has been less than satisfactory.

[meadish_sweetball]

Anybody who has heard Thai people sing karaoke late at night should be able to figure out that tone-deafness and the ability to learn the patterns of the phonematic "tone" system are not directly related to each other.

We had an American guy in our class at uni who spoke very good Swedish. He could never get the proper hang of Thai though - his American intonation came through and he started to stutter as soon as he was going to pronounce something in Thai.

I think your points are right on the money, Sabaijai.

Learning a language means you have to throw away your some of your prestige as an adult. You cannot be sure that the humour, irony or subtle hints you may have mastered in your own language and culture are understood by the people around you. You will be laughed at for your mistakes, you will receive the famous "blank stare" on any number of occasions even though you think you have produced a perfectly comprehensible sentence.

For many people, the older they get, the more respect they expect from their surrounding environment (I notice this streak in myself as well), and I think this is an important point to study when comparing learning a foreign language at different ages, because it impairs and inhibits the learning ability and willingness.

It is of course a cross-cultural problem too. I have also met plenty of Thai taxi drivers and people from other walks of life who say that Thai is easy and why can't foreigners speak it properly - their view is that if they can do it with their lack of education, it should be a breeze for foreigners who are perceived to be better educated. When it comes to learning English, many Thais will excuse themselves with "lin khaeng" (inflexible/hard tongue) when speaking of learning European languages, thinking themselves incapable of pronouncing the sounds we make. Of course, this is not true either. Since most Thai persons produce both "l" sounds and "r" sounds (even though the difference is blurred in the spoken language", they DO have the ability to learn to differentiate between them - the same thing goes for pronouncing an "l" sound at the end of a word, and most consonant combinations. My girlfriend is getting there even with Swedish since I always try to to found references for the sounds in Thai and then directing her articulation from there...

When it comes to learning tones though, the way I did it personally was to listen over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again to the tape provided with David P. Smyth's "Teach Yourself Thai", where there is a nicely structured section with a native speaker who says words with the same tone several times and then switches tone. At first I confused all tones more or less, but eventually I could make out the rising tone among all five, then I became aware of the difference between the mid and low tone (which sounded similar to me at first, but the way I would describe the difference now is that the low tone is so low that it "creaks", whereas the mid tone is a flat, "emotionless" drone. The high tone and the falling tone both sound a bit like a sulking, obnoxious baby, but the falling tone is more decisive and "final" whereas the high tone is more of an "appealing for understanding" sulk.

These rules is what helped me, as well as looking at actual diagrams, pictures of the tones and the curves the sounds create. In such diagrams you can see quite clearly the way the tones go.

Hearing the tones already, I went on to try to reproduce these sounds myself. At this stage, I had already started to learn Thai at uni. Our teachers would start with words in isolation and then make us repeat them until the tone was right. They would not give up either. If you made a mistake, they would again repeat the tone very clearly, and you had to say it back. I dont know if this is the best method, but it did work for me in the end. From isolated words, we went on to two-word, and three-word expressions. We had some particular drills for tone learning, one was

bâan lêek thîi hâa hâa hâa

house number five five five (555)

Each of these syllables have long vowel sounds and take the falling tone.

I also made my own "tone signs" during my first year of learning Thai. It looks totally demented, but I think it helped me in some ways to remember the tone for each word. I would "sign" the curve for each tone while speaking a word.

Good luck and don't give up! Also, remember to not worry too much about giving up your prestige when speaking Thai and don't be afraid about sounding "affected" when speaking. Many males in particular have problem with mimicking Thai because they think it sounds too feminine. My advice is to overdo it instead in the beginning. Once you have got the hang of the tones, your "true" voice will find it's way back to you and it won't sound affected anymore.

I dont have a clue if these hints will help you, mgnewman, but it's the best I can do.

[buadhai]

meadish_sweetball:

Thank you for your encouraging post and for taking the time to write it.

Mike

[Spee]

How can I overcome my handicap and learn to understand and speak Thai?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Paiboon Publishing has a book and CD combo called "Proper Thai Pronounciation." You might want to try listening to this over and over, along with practicing speaking along with it. Maybe it will help you. I hope you stick with it. Good luck.

[gburns57au]

Thank you for the positive criticism. Just what I'm looking for.

And, I'm glad to know that I'm not alone in being an atonal speaker/listener.

I know that given the chance I can overcome this. I just need a little positive reinforcement and some suggestions on how to deal with what I think is not an uncommon problem

It's easy for those who have mastered a problem to be glib about their accomplishments. What is not so easy is to put yourself in the place of someone whose achievement has been less than satisfactory.

The only way you will overcome it is by hard work....Sit down and listen really hard to them speaking, and if you can find one who has time to show you the differences and get you to copy them, just pick a few words at a time so you can practise those words.

good luck

[DavidUK21]

I am still very much a beginner, and at first could not get my head around tones at all. Something which helped me a lot was in a book called 'Thai for Beginners' by Benjawan Poomsan Becker with the Audio CD's. It is a popular and widely available book. At the beginning of the book (pages 12,13,14) there is a section entitled 'Different Tone, Different Meaning' which gives examples of the 'same' word with different tones. Try listening to these words on the CD spoken by a native speaker and then repeating them yourself. After a while practising, try speaking the words with a thai person who speaks english to see how you are getting on. I am slowly getting there.

[sabaijai]

mgnewman, I wasn't trying to be 'glib' any more than your first respondent was trying to be sarcastic. I took time to find references on the Web that I thought might help you, and I said I was aware that some people have a lot of difficulty with learning tones.

The extreme opposite of ego permeability is paranoia. I can think of two friends who have been in Thailand 10 years or more, have decent Thai vocabularies, a basic grasp of the grammar, and yet cannot produce the tones properly. In both cases, I don't think purely cognitive difficulties are to blame. I know them well, and know they have an unusually high sensitivity to social embarrassment. In my opinion their use of Thai tones won't improve much until they loosen up. Maybe that's asking too much, perhaps psychoanalysis is needed, I don't know.

On to some practical suggestions. Drawing curves of how I thought the tones could be visually represented helped me learn tones. The George McFarland Thai-English dictionary has graphs that were scientifically prepared. These might be of use to you (although McFarland's rendering of the tones were taken from real language samples, so he correctly identifies six tones for central Thai).

Good luck with your tones.

[buadhai]

Thanks to all those who took the time to reply, some in great detail. I apologize to sabaijai for over-reacting to his intial post.

Upon re-reading the replies and some deep self-reflection I realize that fear of social embarrassment is a big part of my problem. It probably goes pretty far to explain my inability to communicate effectively in English over the phone as well. (Of course, it doesn't really explain why I do OK with Japanese....)

I guess all the study in the world won't overcome a psychological problem like that, will it?

Now, if I can only learn how to relax. Maybe I'll even be able to do a decent "My Way" in a Karaoke bar....

[sabaijai]

Thanks to all those who took the time to reply, some in great detail. I apologize to sabaijai for over-reacting to his intial post.

Upon re-reading the replies and some deep self-reflection I realize that fear of social embarrassment is a big part of my problem. It probably goes pretty far to explain my inability to communicate effectively in English over the phone as well. (Of course, it doesn't really explain why I do OK with Japanese....)

I guess all the study in the world won't overcome a psychological problem like that, will it?

Now, if I can only learn how to relax. Maybe I'll even be able to do a decent "My Way" in a Karaoke bar....

That's the spirit, Newman, I think you're on to something.

Funny you mention karaoke, as I was forced to sing karaoke at a Thai wedding last week. The groom and bride stuck me in front of one of those karaoke monitors with the Thai lyrics flowing by and I was singing (or trying to sing) Thai songs I'd never even heard before, making a complete laughingstock of myself. I didn't have a clue what the main melody would was but I found that concentrating on the correct tones of the lyrics as they flowed by (fortunately these were Thai ballads) I could make up my own melodies. It sounded ridiculous I'm sure but it was a good way to focus on the tones of each word.

I forget now whether you'd learned to read yet, but leanring to read Thai well usually helps people improve their tones.