Karoke VCDs As A Learning Tool?

[philo]

Listening to Bird & Sek this very moment, it struck me that karaoke VCD's - which can be used to learn Thai - has some strange logic.

There is (almost) always two lines: The first in Thai script and the second in transliteration.

The change of color going linearly - in a pace that relates approximately to the song - from left to right is IMO meaningless for the Thai text. Thai is not read linearly. So why put this color change on the Thai text? It won't help a Thai, and certainly not a foreigner.

If the color changed word by word in the Thai text line (changing when a new word is starting to be uttered), it would be an easy and fun way to learn Thai. Listening to a song and get the song - word by word - displayed right in front of you.

Put in a VCD or go here and see for yourself.

(Edit: It is not DVD, it is VCD - and the word 'color' got partly eaten by the small red ants in my laptop. May be a moderator could change the topic title).

Edited September 1, 2009 by philo

[tgeezer]

Put in a VCD or go here and see for yourself.

That was very nice, and slow enough too; I thought, how refreshing they don't seem to be singing in slang, is this common do you know? Did I see แหงบเหงา ? I can't find it so maybe it was เงียบเหงา which I have found. I don't know about the colours I find that I need to read well ahead to sing along and don't notice them. If they are all as slow and in decent Thai they would be entertaining to use.

Edited September 1, 2009 by tgeezer

[philo]

Put in a VCD or go here and see for yourself.

That was very nice, and slow enough too; I thought, how refreshing they don't seem to be singing in slang, is this common do you know? Did I see แหงบเหงา ? I can't find it so maybe it was เงียบเหงา which I have found. I don't know about the colours I find that I need to read well ahead to sing along and don't notice them. If they are all as slow and in decent Thai they would be entertaining to use.

As far as know, most Thai music videos are fairly straight language about love, missing somebody or your birthplace, money, betrayal, loneliness etc. (like in many other countries). Whether there is much slang, I am not able to say (my knowlegde of Thai is rudimentary).

At any market, street stall or shopping center you will find hundreds or thousands of these VCDs. Some are even intended for children, and can help in learning the alphabet and the sounds. They are priced from (ca.) 39-150 Baht. Just look for the word KARAOKE, and your Thai script with some kind of color-highlighteneing will be there.

My main point was that as Thai is not read linearly LETTER for LETTER or SIGN for SIGN, it would IMO be more logical to highligth WORD for WORD.

If you don't get VCD's, there are hundreds of videos like the one in the link. Open it and you will get related videos; open a related one and get more, etc. etc.

You will also find many tv stations showing these videos.

PS If this thread could be useful for someone, I kindly beg a MODERATOR to change the title to: "Karaoke VCDs as a learning tool?", with the sub text "Why is the color of the script linearly changing?". Thanks.

[tgeezer]

Put in a VCD or go here and see for yourself.

That was very nice, and slow enough too; I thought, how refreshing they don't seem to be singing in slang, is this common do you know? Did I see แหงบเหงา ? I can't find it so maybe it was เงียบเหงา which I have found. I don't know about the colours I find that I need to read well ahead to sing along and don't notice them. If they are all as slow and in decent Thai they would be entertaining to use.

As far as know, most Thai music videos are fairly straight language about love, missing somebody or your birthplace, money, betrayal, loneliness etc. (like in many other countries). Whether there is much slang, I am not able to say (my knowlegde of Thai is rudimentary).

At any market, street stall or shopping center you will find hundreds or thousands of these VCDs. Some are even intended for children, and can help in learning the alphabet and the sounds. They are priced from (ca.) 39-150 Baht. Just look for the word KARAOKE, and your Thai script with some kind of color-highlighteneing will be there.

My main point was that as Thai is not read linearly LETTER for LETTER or SIGN for SIGN, it would IMO be more logical to highligth WORD for WORD.

If you don't get VCD's, there are hundreds of videos like the one in the link. Open it and you will get related videos; open a related one and get more, etc. etc.

You will also find many tv stations showing these videos.

PS If this thread could be useful for someone, I kindly beg a MODERATOR to change the title to: "Karaoke VCDs as a learning tool?", with the sub text "Why is the color of the script linearly changing?". Thanks.

I didn't miss the point but as I said I have already read it by the time the colours track accross. I think that you are right though, hightlight the whole word.

[Tod Daniels]

Sorry this is long, and while this post is about the word highlighting on karaoke, I think this is still at least semi-on topic.

(If it’s not I’m sure the mods will delete it ) . ..

Thai songs are very useful in learning the language ONCE you have at least a marginal vocabulary and can read the thai instead of the horrific transcription they put below it. Because most songs are written for the ‘masses’, they usually use common words, phrases etc. The only draw back I have found is thai songs often use a lot of idiomatic phrases, commonly understood by thais, but often when translated into english are much less understood by foreigners learning thai. I have also seen most songs are written more like poetry rather than adhering to either spoken or written language structure, something that can also slow down the comprehension process when translating it back into english.

I always play all the karaoke songs on the pc with a piece of paper blocking the engrish so I am forced to at least try to read the thai. It is a plus that most popular song lyrics are available on the internet so copying the lyrics first and reading thru them helps a lot; given most karaoke songs display words just a few at a time, sometimes making the meaning of the verse tough to work out.

There is a poster on You Tube who goes by the name 'AnothaiDara'. She has translated over a hundred thai songs into english and does quite a good job of it. She also does lakhons, and other stuff as well.

I am working on translating my favorite songs from Sek Loso's most recent album so my friends in the US would have at least some clue what they were about after I sent them the sound files.

A song I am working on now called โลภะ โทสะ โมหะ is on YouTube here;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HD84SYkAA8

It has a good hook, chorus and also carries a great meaning (at least what I can glean from it). While he speaks just a little too quickly for me to understand the entire "preamble" he gives, (and I am not interested in least about the buddhist stuff just before the song), it is still pretty good for a contemporary rock song.

The lyrics to the song are below, and if anyone cares to give me what they think the english translation is, I'd appreciate it a great deal;

เคยใช่ไหม ที่ใจมันไม่เคยหยุดพักผ่อน

มีแต่ร้อน นอนในห้องแอร์ก็ยังไม่หายขาด

เมื่อชีวิตคนเราต้องก้าวเดินไปข้างหน้า

เมื่อเกิดมาเป็นคนต้องทนอย่าท้อให้มั่นใจ

แม้เส้นทางข้างหน้า มันจะโปรยลงมา

ด้วยลาวาที่ร้อนผ่าว

แม้ไม่มีกุหลาบ ขอให้เราจงทราบ

ว่ามันมีแต่ของจริง

ขอแค่ภายในใจ จงยึดมั่นต่อไป

ว่าทำดีแล้วได้ดี ชีวิตเป็นอย่างนี้

แค่นี้ เท่านี้เพื่อนเอย...

พอเท่านั้น ก็ความต้องการมันทำให้ทุกข์เกิด

กิเลสตัณหา โลภะโทสะโมหะให้ลดหน่อย

เมื่อชีวิตคนเราต้องก้าวเดินไปข้างหน้า

เมื่อเกิดมาเป็นคนต้องทนอย่าท้อให้มั่นใจ

แม้เส้นทางข้างหน้า มันจะโปรยลงมา

ด้วยลาวาที่ร้อนผ่าว

แม้ไม่มีกุหลาบ ขอให้เราจงทราบ

ว่ามันมีแต่ของจริง

ขอแค่ภายในใจ จงยึดมั่นต่อไป

ว่าทำดีแล้วได้ดี ชีวิตเป็นอย่างนี้

แค่นี้ เท่านี้เพื่อนเอย...

I firmly believe learning thai thru song is a valuable resource (for me anyway), especially given the diversity of their music. Most everyone can find a genre they like and use it to further their language skills. It is a shame that thai language schools don't rely on this medium more to further foreign students understanding of thai.

[Richard W]

The change of color going linearly - in a pace that relates approximately to the song - from left to right is IMO meaningless for the Thai text. Thai is not read linearly. So why put this color change on the Thai text? It won't help a Thai, and certainly not a foreigner.

Because it nearly works for English? English of course, isn't totally linear.

[Rikker]

For one, it would probably require more work on the part of the companies producing them. Look at it programmatically, they likely use a program for which they set start/stop times for each phrase on screen, and it animates the progress of the color change at the appropriate pace.

To do it your way, all of a sudden, they have to pay attention to when the singer is pronouncing each word, and match it up with the song in much more detail. Would it be better for foreign language learners? Sure. Would it make much of a difference for natives? Unlikely. And it's safe to say that their core market is Thais, not foreigners.

Thai is not absolutely 100% linear, sure, but overall it is very linear. Thais recognize and read words as units, and the units move left to right in a linear fashion. The color changing in the karaoke is not a problem for them to follow at all, and gives a rough guide as to the tempo of the music. That's all it's designed to do.

The only non-linear thing about the written language is certain vowels, but to ask Thais a question about the non-linear nature of their script would probably be about as effective as asking an English speaker questions like why the vowels in "heart", "hear", "heard" and "wear" don't rhyme.

[philo]

For one, it would probably require more work on the part of the companies producing them. Look at it programmatically, they likely use a program for which they set start/stop times for each phrase on screen, and it animates the progress of the color change at the appropriate pace.

To do it your way, all of a sudden, they have to pay attention to when the singer is pronouncing each word, and match it up with the song in much more detail. Would it be better for foreign language learners? Sure. Would it make much of a difference for natives? Unlikely. And it's safe to say that their core market is Thais, not foreigners.

Thai is not absolutely 100% linear, sure, but overall it is very linear. Thais recognize and read words as units, and the units move left to right in a linear fashion. The color changing in the karaoke is not a problem for them to follow at all, and gives a rough guide as to the tempo of the music. That's all it's designed to do.

The only non-linear thing about the written language is certain vowels, but to ask Thais a question about the non-linear nature of their script would probably be about as effective as asking an English speaker questions like why the vowels in "heart", "hear", "heard" and "wear" don't rhyme.

Thanks for your learned answer. With hindsight - I guess my question had better been formulated like this: 'Why are there many languages (including Thai) that do not separate words by 'space'? But I understand that that is a much more difficult question than the simple technical procedure of highlighting 'signs' word by word.

I am also aware that it (Thai) is their language used by them and they will not do much to make it easier for foreigners to read. Fair enough.

But in my opinion highligting word by word a second or so before the word is spoken would give those who have not yet reached the level where one - as you say - 'recognize and read words as units' (from a long sequence of unseparated letters and symbols), a much easier and funnier experience.

BTW As you obviously have read this thread, and you are noted in the 'Forum Led By' subscript of this forum, could you please change the title of the thread?

[desi]

Why are there many languages (including Thai) that do not separate words by 'space'?

Did you realise that at one time, English did not have spaces between words? Spaces in English only came into use in the 17 century.

Excuse the wiki reference... but Google Books are difficult to quote from...

Wikipedia Manuscript: In the Western world, from the classical period through the early centuries of the Christian era, manuscripts were written without spaces between the words (scriptio continua), which makes them especially hard for the untrained to read.

I know. It does not help you now, but I found it curious when I ran across the fact.

[philo]

No, I did not know until a few hours ago. I did the same kind of search as you and ended up with this and this (and of course many other).

The last link I found to be a good read - if you have the time you will see that it can be asked: Why is a 'railroad' not a 'rail road'?

So I guess languages can be written in units from separated symbols to long texts with no dividers at all.

In Thai, sometimes you see word separators and sentence separators, some times you don't. While it would be easy for me to get them all the time, I learned the same thing as you today: You cannot take them for granted, and they were not originally there in all western languages.

Still would like to have the 'easy' word by word highlighting though. Wishing for the moon ...

[desi]

I've spent a bit of time tonight searching for more too. It's an interesting subject and I wish I had someone I could ask. I have questions...

Looking at your links, we came up with the same info.

I also found No Word Unspoken, which is a decent article on the same book reference you found (The Origins of Silent Reading).

Scriptio continua is another. But after reading, I guess it all comes down to blaming the Brahmic scripts for the lack of spaces in Thai? It still does not explain why Thais did not introduce spaces to improve speed in reading, if this is indeed a truth. After reading a fair bit of The Origins of Silent Reading on Google Books as well as several detailed book reviews (not as dull as the original), I'm convinced it is a truth.

Btw - I posted that English started using spaces in the 17th century but I was incorrect. The Irish monks started adding spaces much earlier.

[Rikker]

In fact, Thai was printed with spaces in the early days of Thai printing. Dan Beach Bradley, an American missionary, brought the first printing press with Thai type to Thailand in the 1830s (though Thai script had previously been printed out of Singapore, as I recall). He published the first Thai newspaper, the first printed dictionary (older Thai dictionaries were handwritten), and the first official government publications. He used spacing between words.

You can see examples of early Thai printing with space in the Royal Gazette (ราชกิจจานุเบกษา), the official newspaper of record of the Thai government. For example, this 1903 page from the Royal Gazette (PDF).

I don't know exactly the chronology of when it went out of use, but from browsing the Royal Gazette spacing words seems to have gone away for a while in the late 19th century, then come back until around 1905. I'll try to look into it in more detail.

[Richard W]

But after reading, I guess it all comes down to blaming the Brahmic scripts for the lack of spaces in Thai?

I don't think the type of script per se is so much to blame. I can see two reasons why one shouldn't expect word breaks:

1) Sanskrit and, to a lesser extent, Pali run words together, with assimilations (sandhi) between adjacent words being marked in writing, obligatorily in Sanskrit and optionally in Pali.

2) Pure Thai is predominantly a monosyllabic language, especially if you count words like เจริน [L]ja [ML]roen as monosyllables. There are SW Asian writing styles which make the syllable boundaries immediately obvious:

(a) Subscript (or conjunct) consonants for 'medial' consonants

( Subscripts for final consonants

(d) Alternatively, marking final consonants with a virama - that was the original use in Thai of the symbol now used for thanthakhat, in which role it is called วัญฌการ [M]wan[H]cha[M]kaan.

(d) Mark initial clusters - that was the role of yammakan.

If you do these - and Thai has in the past - you rarely need word spaces. The problem with Thai is that it has discarded all these useful devices.

I'll now stand back and see if anyone turns on me with a claim that Burmese is hard to read despite using techniques (a) and (d).

[desi]

I don't know exactly the chronology of when it went out of use, but from browsing the Royal Gazette spacing words seems to have gone away for a while in the late 19th century, then come back until around 1905. I'll try to look into it in more detail.

Rikker, thanks! I didn't realise that spacing between words was attempted at one time. And what a wonderful subject! I tried to go to sleep after tripping into this and my brain wouldn't settle down right away.

And I see you've written about it before (I obviously need to read your site clear through).

Question... you are an accomplished Thai reader. Do you feel that reading would increase in Thailand if spaces were introduced? I can't help but notice that even the uni grads I know read comic books over proper books. So is there a connection? Due to the nature of the Thai script, does it take noticeably more concentration to settle into pages of no spaces between words (more than in English), over smaller bites with no spaces?

[desi]

If you do these - and Thai has in the past - you rarely need word spaces. The problem with Thai is that it has discarded all these useful devices.

Interesting. So, why did they get rid of what could be helpful to speed up reading? Was there a similar argument as with English? As below?

However the scriptio continua system (as it was called) had its defenders at the time. One fifth-century recluse called Cassian argued that if a text was slow to offer up its meaning, this encouraged not only healthy meditation but the glorification of God- the heart lifting in praise...

I can understand why Japanese and Chinese would not need spaces, but Thai is alphabetic.

Btw - a Thai course book I purchased recently uses full justified text. Some pages have huge rivers of text. On others, there are no spaces between the English words. I did not have a difficult time speed reading (and only noticed the lack of spacing when I went to critique the book). But there are words in English that would change meaning if spaces were taken away, so it would not work.

Edited September 5, 2009 by desi

[philo]

In desi's link 'No word unspoken' there is an interesting sentence. IGNORING spaces and capital letters it COULD have been written like this:

"an ci entan dmed ie valm an us crip tslo ok ed liket hisan dit wa seas ier tore ad the mal oud"

Now I know how 'block structured' my brain is.

(The sentence is: 'Ancientandmedievalmanuscriptslookedlikethis anditwaseasiertoreadthemaloud'

[desi]

Glen's thai-language.com has two interesting articles on spaces.

How do I recognize where Thai words begin and end?

Spacing in the Thai Language

But I still want to know why Thailand ditched the signals that helped speed up reading.

[desi]

Ah Hah!

Abstract

The study investigated the eye movements of Thai–English bilinguals when reading both Thai and English with and without interword spaces, in comparison with English monolinguals.

In sum, results from reading in Thai give qualified support for a facilitatory function of interword spaces.

Edited September 5, 2009 by desi

[DavidHouston]

Ah Hah!

Abstract

The study investigated the eye movements of Thai–English bilinguals when reading both Thai and English with and without interword spaces, in comparison with English monolinguals.

In sum, results from reading in Thai give qualified support for a facilitatory function of interword spaces.

Thanks, Desi. Could you translate that abstract/summary for us in English?

[desi]

David, as it is in English, is this what you meant?

The study followed the eye movements of Thai and English bilinguals (those who speak both fluently) when reading both Thai and English with and without interword spaces (spaces between words) in comparison with English monolinguals (those who know just one language). Thai is an alphabetic orthography (spelling system) without interword spaces (spaces between words). The participants read sentences with a variety of words (common and less common), with and without spaces between the words. The spaces between the words made a difference when reading Thai as the spaces helped with word recognition, but they did not affect where the eyes moved to (they did not hinder the separating out of individual words). There was not much difference between initial landing positions (where the eyes landed in the sentences) in the spaced and unspaced text. Removal of the spaces slowed down reading in English, which was made apparent by the eye movements in both types of readers (bilingual and monolingual). Discovering the beginnings (or close to where a word began) of target words happened more often with unspaced text than with spaced text. With bilinguals, it was even more so. To sum it all up: The process of reading Thai is easier if there are spaces between words.

(is that close enough?)

Edited September 5, 2009 by desi

[desi]

When I first read the below, I took it to be opposite of the summary.

'Here, initial landing positions were significantly nearer the beginning of the target words when reading unspaced rather than spaced text'

But perhaps what is happening is that when you take away the spaces, people are then forced to read word by word rather than by chunking.

Reading word by word slows the reader down, therefor the summary is consistent: The process of reading Thai is easier if there are spaces between words.

[Rikker]

For those interested, I've posted the full article as both PDF and text.

I can't understand everything it says, though. But a very interesting find, regardless.

[desi]

Thanks Rikker. I'm learning a lot of new words today...

[RickBradford]

Am I right in thinking that Thai children learn to read using spaces between words?

In any case, let us bless that long-forgotten person (religious scholar, I expect) who invented the space. A mighty achievement equivalent to that of Aryabhata, the Indian astronomer who invented the digit "0".

^

David: (An abstract of the abstract): Both English and Thai are easier to read when there are spaces between the words. Ground-breaking research.

Edited September 5, 2009 by RickBradford

[desi]

Am I right in thinking that Thai children learn to read using spaces between words?

I believe so. I have a set of first Thai readers. The first three readers all have spaces between the words.

Note: They are no longer being used by the Thai school system, so someone with the latest ones would have to chime in.

[Rikker]

That's right, desi, but only briefly.

I've attached an example page from a 1st grade textbook produced by the Ministry of Education.

There are no spaces from the 2nd grade on in the books I have.

[desi]

This is the one I have... 6 books.

There is the train, grandfather, Glass, Brave, Uncle, Black a crow and more... and that's just the first story.

รถไฟ มา

ตา มา

ตา มา รถไฟ

ดู รถไฟ

กล้า ดู รถไฟ

แก้ว ดู รถไฟ

รถไฟ มา

ตา ขึ้น รถไฟ

ตา ขึ้น รถไฟ มา หา กล้า

ตา ขึ้น รถไฟ มา หา แก้ว

ตา มี ลูกหมา มา ให้ เเก้ว

...

I approached the Government about putting it on WLT with sound and they said it's ok for me to use it. I just need to get written permission is all.

Edited: And I guess if we wanted to bring this post back on topic... we COULD sing too

Edited September 5, 2009 by desi

[Rikker]

Question... you are an accomplished Thai reader. Do you feel that reading would increase in Thailand if spaces were introduced? I can't help but notice that even the uni grads I know read comic books over proper books. So is there a connection? Due to the nature of the Thai script, does it take noticeably more concentration to settle into pages of no spaces between words (more than in English), over smaller bites with no spaces?

I think that would be very hard to predict, whether it would increase reading in Thailand in general. There must be so many factors affecting that. It might increase literacy, though. (Thailand claims a literacy rate in the high 90s, but I think they have a low standard of what constitutes literacy. Functional literacy and reading comprehension, must be much, much lower.)

For me, though, I still find it difficult to scan Thai text in the way that comes naturally to me in English. Say I'm reading a long paragraph but get distracted and lose my place. Even if I remember the last few words I had been reading, it can be difficult to quickly find my place in a large piece of text, and jump back in. (Although since I have a visual memory, often I will remember what area on the physical page I had been looking at, which helps.) I do think that the lack of word spaces, and the lack of sentence boundary markers (like the full stop in English), definitely contribute to this difficulty.

Once I'm settled in and something has my full concentration, I can move along at a decent clip. In that context I can generally "chunk" whole words, common compounds and expressions without problem. I can "read ahead", where my eyes and/or mouth have moved on while my brain is processing the previous words. This means reading more fluidly for me. But I don't believe I can chunk whole phrases like in English. And I also still find that the surest way for me to avoid getting tripped up or lost is to read aloud, whether truly aloud or simply a mumble under my breath. It's just easier for me that way.

[Richard W]

For me, though, I still find it difficult to scan Thai text in the way that comes naturally to me in English. Say I'm reading a long paragraph but get distracted and lose my place. Even if I remember the last few words I had been reading, it can be difficult to quickly find my place in a large piece of text, and jump back in. (Although since I have a visual memory, often I will remember what area on the physical page I had been looking at, which helps.) I do think that the lack of word spaces, and the lack of sentence boundary markers (like the full stop in English), definitely contribute to this difficulty.

The boundary marker effect is curious, as Thai uses gaps as boundary markers. Why angkhandiao and angkhankhu dropped out of use, I don't know.

[Rikker]

Thai uses gaps as boundary markers.

Yes and no. Gaps do mark sentence boundaries, but they also mark many other things, so there's no ambiguous sentence boundary. Indeed, there's no exact equivalent to the English sentence. Gaps mark the same things that would be marked by the English full stop, comma, semicolon, dash, and so forth. On top of that, gaps are also placed around proper names and other special use words. Gaps are also conventionally placed after the symbols ฯ and ๆ, even in mid-sentence (though usage is very inconsistent on this point). Yet another thing to make it hard to know when the sentences really begin and end.

Question marks and exclamation marks are used by some authors and publishers and not others.

Quote marks are also used with varying effect in Thai -- sometimes like in English, sometimes simply for emphasis

The single most confusing aspect of written Thai for me, though, is that there is absolutely know way to know when the end of a phrase or sentence (typically marked with a gap) coincides with the end of a printed line on the page. Thai does not mark this in any way. A leading gap on the next line would be extremely helpful. Otherwise, the natural tendency is to keep reading, since nothing overt (besides the context) tells you that it isn't a direct continuation of the previous line. It can be very confusing.

Why angkhandiao and angkhankhu dropped out of use, I don't know.

Nor do I.

I'm not sure exactly when the use of the markers อังคั่นคู่ angkhankhu (๚), อังคั่นเดี่ยว angkhandiao (ฯ), and โคมุตร khomut (๛) developed, but the only boundary marker found in the oldest inscriptions is ฟองมัน fong man (๏), which also had a variant form without the middle dot that looks much like the Thai numeral zero (๐).

I wonder if some helpful graduate student has written a thesis on the topic. I'll have a look and see what I can find.