Does It Take Longer To Read Thai Than English

[h90]

This is just an observation.

I can read an english email paragraph in about 5 seconds or a web page of news for instance in about 20 seconds or skim through it in about 10 seconds...

But when I see my wife reading Thai it takes her ages to read an email or something with the same text translated in Thai.

I am wondering if this is something about the structure of the characters in the Thai script that makes it difficult to read quickly?

tryhowfastyoucanreadtheparagraphwithoutspacesandpointsbetweenIguessitisreallymuc

hmoredifficulttoreadkrap

[anothertorres]

she's probably just simple. have fun.

[nisakiman]

There was a thread a while back about the reading habits of Thai people. I searched for it but can't find it, the title of the thread was something along the lines of "why don't they read". Maybe somebody else can dig it out.

The general consensus was that Thai's just don't read, at least not for pleasure. Something to do with the way the language is constructed (as Ianforbes suggests), or just something to do with education (Or lack thereof). My wife Thai has a degree in accountancy, yet she wonders at why I would say statements such as "The movie isn't bad, but nowhere near as good as the book"

For so many Thai's reading seems more of a burden than a pleasure, another sad example of how their natural creative talent is laid to waste.

My wife is likewise a qualified accountant, and as she lives here in Greece with me is always looking for e-books in Thai to download. She doesn't seem to take too long to read her emails, and types both Thai and English at great speed, much to my embarrassment (I'm a two finger typist). When she's chatting on MSN to her mates, there is no hesitation in her typing, just bang bang bang and send. Personally, I would have thought that it should take longer to read Thai script, what with there being so many letters in the alphabet.

That said, she would probably favour Tom and Jerry over any book....

[thithi]

It depends on the text she reads, sometimes the same text translated is not clear or not understandable in Thai while it is in English.

I had practiced both Thai and English Reading in school. Reading Thai text, IMO, we needs a bit longer of time to understand. we get less information if we do the skimming/scanning. And we also have the words with several meaning, and NO spaces between words.

I'm Thai, but I do read texts in English faster than Thai ones....

[MikeyIdea]

Well, the example with the scrambled letters wasn't meant to suggest that Thai would have the same feature. It wouldn't, for a variety of reasons having to do with the fact that nearly all of the vowels are dependent vowels that need to be associated with a consonant (i.e. the Thai script is an abugida), and that the tone marks can only be written with consonants. It was meant more as an illustration of how English readers also don't pick words apart letter-by-letter, but look at the whole word.

As far as your suggestion that Thais are vowel-centric while Westerners are consonant-centric; interesting theory, but I don't know if I follow. Perhaps you can explain using Thai language as a specific example? My experience has been that consonants are crucial to correct tone pronunciation (the initial consonant in fact determines the tone rule for the following vowel, along with any tone mark and final consonant), so Thais pay as much attention to them as they do to the vowels.

I love this discussion, I'll try to explain how I think and let's see if you think it makes sense or not

Different parts of Thailand use different tones for the same word. Let's take the sample Mai = new. I will not, because I can't… write in Thai (and be ready today anyway), I'll reference the 5 tones instead. Thais would think I am crazy if I wrote this too.

In central Thai, Mai has the first tone, in the north-east, it is more like the second tone and in the south, it is the third tone (like if you delete the haa heep). And to complete the sample, in the north, people pronounce it using the fourth tone.

So there is no such thing as the initial consonant determines the rule for the following vowel, in practice that is. Yes, you are right that it is the way that Thai is taught, but as far as the Thais are concerned, that is where it stops. No Thai is practising consonant plus vowel becomes this and that tone. They do not think about this when they speak. This is connected to the way they are taught, how they are programmed to learn: They memorise. They are taught to not question, they don't question, it is the most natural thing in life for them to read the same word and pronounce it differently depending on if they are in Bangkok or in their home village. They don't think when they read, they use the memorised Mai with first tone if they read central Thai and the memorised Mai with the second, third or fourth tone depending on where they come from if they are in their home village. IMO

"My experience has been that consonants are crucial to correct tone pronunciation (the initial consonant in fact determines the tone rule for the following vowel, along with any tone mark and final consonant), so Thais pay as much attention to them as they do to the vowels."

That's where it is, IMHO. You write - My experience, and you are absolutely right. They way we are taught, we would take that approach. We also automatically try to find logic in things, Thais do not, too often a useless exercise in Thailand. "so Thais pay as much attention to them as they do to the vowels" – We do that, they don't. I think you are assuming that they do the same as you do. It is not my experience that they do.

Forget the theory, Thais get tired thinking of the theory anyway… Does it make sense now? The vowel is the one carrying the tone and that is the important information that Thais need to understand. We often hear that Thais are bad at guessing if pronunciation is wrong. I speak more Thai than English since the last 10 years and it is my opinion that Thais are OK at guessing consonants, it's the vowels they can't guess

Anyone remember the HBO film about the tsunami? There was a British woman there who was supposed to have lived for a number of years in Thailand and spoke Thai. I spent the whole film trying to understand what she said I think the consonants she had were pretty close, but her vowels were totally off. How can that be: Here we have a person who earns her living trying to act and speak like other people, she has lots of practice, she is an actress by profession and should have been good. Yet, she fails miserably at pronouncing Thai. I think it is because no one told her where it is important to listen, where her problems are going to be, where and what to correct. She probably tried to correct the consonants when it was the vowels that needed to be corrected, like so many other foreigners I have heard.

Thai judges do not practice case law, Thai law doesn't recognise the concept of case law even. Each case is different, even if it is the same. Hang on, that's the same as my sample with Mai above, isn't it

Michael

Edited November 4, 2009 by MikeyIdea

[A30]

This is an interesting topic. Looking at it from another angle, Ive noticed a quite a few students have problems with their eye sight and only one in twenty five [approx] wear glasses. Some have never had an eye test. Maybe they just can't see what their reading.

[Max2000]

I thank heaven for google translate and use it often. Even this program its not very accurate,at least I get a clue what a article is about. Missus usually take 'years' before she can give me a translation. Dont consider her "thick" at all, but people here dont read much compared to other nations.

[HappyThaiLife]

Discussing the matter with your wife or girlfriend would be the best course of action. Computer based translations are often inaccurate.

We don't discuss much at all. I might get no answer, or a wrong answer. I might make him lose face. He is no dummy, but reads very slowly and re-reads. He doesn't read much at all.

I see that as well...she reads slowly and re-reads, then again, she doesn't read much in thai. She works in english, is fluent and therefore writes many work and personal emails in english. Very few thai books around, many english, but I think that is her personal preference...

As for face....hmmmm, that is another story...wow, a large topic and one that I find very much fun with her. I don't mind losing more face...

[HappyThaiLife]

Discussing the matter with your wife or girlfriend would be the best course of action. Computer based translations are often inaccurate.

We don't discuss much at all. I might get no answer, or a wrong answer. I might make him lose face. He is no dummy, but reads very slowly and re-reads. He doesn't read much at all.

I see that as well...she reads slowly and re-reads, then again, she doesn't read much in thai. She works in english, is fluent and therefore writes many work and personal emails in english. Very few thai books around, many english, but I think that is her personal preference...

As for face....hmmmm, that is another story...wow, a large topic and one that I find very much fun with her. I don't mind losing face...

[a2396]

This is just an observation.

I can read an english email paragraph in about 5 seconds or a web page of news for instance in about 20 seconds or skim through it in about 10 seconds...

But when I see my wife reading Thai it takes her ages to read an email or something with the same text translated in Thai.

I am wondering if this is something about the structure of the characters in the Thai script that makes it difficult to read quickly?

I believe it is much slower to read Thai because of several factors

1) there are no gaps between the words, it takes time to divide them up.

2) groups of words together can have completely different meanings to the same words on their own.

It appears to me the whole sentence needs to be read several times.

I have asked my gf about the meaning of a word or two, and she will often say "I need to read the whole sentence first"

Just my opinion.

From my limited knowledge of the language here, I would agree that Thai is not the most efficient language in the world, particularly in its ability to express clarity or precision of thought and ideas. Translation between Thai and English can be extremely difficult at times, if not impossible. Often there are no equivalent words in the two languages. Trying to use a single word dictionary, to explain an English word meaning to a Thai, is an exercise in frustration. In addition, the education level of many Thais, who farangs are consorting with, is not necessarily that of university graduates.

languages.

[clausewitz]

In my humble opinion I don't think the Thai written word is difficult to decipher for a Thai. After all it's what they've been brought up with. It's the same as a westerner who'll come across a new verb they've never encountered before but instinctively know the past tense and participle. It's an automatic thing. My half baked theory is that Thais aren't as adept at "skimming" and "scanning" text as a westerner and literally have to read something from beginning to end to make sure of the context and meaning.

Of course I could be talking complete and utter <deleted>.

I am a very slow reader of Thai but I am getting faster. For a Thai native reading shouldn't be much slower than for an English native reading English. But it depends on how skilled one is at reading- and some English natives are slow.

[jayjayjayjay]

Typing Thai is particularly tough, due to many double keystroke characters.

Not accurate, but I think 46 consonants and 33 vowels. Vowels can be anything up to a combination of three individual vowels grouped together. Reading is just as horrendous to work out. I can never work out where the beginning and ends of words are! However, most educated Thai's are able to read with fluency subject to assuming trends in common phrases. So you wife might not read enough or have the education to do so. Good chance she is "thick", like me I should add . Thai is not a scientific language, so some topics are hard to express. In my experience, a topic begin translated for business purposes ends up shorter or close in length, but often more total characters.

[jayjayjayjay]

I think that your sample with first and last letter of words works for western languages but is not directly applicable to tonal languages. It works the same but on different parts of the words. Westerners are "programmed" to look for the consonants and the beginnings and the ends, the important information for understanding (the grammar is generally at the end), while in tonal languages it's the vowels that carry the important information so the Thais are "programmed" to look for them instead (It's difficult to get a consonant to carry a tone). I find that Thais generally guess pretty OK if it is the consonant that is wrong but they are bad at guessing if the vowel is wrong.

~snip~

My experience has been that consonants are crucial to correct tone pronunciation (the initial consonant in fact determines the tone rule for the following vowel, along with any tone mark and final consonant), so Thais pay as much attention to them as they do to the vowels.

I would not support this argument. I have observed that if you ask most Thai's to explain the tonal rule, they can't. It is not the consonant curial to tone as you have indicated, it is the first consonant as with English in combination with the vowels that is confirming the word in context. The vowel tone is automatic, it is memorized as singers do a song. This goes for my own spoken Thai. I once was interested in the tonal rules. I haven't looked at this for over 10 years, however, I can hear from a mile away a westerner struggling to understand tonal use within the language.

[yabaaaa]

This is an interesting topic. Looking at it from another angle, Ive noticed a quite a few students have problems with their eye sight and only one in twenty five [approx] wear glasses. Some have never had an eye test. Maybe they just can't see what their reading.

Many wear contact lenses.

[yabaaaa]

So is Thai a particularly good Language or not just too precise? Someone once told me the German language was very precise?

[dave_boo]

Crikey, my MIL gets the FIL to stop the car every three blocks to check and recheck the way and to confirm what the last somtam lady told her - they ignore me sitting there pointing at the satnav!

Ha-same here (well except for the part of stopping<_<). Funny thing is the wife WANTS the satnav in the Vigo (and off my bike) because of the face--I assume. However, actually using it? A falang invention that could show up a Thai? NEVER!