**the best book for short, serious articles on Thai modern culture**

For anyone above intermediate-beginner level. A book with Thai and a Japanese translation.

日本タイ　クロスカルチャー (Japan Thai Cross Culture)

199 baht

(318 pages)

(sold at Kinokuniya CentralWorld, in the general books shelf)

This one is a winner for Intermediate and above learners. It has about 100 short chapters on issues that interest Japanese towards Thailand. The chapters are roughly a page long. They start with a conversation between a Japanese and Thai to set up the key issues. There is then a remarkably insightful analysis of the differences. It does not shy away from controversy. My Thai friends were shocked by some of the analysis, but it seemed to me to hold weight.

Example chapters are 'Not keeping time', 'Buddhism: Part 1', 'Academic credentials and society', 'Driving manners', 'Sexual equality', 'Privacy', 'Signatures', 'Aging society' etc.

It is doubly interesting for a Westerner to read what Japanese think are signficant about Thai society. The stale West versus Thailand debate is replaced by the more nuanced discussion of a Japanese view and a Thai view. The discussion on how Thai's don't like losing face is contrasted with the Japanese tendency to be quick to accept blame. The issue of sexual equality raises the point that women can be far more successful in their careers in Thailand but in other ways are more repressed than the Japanese woman.

The shame is there is no audio. Perhaps a Thaivisa member can offer that service...

:jap:

[Obviously it is annoying that there is no English translation. I have offered to the publishers of all the books I have promoted to translate the books for them either commercially, for free, or any other way. I always get no response from them.]

Link to Part 3:

I'm glad to see the return of this series. I bought books 1 and 3 and liked them both, especially #3. I felt 2 was pretty basic and WAY overpriced.

After the first few lines I was really interested in this one and my only thought was "please let it have audio"...but, no. Still this looks interesting enough to buy. Like you say, maybe one of us can get it recorded somehow.

The publishers might not be interested in English translations but I'm sure the members here would be!

Thanks again for bringing books to our attention that we wouldn't find otherwise.