English Words That Are Difficult To Pronounce Words For Thais ?

[bigbamboo]

This all seems a bit one sided.... picking on Thai's shortcomings and all that.

I know plenty of farang who have difficulty with saying English words too.

Like 'my round'.

[SinglePot]

Yes. I struggle a bit with Scottish too.

[Phronesis]

Refund

[marell]

A case can be made that a big part of it is the mechanics. For example, if you demonstrate to a native Thai speaker that the English 'th' sound requires the tip of the tongue to make contact with the upper front teeth you're halfway there. Same goes for most other sounds (like a 'v' calls for the upper front teeth to touch the lower lip). It's just that if a particular English sound doesn't exist in Thai, people have never learned how to produce it. Sometimes the hardest part is convincing them that they can. So instead of simple repetition (often frustrating) maybe try concentrate on the mechanics of producing unfamiliar sounds. It can be more effective.

This is not too dissimilar to how they try to teach us farangs Thai in the pronunciation of some of their more complicated characters (such as gnor gnu) and the vowels!!!

Exactly. Interesting though, that farangs can usually pronounce 'ng' fine...as long as it's not an initial sound.

[SICHONSTEVE]

A case can be made that a big part of it is the mechanics. For example, if you demonstrate to a native Thai speaker that the English 'th' sound requires the tip of the tongue to make contact with the upper front teeth you're halfway there. Same goes for most other sounds (like a 'v' calls for the upper front teeth to touch the lower lip). It's just that if a particular English sound doesn't exist in Thai, people have never learned how to produce it. Sometimes the hardest part is convincing them that they can. So instead of simple repetition (often frustrating) maybe try concentrate on the mechanics of producing unfamiliar sounds. It can be more effective.

This is not too dissimilar to how they try to teach us farangs Thai in the pronunciation of some of their more complicated characters (such as gnor gnu) and the vowels!!!

Exactly. Interesting though, that farangs can usually pronounce 'ng' fine...as long as it's not an initial sound.

Its all that singing they do!!!

[sprq]

Did you try "she sells sea shells by the sea shore"?

Actually quite easy as all of the sounds are present in Thai language.

Really??

Please give an example of where the "sh" sound is present in the Thai language

An "s" sound never appears at the end of a word in Thai, coupled with the fact that no word ends in an "L" sound, it makes it very difficult for Thais to pronounce "Shells"

A particular sound not being a part of a person's native language does not mean that person cannot say it. Given good tutoring and possessing the will to succeed, anybody on the planet can pronounce any sound in any language properly,

It's simply a matter of dedication and a good teacher. Unfortunately, most Thais have neither, hence the marked pronunciation difficulties.

[loong]

Did you try "she sells sea shells by the sea shore"?

Actually quite easy as all of the sounds are present in Thai language.

Really??

Please give an example of where the "sh" sound is present in the Thai language

An "s" sound never appears at the end of a word in Thai, coupled with the fact that no word ends in an "L" sound, it makes it very difficult for Thais to pronounce "Shells"

A particular sound not being a part of a person's native language does not mean that person cannot say it. Given good tutoring and possessing the will to succeed, anybody on the planet can pronounce any sound in any language properly,

It's simply a matter of dedication and a good teacher. Unfortunately, most Thais have neither, hence the marked pronunciation difficulties.

Yes, I agree, but my post was disputing that all the sounds in the sentence exist in the Thai language already.

[jcisco]

R and L seem to cause some Thais to look as if they are attempting to bite their own face off.... and the positions you use for these sounds are very

close to similar Thai sounds. It took my missus so much work to get her pronunciation correct but she does really quite well.

Th Sounds like There Though Through all seems to get the same treatment. So it sounds off.

And the end of words seem to go missing, can be very difficult to get what is being said. Especially if its a hard sound on the end like the word That. The T would be lost.

Actually i noted this too with Singaporeans with Two and Three, they would utilize the same position of the tongue when saying either of those words. And it leads to common misunderstandings when I or them use these numbers.

[masuk]

they have 'pombem' pronouncing any words starting with an "S' followed by a consonant

satop

sanake

sanack, etc.

on another note, the word VIRUS; it sounded like 'by-laws' to me.

Its not a problem, it is how the Thai rules define the saying of these words.

If they are learning English and want to be understood, it *is* a problem.

When I am learning Thai, I don't make excuses about English-speaking rules as they are applied to speaking Thai (i before e except after c...). I try to learn how to pronounce Thai words as closely to the way a Thai speaker would pronounce them. So IMHO - Thai people learning to speak English should do the same.

According to a program I saw on the BBC, that old "i before c..." business is no longer taught in schools, as there are so many exceptions.

[Neeranam]

Shrimp crisps

Squirrel

[crazygreg44]

Write down the numbers 17, 70, and 20 on a piece of paper and ask them to read these numbers out aloud.

You will be surprised that they will pronounce them all the same. . .

same goes with 25 and 75 . . . . !

Edited May 29, 2013 by crazygreg44

[Neeranam]

Write down the numbers 17, 70, and 20 on a piece of paper and ask them to read these numbers out aloud.

You will be surprised that they will pronounce them all the same. . .

same goes with 25 and 75 . . . . !

Sewenteen sounds nothing like tawenty

[SunnyBkk]

I think Thais can pronounce most of the words. Bad commercials (advertisement) and media gave them bad accent...like express = ach-prede, even Thais graduated from USA or England sill say the word "management" wrong..

Sometimes, I have to speak English in Thai accent to make Thais understand what I say.

Edited May 30, 2013 by SunnyBkk

[loong]

It amazes me when I see the many adverts on TV for Truemove H. The H sounds like "Edge"

As Edge is a pretty poor internet connection, you'd think that they would try to get the pronunciation correct

[SinglePot]

I think Thais can pronounce most of the words. Bad commercials (advertisement) and media gave them bad accent...like express = ach-prede, even Thais graduated from USA or England sill say the word "management" wrong..

Sometimes, I have to speak English in Thai accent to make Thais understand what I say.

I had the same problem teaching Italians.

Waving my arms around didn't seem to work.

[captainhornblower]

The Robert Palmer classic song 'Simply Irresistible' causes a few problems

[BKKdreaming]

Hi....just got back on TV , and have only read the last page but I see many ideas,

I just do not know how long they will last before they go crazy or head explodes

But I will read all of the replies and take notes ,

Keep it going......thanks

[SinglePot]

Burnley

[BangkokHank]

Electricity is one that normally comes out as Electric city

Even the electricity bill at my apartment has it written as "Electric city".

[Scott]

Names are a problem. I know several teachers named James.

[BangkokHank]

From my experience, Thais have problems, among other things, pronouncing the "st" combination, usually leaving out the "s". So
"fast" becomes "fat"; "cost" becomes "caught"; etc. And of course the "x" at the end of a word is usually replaced with a "k".

Combining these two mispronunciations: I ran into one of my students at a mall a few days ago and to make conversation, I asked her what she was doing there. She replied that she was there to watch the movie "Fat Sick". At first I thought it was a movie about some unhealthy overweight person. Then I realized she meant "Fast and Furious 6".

[SinglePot]

Accrington Stanley must be a bit tricky for them then.

[Yooyung]

Crisps...as in what Americans call potato chips. I've had fun on a number of occasions trying to get Thais to say this word. Usually they can manage 'crips' pretty easily but the 'sps' bit at the end always bet them.

Ever heard a Thai say Chesters Grill? It comes out like cheSTUH Giw....I think it sounds cute, especially when its being said by a young lass in a tight little university uniform!

[SinglePot]

Easier worn than said.

[Rolo Tomazi]

Once I asked for directions and was told about a place called "wet coat" - it didn't make any sense to me until I arrived at a shop called "West Coast".

All joking aside I am teaching first graders and it all starts with "one, too, tee, for, fai, sick...".

Unfortunately Thai teachers teach terrible pronunciation, words like "appen", "bisicken" and "footbon" are repeated and remembered. It is difficult to change that but if a good teacher tries hard enough it can. I growl at my students like a dog "rrrrrrrrr!" and they are having fun. They crack up saying "vvvvv!" in a big group but once they got it, they use it right. About ten out of 45 will use it right from then on.

As mentioned consonant combinations are butchered, words with rt, st, lm ususally end up with only one consonant. "three" is a very difficult word for them. What I really found difficult to understand is that "s" often turns to "t" as in bus "but" or horse "hort", or: "My name it..." and then the other way around: "hot" turns into "hoss" and "good" turns into "goose". How can you mix up s and t?

Maybe the answer is obvious if you know their language which I don't.

When I studied Japanese it all became clear to me. They have a syllable system, using "ma, me, mi, mu, me, mo", "ka, ki, ku, ke, ko" aso and are fitting foreign words into that. So "McDonald's" ends up being "Ma-ku Do-na-ru-do."

[SinglePot]

Interesting. Looks like Japanese add syllables whereas Thai seem to compress.

[Briggsy]

This is not too dissimilar to how they try to teach us farangs Thai in the pronunciation of some of their more complicated characters (such as gnor gnu) and the vowels!!!

gnu

ngu

Edited June 14, 2013 by Briggsy

[Zooheekock]

Aspiration is the key for many English words. The Thai language finishes the majority of words with a closed mouth. If they learn to aspirate at the conclusion of an English word that ends in a consonant or an s, it makes a huge difference.

Unfortunately that's not really true. To simplify dramatically, English doesn't use aspiration for contrastive purposes. In other words, there's no perceived difference between the p in pin [pʰɪn] and the p in spin [spɪn] - although the first is aspirated and the second isn't, we hear them both as the same sound. Thai is different - พ and ป (or ท and ต) differ in that the former is aspirated whereas the latter isn't. And whilst it's true that Thai stops are unreleased when they are syllable-final, in normal speech, they very often are in English too. What counts in English consonants is voicing, which is contrastive. For example: sue/zoo, mouth/mouth (the latter as a verb, eg 'He mouthed the words silently'), pin/bin, shin/gin, cot/ɡot etc) so it's useful for students to learn to be able to produce voicing at will.

Consonants which Thais typically have a problem with are the sounds in thin [θ], father [ð], ship [ʃ], measure [ʒ], chip [tʃ] and very [v]. You need to explain in detail exactly what your tongue, lips, teeth etc are doing when you make these sounds so some background reading will go a long way.

Although nobody will have a problem distinguishing between 'bop' and 'pop', when these voiced-voiceless pairs are syllable-final, they become very difficult. You can try seeing how many people can tell the difference between 'mob' and 'mop' or 'big' and 'bic'. Not many will consistently get it right.

The r/l distinction isn't really a major problem once students' attention is brought to it, though it's worth pointing out that the English r is different to the Thai r. Thais form their r by touching the tip of their tongue to the ridge behind the upper teeth; most native-speakers of English don't do this.

Most consonant clusters are a problem, though to varying degrees. Thai has no syllable-final consonant clusters so these can be more-or-less impossible (I know Thai speakers who would get an 8/8.5 on IELTS but who just can't say 'wasps') depending on what they are. Initial consonant clusters are easier - make sure the second consonant doesn't disappear and that no extra vowel creeps in.

Vowels differ in slightly subtler ways. In some cases, Thai uses vowels where English uses diphthongs (so โอ is not quite the same 'Oh' and เอ is a little different to 'a, b, c'). If you say the 'Oh' in "Oh my God", you'll feel your lips and jaw move - you're gliding from one vowel to another. Thai speakers typically won't do this. This is one reason why English rendered by Thai-speakers can sound a little flat and lifeless. As someone else said earlier, vowel weakening (using schwa or one of the other weak vowels) is a rare event so that needs lots of work, as does word stress generally. Students, for example, should be able to recognize and reproduce the difference between IMport (as a noun) and imPORT (as a verb). They'll naturally gravitate to the second pronunciation so they need to be trained out of this.

Beyond that, what's more important - and almost never taught - are the various ways we join words in English. Students won't be very successful at reproducing these but knowing about this makes a massive difference to their listening abilities. So, for example, when we join a word with a final consonant to a word with an initial vowel, the consonant usually leaves the first word and joins the second. We don't say "I want an egg."; we say " I wan ta negg." When we link certain classes of vowels we insert extra sounds. We don't say "Go in"; we say "Go-w-in" and we replace "the ice cream" with "the-y-ice cream". Most British speakers of English will also put in an extra r in phrases such as "My sister-r-is over there."

There's much more which could be said but hopefully that will give you some ideas.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Zooheekock

[Scott]

Troll post removed.

This is the teaching forum, please stick to the topic.

[wayned]

"borrow" Difficult from them to say and they definitely don't understand the meaning or concept?