Which language is more difficult to learn to speak: English or Thai ?

[quiuvo]

I'm learning to speak Thai and think I'm making progress. My girlfriend helps a little because she thinks that I may pick up ladies everywhere who don't know English hmm . My Thai friends feel proud of Thai language and tell me I will not learn it fast because it is more difficult than English . I do not want to learn to write it yet.

I think English is more difficult by far. I need to convince them so. Help.

[i claudius]

Thai ,i am in my 60s and still cant speak it properly ,but i picked up english when i was only about 2/3 years old.

[manarak]

Thai is far more difficult than English - I can't even understand how someone can suggest otherwise.

A lot of Thais even don't master their own language.

[quiuvo]

Say it ain't so! We have such a rich vocabulary. Shakespeare would not have been able to write the masterpieces with Thai .

[andrewrooney]

It's difficult in different ways. Thai is difficult for us to learn because the pronunciation is so different than what we are used to. The grammar and vocabulary is actually pretty easy, though.

English is difficult for Thai people to learn because in addition to the pronunciation being difficult (for native Thai speakers), the grammar is far more complex, there's more vocabulary to learn, and spelling is inconsistent.

[andrewrooney]

Also, OP, if you are serious about learning to speak Thai, you should go ahead and learn to read it as well. Reading Thai and understanding how words are formed will help you immensely with your pronunciation.

[tingtong]

silly question...

but from a non English-native's point of view:

Thai, and by far, being a tonal language. yep, i am not chinese, nor come from another native tonal language, so, this is a major difficulty for me, and i believe for most.

throw in writing...thai is completely different alphabet, so, ground zero, cant use even my own letters i got used to...

so, conclusion: thai is by far more difficult, doesnt matter what you feel, really

test your skills with strangers, where they dont have to be polite about it. and get ready for a surprise.

PS:

i am not sure why the thai kids in most case cant speak English after leaning it for 12-18 yrs in school...

[manarak]

Say it ain't so! We have such a rich vocabulary. Shakespeare would not have been able to write the masterpieces with Thai .

vocabulary isn't the point - rather think about the tonal language, many works sounding the same even without the tones, and the same words have a different meaning depending on the tone, "new wood doesn't burn": mai mai mai mai, "far/near": glai/glai ...

I agree that speaking Thai, or more precisely, expressing in a clumsy way what you want, is quite easy if you got the vocabulary due to the almost absence of grammar and structure in Thai, so if the words are put together they will understand you and give you a smile "farang puut Thai daaai, farang gaeng maaak"...

but try to understand two Thais talking... they don't even pronounce properly between R L and N (proper Bangkok Thai is with a proper R), and then they swallow every second consonant, making every conversation sound like a soup of ai, aa, oo with random consonants thrown in-between...

and then the writing... all words attached, characters are not read in the order they are written... or not written in the order they are pronounced, your choice!

the alphabet... 44 consonants, 15 vowels!

the writing fonts!! sometimes I can't recognize a character I know because it looks so different in the font used - that's actually very frustrating.

and how many variants of t,d and k does one really need??

Edited December 8, 2013 by manarak

[manarak]

i am not sure why the thai kids in most case cant speak English after leaning it for 12-18 yrs in school...

poor teachers, poor school discipline, no people to practice with, mai bpen rai attitude...

[quiuvo]

Also, OP, if you are serious about learning to speak Thai, you should go ahead and learn to read it as well. Reading Thai and understanding how words are formed will help you immensely with your pronunciation.

I feel incompetent at the moment. Your replies make me feel this way. I will try to read Thai at a later time. Now I just want to talk. But when I listen to Thais talk it seems like a losing battle. Throw in the slang they have and I'm in big trouble since I do want to know what they are talking about.

[Neeranam]

I'd say English is a far more complicated language. Take 'ough' for example - it can be pronounced 9 different ways.

up - hiccough

off - cough

uff - rough

oe - dough

ow - plough

oo - through

A rough coated, dough faced thoughtful ploughman trudged through the streets of Scarborough after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.

And what about all the silent letters and idomatic phrases, 12 tenses! etc

[quiuvo]

Great great, enormous, gargantuan leap. I feel more relaxed. And I now there are 1,000s of examples like the above.

[manarak]

Also, OP, if you are serious about learning to speak Thai, you should go ahead and learn to read it as well. Reading Thai and understanding how words are formed will help you immensely with your pronunciation.

I feel incompetent at the moment. Your replies make me feel this way. I will try to read Thai at a later time. Now I just want to talk. But when I listen to Thais talk it seems like a losing battle. Throw in the slang they have and I'm in big trouble since I do want to know what they are talking about.

it will take a long time, because even although you might understand the basic words, you might still not understand what they are talking about, since the colloquial names given to many things are composed of other common words that acquire a new meaning when put together.

For example, in regular Thai: Rongraem = hotel. Rong = building Raem = half moon / i.e. = night ... creative, yes?

And this is regular Thai - then you got all the colloquial words (of which no decent ones come to my mind right now, LOL)

[manarak]

I'd say English is a far more complicated language. Take 'ough' for example - it can be pronounced 9 different ways.

up - hiccough

off - cough

uff - rough

oe - dough

ow - plough

oo - through

A rough coated, dough faced thoughtful ploughman trudged through the streets of Scarborough after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.

And what about all the silent letters and idomatic phrases, 12 tenses! etc

ok - but basic english is easy to learn

[Bender]

thai is an astouding hard language to learn for a normal foreigner.

only a thai will tell you that english is harder, mostly because they are lazy to learn anything in fact!

[quiuvo]

English teachers in here? Please help! How many words in the English language v Thai ? Also tell us about grammar and any other things that might help me? I know English is more difficult. I had a great example above fm neeranam. Any more? Oh, forget out lazy people.

[thaimite]

I think it depends on the level of language skill you are talking about.

To master basic conversation is probably much easier for English that it is for Thai, but if you aim to get a degree of fluency then English would be much harder due to its rich varied vocabulary and complex grammatical and spelling rules.

[Thaddeus]

If it hasn't surpassed it yet, there are around a million words in the English language, the vast majority of which will never ever be used on a day to day basis.

I have used this analogy before.....

The English language is like a piano, the Thai language is like a guitar.

I could teach you how to play 'Chopsticks' on the piano in a matter of minutes, and everyone would recognise the tune and its name, even if you hit the odd bum note, and you would have taken the first steps in mastering a language....... then I would play Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, just to illustrate exactly how far away you are from mastering a language.

I can't play either tune on the guitar.

English is one of the easiest languages to learn just to get a basic understanding of what is being said by a person of any nationality, Thai is one of the hardest for non-asians due to the tones and unfamiliar consonant conjugations.

Basic speak ..... English easier.

Edited December 8, 2013 by Thaddeus

[roamer]

I think it depends on the level of language skill you are talking about.

To master basic conversation is probably much easier for English that it is for Thai, but if you aim to get a degree of fluency then English would be much harder due to its rich varied vocabulary and complex grammatical and spelling rules.

Certainly some truth in that, with the caveat that those who are attempting to acquire fluency in English are probably also more used to studying at a higher level anyway.

One thing I have often noticed about non-native Thai speakers is that they are also often fluent in another language, quite often English. Possibly that gives them the confidence to learn Thai. Whereas with native English speakers they often tend to be as deficient in Thai as they would be in Spanish if they lived in Spain.

[quiuvo]

I should have said " to master." Let's say you only speak Russian and have a very high IQ but are told to learn Thai and English to be able to teach it at the university level, I wonder what he/she would say is more complex.

[roamer]

I should have said " to master." Let's say you only speak Russian and have a very high IQ but are told to learn Thai and English to be able to teach it at the university level, I wonder what he/she would say is more complex.

Have you met many Thai English teachers ? If you had then you might form the impression that whoever taught them at English at University was somewhat deficient in their ability to speak the language themselves

Edit. Notice I said "speak", they will of course be able to explain that in English a complex sentence has an independent clause joined by one or more dependant clauses, in Thai.

Edited December 8, 2013 by roamer

[canopy]

English is far tougher. I feel sorry for people having to learn so many idioms and slang to have basic comprehension. Reading and writing English is completely illogical and impossible without prior familiarity and memorization of words. Proper english writing is littered with junk like hyphens, apostrophes, commas, dashes, caps, etc--none of that in thai. And so with caps english has 52 characters to learn and with cursive it's 104. Thai language has no tenses and no plurals, hurray. Thai having a "bigger" alphabet is an advantage, not a disadvantage as the same vowel isn't reused to make different sounds like in english. Any word you see written in Thai you can pronounce precisely. Thai words are often shorter than english words because tones mean you can pack more into a single syllable. In english we get one word "cow". In Thai "cow" is many words based on tone including the word rice and the color white. That's easier than tacking on more syllables to deal with.

[canman]

Thai, certainly harder to actually learn the sounds. English certainly a more complex language:

Examples below from: http://www.english-zone.com/language/english.html

In what other language do they call the third hand on the clock the second hand?
Why do they call them apartments when they're all together?
Why do we call them buildings, when they're already built?
Why it is called a TV set when you get only one?
Why is phonetic not spelled phonetically?
Why is it so hard to remember how to spell mnemonic?
Why doesn't onomatopoeia sound like what it is?
Why is the word abbreviation so long?
Why is diminutive so undiminutive?
Why does the word monosyllabic consist of five syllables?
Why is there no synonym for synonym or thesaurus?
And why, pray tell, does lisp have an s in it?

In what other language do people drive in a parkway and park in a driveway?
In what other language do people play at a recital and recite at a play?
Why does night fall but never break and day break but never fall?
Why is it that when we transport something by car, it's called a shipment, but when we transport something by ship, it's called cargo?
Why does a man get a hernia and a woman a hysterectomy?
Why do we pack suits in a garment bag and garments in a suitcase?
Why do privates eat in the general mess and generals eat in the private mess?
Why do we call it newsprint when it contains no printing but when we put print on it, we call it a newspaper?
Why are people who ride motorcycles called bikers and people who ride bikes called cyclists?
Why -- in our crazy language -- can your nose run and your feet smell?

[toybits]

If you are Thai, English is more difficult to learn. If you are an English-speaker, Thai is more difficult to learn. Pointless questions - really....

[canman]

If you are Thai, English is more difficult to learn. If you are an English-speaker, Thai is more difficult to learn. Pointless questions - really....

Possibly the question is best answered by a non native english / thai speaker who has or attempted to learn both languages.

I am sure we have several who fit the criteria on TV.

[Ajaan]

Thai is far more difficult than English - I can't even understand how someone can suggest otherwise.

A lot of Thais even don't master their own language.

That's such BS. There's no such thing as a universal scale of difficulty across languages. It all depends on what your native language is. If you're a native speaker of Spanish, English is way easier than Thai. If you're a native speaker of Khmer, Thai is much easier than English. Etc. ad nauseam.

All normal adult native speakers "master their own language". They may be deficient in fancy, erudite, "learned vocabulary" or only functionally literate (or non-literate), and they may speak a non-standard dialect that educated people look down upon, but they are most certainly masters of the dialect they do speak and perfectly competent at communicating and understanding what they need to in the context of their daily lives. All human languages accomplish exactly what they need to do, and provided you learn the language from an early age, it will be easy to learn, and you will master it.

[Ajaan]

Say it ain't so! We have such a rich vocabulary. Shakespeare would not have been able to write the masterpieces with Thai .

vocabulary isn't the point - rather think about the tonal language, many works sounding the same even without the tones, and the same words have a different meaning depending on the tone, "new wood doesn't burn": mai mai mai mai, "far/near": glai/glai ...

I agree that speaking Thai, or more precisely, expressing in a clumsy way what you want, is quite easy if you got the vocabulary due to the almost absence of grammar and structure in Thai, so if the words are put together they will understand you and give you a smile "farang puut Thai daaai, farang gaeng maaak"...

but try to understand two Thais talking... they don't even pronounce properly between R L and N (proper Bangkok Thai is with a proper R), and then they swallow every second consonant, making every conversation sound like a soup of ai, aa, oo with random consonants thrown in-between...

and then the writing... all words attached, characters are not read in the order they are written... or not written in the order they are pronounced, your choice!

the alphabet... 44 consonants, 15 vowels!

the writing fonts!! sometimes I can't recognize a character I know because it looks so different in the font used - that's actually very frustrating.

and how many variants of t,d and k does one really need??

"Absence of grammar and structure in Thai"??? Please stop babbling about a topic--human language--which you clearly know NOTHING about. All language have equally complex grammar and structure...just because that structure exists in a form that you personally can't fathom or are unfamiliar with, doesn't mean the structure doesn't exist.

[AyG]

All language have equally complex grammar and structure...

Even Esperanto which only has 16 grammar rules?

[Joe Mamma]

Well, the question should be for people with normal hearing. But those who have trouble deciphering lyrics in music and other frequency filtered troubles, will find English much easier to learn. And it doesn't have to be perfect and full ranged as it can be understood even in it's pigeon form. English language is being simplified and mutated as the cultures decline. I learned it proper and see it being mutilated every day. And for the new vocabulary that is era specific, i don't care to learn, "yo bud" dig?!

[kingstonkid]

For us Thai is difficult. I took lessons and found that the tones completely messed me up

There is nothing int he english language that comes close to it.