Paradox In Traditional Spelling Rules

[topfield]

I have been campaigning against the English language Thai press's spelling of Thai names .

When printed in the newspapers : as pronounced, these names CANNOT be recognised or understood by Thais. The classic example is the Governor of the Bank of Thailand. The name as written by the Bangkok Post rhymes with Dracula...DEVAKULA. His name is in fact TEVA-GUN..!!

THERE ARE 60 MILLION THAIS. NOT A SINGLE ONE WOULD KNOW WHO DEVAKULA WAS !!!

The reasoning behind this strange " transliteration " was provided in a posting a few weeks ago.

"I don't know in which era it was decided, probably Rama 5 or 6, but it was decided to allocate an English letter, or letters to every Thai letter even though several Thai letters have the same consonant sound, though different tonal rules. The newspapers have to follow these rules "

OK , friends. Why then is the name of the top general in the Thai army spelt

S-O-N-T-H-I IE phonetically correct but for the ubiquitous uneccessary "h"

Yet the leader of the PAD is spelt S-O-N-D=H-I, incorrect phonetically ??

Or should I be addressing this question to the Editor of the Bangkok Post/Nation ?? [ They wont discuss the matter anyway..have tried]

[jdinasia]

Try the Thai language forum ... but you'll have to understand written Thai to get it ...<not the forum but the WHY> Basically there are 2 T sounds +++ aspirated and non aspirated ... and final letters in syllables have 2 types too (full stop or not)

[daveh]

It's funny how no one complains about the nonphonetically spelled "Thailand" and "Phuket". Yet somehow we all manage to say them correctly.

[ColPyat]

Or should I be addressing this question to the Editor of the Bangkok Post/Nation ?? [ They wont discuss the matter anyway..have tried]

If you have really nothing better to do, you may consider getting a linguistics and oriental studies degree, then spend the rest of your working life developing a better sythem of transliteration and lobbying for the introduction of your sythem.

Good luck with fighting the windmills.

[topfield]

Dear friend COLPYAT,

So you think this is a totally obscure topic ?

How long have you lived in Thailand ? Do you have Thai friends ?

Do you discuss Thai politics with your Thai friends ?

Do you get your info mainly from the Bangkok Post & Nation ?

If the answer to the above is yes, you just do not know how wrong you are !

The use of totally non phonetic names which bear little or no resemblance to the true name as used by Thais creates a huge invisible cultural barrier between Thais and non Thais.

It is indeed a very very serious matter.

Next time you meet with Thai friends and talk abour SONDEE you will be met by total incomprehension. Ask about BIDDAYA ( finance minister) and you will get wierd looks.

And this not only effects Foreigners talking to Thais but Thais talking to foreigners......should a Thai mention TEVAGUN you will not have a clue who he is talking about as the name you are familiar with and know is .....DRACULA sorry DEVAKULA !

Dear friend ...this is a very serious matter which damages Anglo-Thai cultural relations !

To our friend JDINASIA.

Sorry to contradict you but the name of the Head of the Thai army {surname Boonyaratglin) is spelt exactly the same as our firebrand publisher friend ( surname Limtongkun) so it seems the Post and Nation break their golden rule of using ancient incomprehensible spelling when it suits them.

'Deputy Governor Thani Plookcharoen (ธานี ปลูกเจริญ)

[topfield]

Dear friend COLPYAT,

So you think this is a totally obscure topic ?

How long have you lived in Thailand ? Do you have Thai friends ?

Do you discuss Thai politics with your Thai friends ?

Do you get your info mainly from the Bangkok Post & Nation ?

If the answer to the above is yes, you just do not know how wrong you are !

The use of totally non phonetic names which bear little or no resemblance to the true name as used by Thais creates a huge invisible cultural barrier between Thais and non Thais.

It is indeed a very very serious matter.

Next time you meet with Thai friends and talk abour SONDEE you will be met by total incomprehension. Ask about BIDDAYA ( finance minister) and you will get wierd looks.

And this not only effects Foreigners talking to Thais but Thais talking to foreigners......should a Thai mention TEVAGUN you will not have a clue who he is talking about as the name you are familiar with and know is .....DRACULA sorry DEVAKULA !

Dear friend ...this is a very serious matter which damages Anglo-Thai cultural relations !

To our friend JDINASIA.

Sorry to contradict you but the name of the Head of the Thai army {surname Boonyaratglin) is spelt exactly the same as our firebrand publisher friend ( surname Limtongkun) so it seems the Post and Nation break their golden rule of using ancient incomprehensible spelling when it suits them.

THE SOLUTION : as used by the Public Relations Dpt, [sadly sometimes only] Quote :

'

Deputy Governor Thani Plookcharoen (ธานี ปลูกเจริญ) . THIS WAY ONE CANNOT GO WRONG

[ColPyat]

So you think this is a totally obscure topic ?

I think that this is a topic to be dealt with on university level in the linguistics faculties, or not at all.

[Guest endure]

I have been campaigning against the English language Thai press's spelling of Thai names .

When printed in the newspapers : as pronounced, these names CANNOT be recognised or understood by Thais. The classic example is the Governor of the Bank of Thailand. The name as written by the Bangkok Post rhymes with Dracula...DEVAKULA. His name is in fact TEVA-GUN..!!

THERE ARE 60 MILLION THAIS. NOT A SINGLE ONE WOULD KNOW WHO DEVAKULA WAS !!!

I see you managed to get your cataracts sorted. Where did you go? Rutnin?

[Kerryd]

I see you managed to get your cataracts sorted. Where did you go? Rutnin?

I noticed that he seems to have regained control over his Caps Lock key !

Too bad this is almost exactly the same topic and arguments that he already put forth in previous thread.

[Richard W]

Sorry to contradict you but the name of the Head of the Thai army {surname Boonyaratglin) is spelt exactly the same as our firebrand publisher friend ( surname Limtongkun) so it seems the Post and Nation break their golden rule of using ancient incomprehensible spelling when it suits them.

Mrentoul, who then worked at the Bangkok Post, said that if in doubt, the rule was to ask the person how they wanted their name spelt in English.

Surely it's not really a degree-level issue. I really need a table to explain the issue, but I'll try my best with text. I'll use the labials as an example, as they have fewest complications. The two systems are based on the Sanskrit and Thai pronuciations of the letters at the beginning of a syllable, as they would be written by linguists.

Thai letter บ, name bo bai mai Skt. /p/ Thai /b/ mid tone class, English beginner's hint /b/

Thai letter ป, name po pla Skt. /p/ Thai /p/ mid tone class, English beginner's hint /bp/

Thai letter ผ, name pho phueng Skt. /ph/ Thai /ph/ high tone class, English beginner's hint /p/

Thai letter พ, name pho phan Skt. /b/ Thai /ph/ low tone class, English beginner's hint /p/

Thai letter ภ, name pho samphao Skt. /bh/ Thai /ph/ low tone class, English beginner's hint /p/

(At the end of a syllable, Thai pronounces all of these as /p/.)

If you want to give a widely understood hint on the pronunciation of the letter at the start of a syllable, you use the Thai pronunciation as the basis, as in the Royal Thai General System (RTGS). Unfortunately that system gives neither vowel length nor tone, so it is very difficult to work out the Thai spelling from a transcription - a way of representing the sound.

If you want to give a good hint as to the Thai spelling, and do not mind people coming out with a Sanskrit pronuniciation, you use the Sanskrit pronunciation as the basis, and this is the basis for a transliteration - a way of writing the spelling. (Does anyone have the documentation of this system? I have no idea how it copes with consonants and vowels that only occur in native Thai.) For words of Sanskrit origin, tone marks are very rare. This is my preferred way of doing a transliteration, but it is complicated by the need to handle the likes of bo bai mai, which occurs in old loan words from Sanskrit, such as /bùt/ บุตร 'son', as well as native words. My preferred transliteration of this word is something like

p'ut

. The apostrophe is not arbitrary, but based on ancient pronunciation. Distinguishing บ ด ฎ from ป ต ฏ makes transliteration schemes ugly.

There is an ISO scheme ISO 11940:1998 of transliteration based purely on the Thai pronunciation of the letters. It starts out by writing a macron over high consonants, then puts a dot under the first redundant consonant, and so on. I've seen two very different interpretations of it. Also the system of dots, primes and underlines is not easy to memorise - and the Estonian interpretation has accents on consonants! Both the Estonian and IBM (ICU) interpretations are difficult to type. I've never seen this system in use.

[samran]

I have been campaigning against the English language Thai press's spelling of Thai names .

When printed in the newspapers : as pronounced, these names CANNOT be recognised or understood by Thais. The classic example is the Governor of the Bank of Thailand. The name as written by the Bangkok Post rhymes with Dracula...DEVAKULA. His name is in fact TEVA-GUN..!!

THERE ARE 60 MILLION THAIS. NOT A SINGLE ONE WOULD KNOW WHO DEVAKULA WAS !!!

I see you managed to get your cataracts sorted. Where did you go? Rutnin?

Maybe he got them fixed at Samitwhere-d (Samitivej)

Also, on the topic for the BOT governor, well, I doubt 59.5 million Thai's would know who he is. He wasn't even the first choice for the job anyway.......

[kidtheung]

I think you better spend this time in learning how to read Thai characters, I had a little bit the same problem in the beginning. You can not be sure about translations anyway since western languages do not know the different tones etc.

The only way to learn to speak correct Thai is to learn to read their way, rather than to want to be stuborn and "translate" it into SOMETHING that you can read but never understand.

Peace !!

[sabaijai]

"I don't know in which era it was decided, probably Rama 5 or 6, but it was decided to allocate an English letter, or letters to every Thai letter even though several Thai letters have the same consonant sound, though different tonal rules. The newspapers have to follow these rules "

I forgot to mention, both statements above are false. The media follows name spellings preferred by the person referred to. For place names there is an official government list keyed to the RTGS, and it's quite logical. The same sound always gets the same Roman letter, none of theis 'allocating English letters to every Thai letter.