Kham muang learn = PLEASE NO CENTRAL THAI..!

[KhamMuang]

In Chiang Mai and northern Thailand (a.k.a pahk neua) locals can often be heard to use words your are unlikely to hear in Bangkok. Kham muang, peculiarities overlap with those of the Lao language and the dialet of Thailands northeast, Isaan.

I would like to extend this as I am also learning and have reached the limit with the below - (I am male so it acts as neutral tone to).

I hope this will help someone else out there too who would like to learn this.

... PLEASE NO CENTRAL THAI ...

Chiang Mai Province

#######################

MEN OR NEUTRAL

#######################

ba bpen yang = never mind

a-yahng = what

hoo(h) = know

ba hop = I don’t know

sabai dee for = are you well?

bpee(f) elder sibling but not old enough to be your parents siblings

sorp(f) = to like

Gin kao for = You eat or not?

sawatdee khap = hello by men

ai(f) = I - male first person pronoun

jai(f) gor(l) = ‘isn’t it?’ or ‘aren’t you?’

gor(l) = not

ner(f) = ‘okay?’ or ‘right?’

meuan(f) = fun

kor hai meuan ner. = I would like to give you fun okay?

jaht(f) nuk(h) = much, many, a lot

nyia(h) = do, make

haem® = more, another

kum® = joke

oo(f) = talk, speak

pai® = who

sa-lee = bed

Gor Dai = can if you want

Khap Khun jaht nuk = highest thanks

Pin = to turn over

pin-ja-lin = opposite

#######################

WOMAN

#######################

sawatdee jao(f) = hello by old woman

kha jao = I -- female first person pronoun

Dtaa® = true / chiang mia girl nickname

#######################

COUNTING

#######################

são = Twenty

#######################

SENTENCES

#######################

Chiang Mai = Ai sorp oo kham muang jaht nuk. Meuan jai gor?

English = I like speaking northern Thai a lot. It’s fun, isn’t it.

[BritManToo]

nyia (sounds like neeya) = look at that, or look over there

where you write 'for' I hear 'baw'

where you write 'ner' I hear ler, law and ror

Gor dai = OK (everywhere in Thailand)

[KhamMuang]

Thank-you britmantoo

I made a spelling mistake.

ba hoo = I don’t know

sabai dee gor = are you well?

[BritManToo]

ba hoo = I dont know

sabai dee gor = are you well?

Are you sure it's not

baw hoo

sabai dee baw

????

[KhamMuang]

ba hoo = I dont know

sabai dee gor = are you well?

Are you sure it's not

baw hoo

sabai dee baw

????

Ba corresponds to mai, -- Roo, central thai for 'know' becomes hoo(h) hence ba hoo means I dont know.

[BritManToo]

ba hoo = I dont know

sabai dee gor = are you well?

Are you sure it's not

baw hoo

sabai dee baw

????

Roo, central thai for 'know' becomes hoo(h) hence ba hoo means I dont know.

'Baw' is Lanna/Issan for 'not'

Usually written as บ.

[KhamMuang]

@Britmantoo - this language is kham muang / yuan ---- a mix of lao and isaan.

[Briggsy]

Study Laos, for which there is material available. You will understand Kham Meuang in leaps and bounds. Learn the Thai alphabet in which kham meuang when written is written in and you will be able to see all the correct pronunciations.

[Richard W]

There's a whole list of words in the Peace Corps Dictionary, which I'm painfully slowly annotating, as I mentioned in the archived thread Does anyone know the Thai Norther dialect. The link to what I have done so far is still at http://homepage.ntlworld.com/richard.wordingham/lanna/peace_corps_dictionary.pdf , as given in that thread. Replace '.pdf' by '.odt' for the LibreOffice master. You will need your own font for the tua mueang if you use the LibreOffice master.

I've tried to copy the original's text accurately, but it isn't easy to deduce the pronunciation. I've usually been able to work it out with the aid of other dictionaries. Note that the equation of tones in dead syllables to syllables in live tones is not beyond dispute, and I'm not sure that there is one equation that matches all of Northern Thai. The equation with Bangkok tones is not beyond dispute. The notation is based on the Chiangmai accent, and a key to the meaning of the tone syllables has to be worked out for each Northern Thai accent. There appears to be a Lao tinge to the original dictionary.

Corrections to typos - or more precisely incorrect pronunciations - up to where I've annotated the example sentences with pronunciations will be appreciated and first corrections will be acknowledged. The links to precise posts acknowledging previous help need to be updated - the ThaiVisa post URIs have been changed.

Mekong Bob said (citation 1 and citation 2) that he would produce his own version, but I haven't found anything beyond a nice looking sample he posted in citation 1.

[Richard W]

ba hoo = I dont know

sabai dee gor = are you well?

Are you sure it's not

baw hoo

sabai dee baw

????

สบายดีก่อ [-]sa[M]baai [M]dii [L]kaw is fine. ([-] indicates tonelessness.)

While บ่ฮู้ [L]baw [H]huu is fine for 'I don't know', the first word may be reduced. Indeed, as in Tai Lue to the north (Burma, Chinese and Laos, with guest appearances in Thailand), the first syllable can be reduced to a syllabic nasal, which I'm tempted to represent as [-]mm.

[KhamMuang]

My girlfriend comes from chiang mia city bound. So I am trying to understand her at times. "facepalm"

She says that her LOCAL LANGUAGE / Lanna = "NOT bangkok = central thai" is not written like normal text as I have started to notice.

I wanted to create a thread that would help me and others understand how to say certain words by keeping it SIMPLE.

I will look into laos as stated by briggsy - I noticed it this morning that laos is the main.

For example:

ai = I / male

baa = go

ba = crazy

cheng-wa = <deleted> boring

lamgaan = be quiet / shutup

ba bpen yang = never mind

ta-lee = beach

forgot what steering wheel is and still trying to say 'YOU' thou... ???!!! "ai baa ba" "shakehead"

[Richard W]

My girlfriend comes from chiang mia city bound. So I am trying to understand her at times. "facepalm"

She says that her LOCAL LANGUAGE / Lanna = "NOT bangkok = central thai" is not written like normal text as I have started to notice.

I wanted to create a thread that would help me and others understand how to say certain words by keeping it SIMPLE.

I will look into laos as stated by briggsy - I noticed it this morning that laos is the main.

While Kam Mueang has a lot in common with Lao, allegedly at a deeper level it has more in common with Siamese. Like Isan, it has a lot of Siamese loans, with varying degrees of assimilation.

Chiangmai tones are somewhat similar to Siamese, unlike Isan or Lao tones. The famous difference is that there are two falling tones rather than one - the words with, in Siamese, high or middle consonant initials and mai tho have the 'high' falling tone, sometimes described as having a late fall, and those with low consonant initials and mai ek have the 'low' falling tone, which is more like the Siamese falling tone.

One big difference in the consonants is that where Siamese has initial /r/, Kam Mueang, like Lao/Isan, has /h/ in inherited words (like [H]hawn 'hot') but /l/ in loanwords (like [H]lot 'car, vehicle'). The other big difference is that what in Siamese are aspirated low consonants (particularly ช /ch/ ท /th/ พ /ph/) are only aspirated in Kam Mueang if they are followed in Siamese by ร /r/, which is otherwise silent in second place. ค /kh/ is less predictable - while it is usually Kam Mueang /k/ on its own, it can be Kam Mueang /kh/ or /x/, and this difference is the basis of the obsolete Siamese consonant ฅ kho khon. The second big difference has an associated effect on which consonants count as 'high'.

[KhamMuang]

My girlfriend comes from chiang mia city bound. So I am trying to understand her at times. "facepalm"

She says that her LOCAL LANGUAGE / Lanna = "NOT bangkok = central thai" is not written like normal text as I have started to notice.

I wanted to create a thread that would help me and others understand how to say certain words by keeping it SIMPLE.

I will look into laos as stated by briggsy - I noticed it this morning that laos is the main.

While Kam Mueang has a lot in common with Lao, allegedly at a deeper level it has more in common with Siamese. Like Isan, it has a lot of Siamese loans, with varying degrees of assimilation.

Chiangmai tones are somewhat similar to Siamese, unlike Isan or Lao tones. The famous difference is that there are two falling tones rather than one - the words with, in Siamese, high or middle consonant initials and mai tho have the 'high' falling tone, sometimes described as having a late fall, and those with low consonant initials and mai ek have the 'low' falling tone, which is more like the Siamese falling tone.

One big difference in the consonants is that where Siamese has initial /r/, Kam Mueang, like Lao/Isan, has /h/ in inherited words (like [H]hawn 'hot') but /l/ in loanwords (like [H]lot 'car, vehicle'). The other big difference is that what in Siamese are aspirated low consonants (particularly ช /ch/ ท /th/ พ /ph/) are only aspirated in Kam Mueang if they are followed in Siamese by ร /r/, which is otherwise silent in second place. ค /kh/ is less predictable - while it is usually Kam Mueang /k/ on its own, it can be Kam Mueang /kh/ or /x/, and this difference is the basis of the obsolete Siamese consonant ฅ kho khon. The second big difference has an associated effect on which consonants count as 'high'.

Kapt Khun jaght nuk - Richard W

- I will remember your annotation for the siamese and download a copy soonest.

- I also know that there are 6 tones and not 5 as per central thai.

How would one know which are loanwords from lao/isan and siamese..?

[Richard W]

How would one know which are loanwords from lao/isan and siamese..?

I believe there is no way to recognise loanwords from Lao/Isan short of comparing several languages - nor is it particularly useful.

If you hear a Kam Mueang word beginning /l/ and you need to identify it using your knowledge of Siamese, then consider the possibility that it starts with /r/ in Siamese. If you hear as word beginning /h/, and know or suspect from its tone that the /h/ is a low consonant, strongly suspect that it would start with /r/ in Siamese. There are only a few cases where Siamese only has the word in a form borrowed from Lao or Northern Thai. However, Siamese does have onomatopoeic words and Chinese words starting with low /h/.

If you're trying to guess the Northern Thai word corresponding to Siamese word beginning with /r/, first try to work out if it is a borrowing from Sanskrit or Pali. If it is, it should begin with /l/, and if not with /h/. This rule doesn't always work. For the Siamese word รูป 'statue', marked as a loan by the use of ป as a final consonant, the Northern Thai from is [F]huup, not *[F]luup. For the word ร้อย '100', marked as native by the tone mark, the form [H]lawi is actually commoner than the expected from [H]hawi.

Compound words related to government are likely to have /l/ rather than /h/ even if composed of native elements. For example, Siamese รายงาน 'report' is a compound of two native words, but as well as the native pronunciation [M]haai[M]ngaan, there is also the pronunciation as a loanword [M]laai[M]ngaan. 'School' can [M]loong[M]lian or [M]hoong[M]hian.

[Richard W]

There are two remarks relevant to the rising tone that I think are worth making. Firstly, where initial Northern Thai /p/, /t/ or /k/ corresponds to Siamese /p/, /t/ or /k/, the initial works as a high consonant. Thus the word corresponding to Siamese ตา 'eye' actually sounds like ต๋า [R]taa. The Northern word [M]taa corresponds to Siamese ทา [M]thaa 'to paint'

Secondly, a high or mid initial in a dead syllable with a short vowel has a tone that is almost as a high tone, but rises at the end. For Chiangmai, this is treated as a rising tone, and generally written with mai chattawa, e.g. the rare monosyllabic word corresponding to the Siamese prefix สัท- [L]sat[H]tha 'sound' is written phonetically as สั๋ด [R]sat in the Northern Thai Dictionary of Palm-leaf Manuscripts. (That dictionary in principle only lists rare words, though some common words have crept in.) High consonants are used in the transcriptions even though the rules for using the Thai script seem to dictate the use of low consonants in such a situation.

[KhamMuang]

Thank-you Richard keep it coming please.

I will post more words here once I have wrapped my head around them aswell.

New words:

ping-yang = what's wrong

knee-u-ghow = Im hungry

jhe = much

Remember that these words are not spelled correctly - just a guide to help you say it.

[CMBob]

Has anyone seen a dictionary for northern Thai anywhere. I always wanted to buy one because most of my Thai friends here in Chiangmai normally only speak northern Thai and that generally leaves me out in the dark.

I too am interested in a northern Thai vocabulary but, while I can read Thai (and, of course, that tells me which tone to used), I often can't make head nor tails of the transliterations that are too often posted here. If posters here could include the Thai spelling, that sure would be helpful (but no problem if you can't or don't....just a general request).

[KhamMuang]

My previous statement of much isn't jhe = much

but more like jha = much = sharp upwards tone.

[KhamMuang]

I found two books that might be able to help us.

This one is tricky but will locate a copy. = Lanna Language by Kobkan Thangpijaigul

and ...

http://www.shanyoma.org/yoma/the-phonology-of-the-lanna-language.pdf

[KhamMuang]

The second document - http://www.shanyoma.org/yoma/the-phonology-of-the-lanna-language.pdf

I will get my girl to help me out with as some of the words are faded due to a photocopy.

[Richard W]

The second document - http://www.shanyoma.org/yoma/the-phonology-of-the-lanna-language.pdf

I will get my girl to help me out with as some of the words are faded due to a photocopy.

This document is not quite right. It overlooks the difference of tone in short dead syllables with a high or mid initial on one hand and with a low initial on the other. A good sketch of Northern Thai tones is given in Notes on Some Phonological Aspects of Northern Thai, which compares the tones of Northern Thai accents with Standard Thai.

[Richard W]

knee-u-ghow = Im hungry

I'm not sure what 'knee' is meant to be, but 'u-ghow' would seem to be mispronounced Central Thai หิวเข้ว [R]hio [F]khao (Northern Thai is [T]hio [6]khao in my notation) 'to be hungry'. I've heard my wife, who's from Chiangdao, say หยู for หิว, but I wasn't aware of that being specifically Northern. The Maefahluang dictionary says that หิว is really a Siamese loan, and that the true Lanna expression is อยากกิ๋นเข้ว [L]yaak [R]kin [6]khao, though as that dictionary transliterates rather than transcribes, it doesn't use the mai chattawa.

เข้ว [F]khao 'rice' is the old Central Thai form; in Standard Thai it is supplanted by ข้าว [F]khaao.

[Richard W]

ping-yang = what's wrong

I think this is เป๋นหญัง [R]pen [R]nyang.

[KhamMuang]

ping-yang = what's wrong

I think this is เป๋นหญัง [R]pen [R]nyang.

This sounds correct now. เป๋นหญัง [R]pen [R]nyang.

Doesnt yaak meen difficult...??

อยากกิ๋นเข้ว [L]yaak [R]kin [6]khao = will find out tonight.

[KhamMuang]

I started this doc - use as you feel fit.

Will update constantly...

words to english - my personal preferance.docx

[KhamMuang]

Further update -

words to english - my personal preferance.docx

[Richard W]

Doesnt yaak meen difficult...??

That's NT ญาก ᨿᩣ᩠ᨠ [F]nyaak = ST ยาก [F]yaak.

[Johpa]

nyau ( rhymes with 'raw") cheers (used when drinking with the mates).

I speak a mix of 80% central Thai and 20% Kham Muang. The city folks in Chiang Mai tend to speak the inverse, 80% Kham Muang and 20% central Thai. In the more rural areas up north they speak a nearly 100% Kham Muang that is only slightly intelligible to central Thai speakers. My son speaks a near perfect Kham Muang and my daughter speaks mostly central Thai. My neighbors joke this makes my kids true luuk kreung, one half Khon Muang and the other half Thai.

[KhamMuang]

Ha ha = johpa = luuk kreung,

@RichardW firstly -

I tried yaak kin khao as she insists on knee-u-ghow for im hungry.?! (shakehead)

learnt some new words last night.

shorp = like

mai shorp = dont like.

[Zooheekock]

There's a whole list of words in the Peace Corps Dictionary, which I'm painfully slowly annotating, as I mentioned in the archived thread Does anyone know the Thai Norther dialect. The link to what I have done so far is still at http://homepage.ntlworld.com/richard.wordingham/lanna/peace_corps_dictionary.pdf , as given in that thread. Replace '.pdf' by '.odt' for the LibreOffice master. You will need your own font for the tua mueang if you use the LibreOffice master.

That looks very interesting. Thanks for that but which font are you using? The document says gr3Lannawww but Google says that there's no such thing.

Last month, whilst in Chiang Mai, I picked up a book called ไวยากรณ์ภาษาไทยถิ่นเหนือ by สรบุศย์ รุ่งโรจน์สุวรรณ in DK. I haven't done more than have a quick flick through but it looks interesting. Also this https://www.scribd.com/doc/45760470/%E0%B8%A0%E0%B8%B2%E0%B8%A9%E0%B8%B2%E0%B9%80%E0%B8%A1%E0%B8%B7%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%87%E0%B8%A5-%E0%B8%B2%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%B2-%E0%B9%81%E0%B8%9A%E0%B8%9A%E0%B9%80%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%B5%E0%B8%A2%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%8A%E0%B8%B8%E0%B8%94%E0%B8%9E%E0%B8%B7-%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%90%E0%B8%B2%E0%B8%99-%E0%B9%80%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%B5%E0%B8%A2%E0%B8%99%E0%B8%94-%E0%B8%A7%E0%B8%A2%E0%B8%95%E0%B8%99%E0%B9%80%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%87 (a scan of a book called ภาษาเมืองล้านนาแบบเรียนชุดพืนฐานเรียนด้วยตนเอง) may be interesting to some.