are there Thai words to help pronounce the English letter 'R' or other ideas ?

[BKKdreaming]

As we know the letter "R" in English is hard for Thais to pronounce

Are there any Thai words that start with the "R" sound ?

Or how would you explain to them how to pronounce "R"

Is there a list of useful "R" words that would be good practice

Thanks for your ideas

OHHH .....I know it is not easy as I have a problem with the Spanish long rolling "R"

[stoneyboy]

School

Roong Riian.

[Tywais]

Go here - Google Translate and click on the Speaker icon. This is ร เรือ the standard helper phrase for ร in the Thai alphabet. As for pronouncing the r sound, it depends on region where central Thai are more likely to enunciate it clearly.

[KhunBENQ]

Don't think that they do not know

They only have to listen the evening Royal and general TV news.

School

Roong Riian.

Good example, listen (allow Flash player):

http://www.thai-language.com/mp3/P196715.mp3

Another speaker:

http://www.clickthai-online.de//cgi-bin/playmp3.pl?308535

รถเร็ว rot reo (rapid train):

http://www.thai-language.com/mp3/P207929.mp3

Thousands of words but might rarely hear an "r"

http://www.thai-language.com/let/195 (59 pages)

Let them speak and then click on the loudspeaker symbol where available, can be big fun.

Its especially true for the Isan dialect because of its similarity to the Laos language which indeed does not have an "r".

[BKKdreaming]

Go here - Google Translate and click on the Speaker icon. This is ร เรือ the standard helper phrase for ร in the Thai alphabet. As for pronouncing the r sound, it depends on region where central Thai are more likely to enunciate it clearly.

Thanks , that helps some , at least it sounds like a soft "R" and a word they can work off of ,

any more examples ?

[bluebluewater]

Sorry, but it is not at all difficult for Thai people to pronounce the "r" sound. There are thousands of words in the Thai language that either start with that "r" sound or have the "r" sound within.

What happens is that they are lazy in their pronunciation of their own language and turn that 'r' sound into an "l" sound. They learn it that way as babies in the home and then are allowed to continue to do the same in the schools. They are mispronouncing their own language. They are often none too happy about it when you point that out to them either.

It's OK if they do it but if I mispronounce something then all hell breaks loose.

[bearpolar]

Funny enough, ask a thai to pronounce ร and theres a good chance he'll do it better than you.

[Hatyaier]

As we know the letter "R" in English is hard for Thais to pronounce

Are there any Thai words that start with the "R" sound ?

Or how would you explain to them how to pronounce "R"

Is there a list of useful "R" words that would be good practice

Thanks for your ideas

OHHH .....I know it is not easy as I have a problem with the Spanish long rolling "R"[/quote

Can you say 100 in Thai?

[Richard W]

What happens is that they are lazy in their pronunciation of their own language and turn that 'r' sound into an "l" sound. They learn it that way as babies in the home and then are allowed to continue to do the same in the schools.

Most Thais' mother tongue is not Thai. As previously pointed out, Lao (North-Eastern Thai if you count the RTA) and Northern Thai lack /r/.

Thai schools can do a good job of teaching Thais with other mother tongues how to say /r/.

[tgeezer]

Does the letter 'r' exist n Thai? The Thai letter ร is nothing like 'R'. The tip of the tongue for 'R' is raised towards the roof of the mouth, in ร the tongue is in the same position as it is for ล which is the same as 'L'. I think that this is the reason that ร is often pronounced ล.

[Gsxrnz]

I don't understand why we get all worked up about the Thais interchanging L for R, on indeed totally dropping either of them when informally speaking.

We do something similar all the time in English. To call it lazy as some have said is ridiculous, it's just normal speech as opposed to formal speech in both languages.

In (standard) English, we interchange D and T all the time and we drop T entirely when speaking many words. We also mess up and mispronounce many vowels. Which is no different to the Thai L and R, or in fact their G and K which is also subject to variation.

The D/T in English doesn't annoy us, so why should them swapping L/R in their own language be an issue.

When it comes to them speaking English, the problem only exists because they treat the use of our L/R rather casually and have to be made to understand that L/R are very critical in English. They can certainly say the letters as they both exist in Thai - they just have to learn to use them properly and get their tongues around some of our word structures that don't exist in Thai that incorporate R.

[bearpolar]

It's nothing like R yet thais pronounce it RRRRRAW RRRRROOUA?

[BKKdreaming]

I don't understand why we get all worked up about the Thais interchanging L for R, on indeed totally dropping either of them when informally speaking......

I would just like to help a few of them improve . and not being able to pronounce the R when you are working with English speakers is a problem ,

And we have all heard the "Flied Lice" that makes a joke out of it and is spoken by other Asians too ,

But thanks for many of the above ideas, I will pass them on

[luk AJ]

Color brue

[tgeezer]

Just try saying R yourself with the tip of your tongue touching your gum where it is when you say L and you will see their problem.

[Gulfsailor]

According to my gf, those Thais who do not prrrroperrrrly prrrronounce the R sound have a lack of education. Both at home and in school. 'They have a lazy tongue'.

[bearpolar]

According to my gf, those Thais who do not prrrroperrrrly prrrronounce the R sound have a lack of education. Both at home and in school. 'They have a lazy tongue'.

Then she is obviously over compensating in front of you to hide something about herself. Tons of highly educated thais will pronounce most R's as soft R/almost L's (while still pronouncing the letter itself as rrrrrrrrrrrrraw rrrrrrrrrroua)

Thai language sounds much prettier with soft r's and l's,

[Richard W]

Does the letter 'r' exist n Thai? The Thai letter ร is nothing like 'R'. The tip of the tongue for 'R' is raised towards the roof of the mouth, in ร the tongue is in the same position as it is for ล which is the same as 'L'. I think that this is the reason that ร is often pronounced ล.

It may facilitate confusion - the English word ruler can be a tongue twister for Thais who aren't secure in their use of /r/. However, the reason is that several Thai Tai languages lack /r/.

[tgeezer]

I don't think that many people realize that ร is ล with a trill, r is ย with the air necessary to trill ล. When someone's girlfriend say people say 'r' badly she means that hey say ร badly ; no trill.

[billphillips]

The Thai alphabet has an R and it's in common use mostly by Bkk or middle/upper class Thais. The Thai greeting = Sawadi kRap .. Hundred = Roy. From my experience it's a fashion or slang to substitute the sound of L in place of R or remove the R altogether. Sawadi kap and Loy being examples.

If you ask any Thai to recite their alphabet you will clearly hear a perfect R along the way. They can pronounce it, perhaps better than us but choose not to for some reason.

[tgeezer]

You still don't get it do you billphillips? The older generation of which I am one, are proud of the fact that we can and do say ร when we are concentrating, The ร in ครับ ร้อย is said with the tongue touching the gum above the front teeth if you don't do that then you are saying krap- roy. Often we say ล instead of ร: ไม่เอาเหลอ then hate ourselves afterwards! The topic is how to teach Thais to say 'r' and I think that pointing out that 'r' is not ร might help. I would be interested in any feedback to see if I am right.

[Tywais]

You still don't get it do you billphillips? The older generation of which I am one, are proud of the fact that we can and do say ร when we are concentrating, The ร in ครับ ร้อย is said with the tongue touching the gum above the front teeth if you don't do that then you are saying krap- roy. Often we say ล instead of ร: ไม่เอาเหลอ then hate ourselves afterwards! The topic is how to teach Thais to say 'r' and I think that pointing out that 'r' is not ร might help. I would be interested in any feedback to see if I am right.

From my two years of Spanish, I would say it more closely resembles the Spanish r which is also not the same as the English r. Though never heard Spanish speakers changing it to an l sound.

I would venture to say it is not lazy speaking but either education based or regional dialect. Working at a university the ร is usually pronounced clearly by the academic staff as opposed to the less educated general worker. However, that is not always the case. Too many variables that may effect how they may have come to use it one way or the other.

Not the only language with variations of the r sound. Might look up non-rhotic r. US English it varies on usage and region. British, Australian also. Long history on it.

[billphillips]

You still don't get it do you billphillips? The older generation of which I am one, are proud of the fact that we can and do say ร when we are concentrating, The ร in ครับ ร้อย is said with the tongue touching the gum above the front teeth if you don't do that then you are saying krap- roy. Often we say ล instead of ร: ไม่เอาเหลอ then hate ourselves afterwards! The topic is how to teach Thais to say 'r' and I think that pointing out that 'r' is not ร might help. I would be interested in any feedback to see if I am right.

I get it perfectly, I'm not so sure about you though. Thai people can and do use R. They have a similar sounding letter in their own alphabet. It has nothing to do with where you stick your tongue, forget your personal preference of tongue wrestling, that will only confuse them. As I said ... They have an R sound in their own language but for some reason, chose not to use it. Whether the Thai letter is the same as R or not is irrelevant, it's the sound that's important. In fact of course it's not the same letter .. It's Thainess.

[tgeezer]

As a generalisation I don't doubt what you say but it would appear from the fact of this topic being posted that it is not true for all Thais. I don't believe that students learning English choose not to say 'r'. you evidently do believe it so what is your suggestion to help bkkdreaming teach these unique Thais how to say 'r' ; substitute ร make them to say รuller. รole รevolution etc. I think that he may have tried this already.

[Johpa]

According to my gf, those Thais who do not prrrroperrrrly prrrronounce the R sound have a lack of education. Both at home and in school. 'They have a lazy tongue'.

Your girlfriend has been brainwashed by the Bangkok based Sino-Thai elite into believing that those who do not speak the local Bangkok variant of Tai are somehow inferior beings. Nothing more self-congratulatory than calling other people lazy because their local dialect differs from the dialect spoken by those who control the reins of power.

[billphillips]

I believe that the regional preference of not using the Thai R is just that .. a regional preference. That preference transfers over to English as its learned as as second language. Much the same as leaving off the end of some words. I explained to my wife that in English that doesn't work because without tones the meaning can be completely different rather than an abbreviated version of the true meaning. Am example of that could be "help" spoken as "hell" computer is another.

Now that my wife understands the importance of using English more correctly, to be understood at the first attempt, their is much improvement. Have you ever experienced the confusion of getting a drink four a guest that asks for Spy, Splash or Sprite it's all pronounced much the same to our mono-tonal (language) ears.

I don't think there is a way to help local people to pronounce R or any other letter / word / phrase etc. It's a matter of choice for them, if they hear their friends talking in a set way, they don't want to be heard to be different. No one wants to be the "odd one out" in a group. Also, as its an accepted local way of talking Thai, the transfer of incorrectly applying it to English comes naturally. The point that the Thai version of R differs somewhat from the English version is rather petty, it's a "near enough not to notice" difference. It's unrealistic to expect a second language to be spoken without some sort of accent or variation, it does happen but as a rare event rather than the norm. In short, in my opinion .... If they don't want to talk correctly ... they won't ... The desire to do so has to come from them. No amount of coaching / teaching will make the slightest difference in English or Thai.

[Johpa]

If they don't want to talk correctly ... they won't ... The desire to do so has to come from them. No amount of coaching / teaching will make the slightest difference in English or Thai.

They are speaking correctly for their regional language or local dialect. It has nothing to do with desire or want. All you prescriptive grammarian wannabes are so out of touch with modern linguistic thought that there is really nowhere to begin other than to repeat the old adage that a language is nothing more than a dialect with an army behind it.

[tgeezer]

The topic is Thai students learning English and having difficulty with 'r' it has nothing whatever to do with prescriptive grammar. I have just had a word with a group visiting for New Year, a teacher, a retired teacher and a man from the ministry of health, all non English speakers, and their view was that there are two ร sounds in Thai one of which is ล ! I must say I had never thought of it like that.