Diction Of Provincial Thai Males

[Briggsy]

My Thai is a long way from perfect but I can have quite in depth conversations with people.

I find that when I go upcountry, and I'm not talking about areas that don't use the central dialect, I find many older males mumbly and difficult to catch. Does anybody else share this experience? They seem to understand me fine. We normally understand each other in the end but it takes longer to get there. Are they perhaps using a local accent?

[toptuan]

Of course, Briggsy. Not only is the accent different, but the vocabulary is different.

It's the same scenario as when I go to Arkansas and try to understand my 70-year-old uncle. It's the same language, but I still miss 30%. Since Thai is your second language, don't feel badly if you miss the same % or worse! :-)

Edited November 26, 2006 by toptuan

[PeaceBlondie]

Same thing in Mexico. Textbook Spanish, spoken by literate Mexicans, is reasonably clear. Folks who never finished sixth grade, and have spent their life out in the village, sure. They always understood my castellano, but I missed a lot of the poorly enunciated local lingo.

Besides, some old folks have lost our teeth!

[toptuan]

Shpeek fer yershelf, Blondie!

Edited November 26, 2006 by toptuan

[baennaenae]

Shpeek fer yershelf, Blondie!

555555555555555555555555555555555555555!!!!

[Johpa]

Same thing in Mexico. Textbook Spanish, spoken by literate Mexicans, is reasonably clear. Folks who never finished sixth grade, and have spent their life out in the village, sure. They always understood my castellano, but I missed a lot of the poorly enunciated local lingo.

Besides, some old folks have lost our teeth!

I dare say that their local "lingo" is enunciated with 100% perefection and they are able to communicate to perfection within their social universe. It is your less than 100% grasp of their particular language that is the issue as you are the outsider.

Don't feel too bad. Having been taught Central Thai in college and having been taught, to a less formal degree, proper Chiang Mai City Kham Muang, I still can not follow 100% the casual talk of many of my neighbors and inlaws in the village. This is especially true of the men who tend to more frequently lace their conversations with a coarse slang, much of which reflects even older local linguistic attibutes no longer commonly heard in the Kham Muang spoken in the city.

[endure]

Same thing in Mexico. Textbook Spanish, spoken by literate Mexicans, is reasonably clear. Folks who never finished sixth grade, and have spent their life out in the village, sure. They always understood my castellano, but I missed a lot of the poorly enunciated local lingo.

Besides, some old folks have lost our teeth!

You can usually find them in the glass on the bedside table

[baennaenae]

Same thing in Mexico. Textbook Spanish, spoken by literate Mexicans, is reasonably clear. Folks who never finished sixth grade, and have spent their life out in the village, sure. They always understood my castellano, but I missed a lot of the poorly enunciated local lingo.

Besides, some old folks have lost our teeth!

You can usually find them in the glass on the bedside table

555 plus