Help With Learning Vowels

[Pilchard]

Does anyone have any hints or memory aids for learning Thai vowels ?

Got the Alphabet sorted after a long struggle, but at least with the Alphabet I had a name/object/animal to associate the word and sound with.

I have the first 4 ( 8 if you inc short sound) and the last 5 vowels stuck in my head ok, the the middle and combination vowels just won't stick.

Any ideas ?

Thanx

[baennaenae]

Does anyone have any hints or memory aids for learning Thai vowels ?

Got the Alphabet sorted after a long struggle, but at least with the Alphabet I had a name/object/animal to associate the word and sound with.

I have the first 4 ( 8 if you inc short sound) and the last 5 vowels stuck in my head ok, the the middle and combination vowels just won't stick.

Any ideas ?

Thanx

You write it on a piece of paper when you say it and as often as you can and try to remember them by heart good luck

[samran]

try relating them back to the english vowels. Worked for me. Long and short.

[Richard W]

Does anyone have any hints or memory aids for learning Thai vowels ?

My mnemonic tricks won't work for everyone, but here they are.

For เอา I effectively use the English-German correspondence of 'ea' and 'au', e.g. 'beam' and 'baum', 'dream' and 'traum'. (I actually remember that Germanic *au became Old English long 'ea').

For เออ I use English 'people' = French 'peuple', and the fact that while the 'strange' French (and German) vowels are front rounded, while the 'strange' Thai vowels are 'back unrounded' - which can both get mangled to 'central' by the English.

For เอีย and เอือ, think of the transliteration 'ie' for the former, as in 'Chiengmai'. It would not be so unnatural to try writing it as *อีเย, so think of the เ being moved to the start to mark it as a compound. Similar reasoning applies to *อืเอ and เอือ.

For the vowel of ยวน [M]yuan 'Greek', a plausible and more original reading is 'yawon'. (It comes from Sanskrit 'Yavana'.) I just think of the spelling arising that way. อัว then makes sense as making the first vowel explicit, and leaving the second implicit. There used to be a lot of final implicit 'a' vowels, but nowadays they should mostly be made explicit.

ะ at the end of a vowel symbol indicates shortness and, in careful speech, a final glottal stop. Most of the combinations using it then make immediate sense. Note that ะ must come at the end of a syllable. I think maitaikhu, as in เด็ก [L]dek 'child', is actually in origin ะ written on top, but I could be wrong. (I also think mai han-akat has the same origin - the Lao and Lanna scripts use mai han-akat as a shortening mark as well as a simple vowel.)

Now, you may have noticed that ไม่ gets reduced from 'mai' to 'me', especially in ไม่สบาย 'not well'. In a similar fashion, ะ shortens, simplifies and lowers the เอา vowel, which explains the most complicated compound vowel, เอาะ.

I don't have any mnemonic for เอิ and เอย, but I think of them as related - the i/y somehow changes the vowel from ee to oe.

[Pilchard]

Does anyone have any hints or memory aids for learning Thai vowels ?

My mnemonic tricks won't work for everyone, but here they are.

For เอา I effectively use the English-German correspondence of 'ea' and 'au', e.g. 'beam' and 'baum', 'dream' and 'traum'. (I actually remember that Germanic *au became Old English long 'ea').

For เออ I use English 'people' = French 'peuple', and the fact that while the 'strange' French (and German) vowels are front rounded, while the 'strange' Thai vowels are 'back unrounded' - which can both get mangled to 'central' by the English.

For เอีย and เอือ, think of the transliteration 'ie' for the former, as in 'Chiengmai'. It would not be so unnatural to try writing it as *อีเย, so think of the เ being moved to the start to mark it as a compound. Similar reasoning applies to *อืเอ and เอือ.

For the vowel of ยวน [M]yuan 'Greek', a plausible and more original reading is 'yawon'. (It comes from Sanskrit 'Yavana'.) I just think of the spelling arising that way. อัว then makes sense as making the first vowel explicit, and leaving the second implicit. There used to be a lot of final implicit 'a' vowels, but nowadays they should mostly be made explicit.

ะ at the end of a vowel symbol indicates shortness and, in careful speech, a final glottal stop. Most of the combinations using it then make immediate sense. Note that ะ must come at the end of a syllable. I think maitaikhu, as in เด็ก [L]dek 'child', is actually in origin ะ written on top, but I could be wrong. (I also think mai han-akat has the same origin - the Lao and Lanna scripts use mai han-akat as a shortening mark as well as a simple vowel.)

Now, you may have noticed that ไม่ gets reduced from 'mai' to 'me', especially in ไม่สบาย 'not well'. In a similar fashion, ะ shortens, simplifies and lowers the เอา vowel, which explains the most complicated compound vowel, เอาะ.

I don't have any mnemonic for เอิ and เอย, but I think of them as related - the i/y somehow changes the vowel from ee to oe.

Wow.. Thanks for taking the time to write that reply (I had to Google the word mnemonic ! )

The references to Lao and Lanna scripts are completely over my head but I found the rest helpful.

Sometimes it's good to give up the frontal attack and think around the subject for a while, hopefully assimilating it without it noticing

Thanks

[jaithai]

I downloaded a mnemonic guide from 1stEasyThaiAlphabet.com. They claim to help you memorize the Thai alphabet in 60 minutes, as well as remembering to which class each consonant belongs and the tone rules. And it works! I've rely on this as a guide to tweak my memory as I study. Full access to the program is only $5.95 and it was well worth it.

[teddy_bare]

I started learning to read and write thai about 4 months ago. i bought a children's school book and sat in various coffee shops. Over a Coffee Latte i would ask any thai who happened to be near me how to pronounce each vowel sound. I then wrote it down as i would say it in english. i asked over and over again with different people just to check any variations. the staff become very helpful and good friends. Futher childrens books help me practising my reading and translation. i can't say i understood what the text said but at that point i was more interested in learning to translate the sound of the words. next i did the tones (very hard).

i am now reading, copying and translating a Cartoon book with the famous Doeraiman and his side kick Nobita. get seen reading this and the thais will flock to you to help. They all know the character and think it's cute you are reading it.

Anyway my thai language ability has improve more in 4 months than the 3 years of talking Bar thai. someone told me "if you learn to read thai the speaking will become easier" it is so true.

Good luck in your learning

""""(@

[davidbkk]

i picked a word with each of the complex vowel combinations and memorised those, eventually they just stuck. not sure how, but i just read them all instantly now when mixed with any consonant.

[PinkChilli]

You could also try writing all the vowels on a chart, organised in a way that makes sense for you. I have a chart with 5 columns containing:

1. an English equivalent (pronunciation guide)

2. the short version with an open syllable

3. the long version with an open syllable

4. the short version with a closed syllable (if different)

5. the long version with a closed syllable (if different)

Making the chart yourself is a good aid to remembering the vowels.

Next you pick a piece of writing that is meaningful to you and that you will see often (say a menu).

Per vowel go through the menu scanning until you find instances of it, then highlight them with a highlighter. Then, as you already know the consonants, you can try to figure out how the syllable is pronounced. When you've figured out how to pronounce the syllable, highlight the whole syllable.

After you've done this for a bit, the menu will start to fill up with highlighted bits, which is quite motivating.

Note: watch out for the symbols that can be part of several different vowels ie

เ

อ

า

อี

อื

อั

And watch out for the symbols that can be either consonants or (parts of) vowels ie

อ

ว

ย

Hope this helps,

Denise