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A Thai language (ภาษาไทย, phasa thai, meaning "the language of Thais"), is the national and official language of Thailand and the mother tongue of the Thai people, Thailand's dominant ethnic group. Thai occurs as member of the Tai group of the Tai-Kadai language family. A Tai-Kadai languages come thought to own originated inside what is currently southern China, and a select few linguists use at times proposed links to the Austroasiatic, Austronesian, or Sino-Tibetan language families. These are the tonal and analytic language. the combination of key, a complex orthography, relational markers and the distinctive phonology can make Thai hard to see for speakers of numbers of unrelated & extremely differing languages.
Languages and dialects
Standard Thai, likewise referred to as Central Thai or even Siamese, is the official language of Thailand, spoken by about 25 million population (1990) including speakers of Bangkok Thai (although a latter is another time considered as a separate idiom). Khorat Thai is spoken by about 400,000 (1984) within Nakhon Ratchasima; it occupies a linguistic position someplace between Central Thai & Isan on a dialect continuum, and can be considered the variant or dialect of either.
Additionally to Standard Thai, Thailand is house to many more related Tai languages, including:
Isan (Northeastern Thai), the language of the Isan region of Thailand, is considered by some to exist as the idiom of the Lao language, which it closely resembles. These are spoken by astir 15 million humans (1983).
Nyaw language, spoken mostly in Nakhon Phanom province, Sakhon Nakhon province, Udon Thani province of Northeast Thailand.
Galung language, spoken in Nakhon Phanom province of Northeast Thailand.
Lü (Tai Lue, Dai), spoken by about 78,000 (1993) inside northern Thailand.
Northern Thai (Lanna, Kam Mueang, or Tai Yuan), spoken by astir 6 million (1983).
Phuan, spoken by an unknown number of population within central Thail& and Isan.
Phu Thai, spoken by about 156,000 about Nakhon Phanom province (1993).
Shan (Thai Luang, Tai Long), spoken by about 56,000 within northerly-north-west Thailand (1993).
Song, spoken by about 20,000 to 30,000 within central & northern Thailand(1982).
Southern Thai (Pak Dtai or Dambro), spoken astir Five million (1990).
Tai Dam, spoken by about 20,000 (1991) inside Isan & Saraburi province.
Cost comparisons come from either [http://www.ethnologue.com/ Ethnologue 2003-10-4].
Numerous one languages come spoken by multitude outside Thailand. Virtually all speakers of idiom & minority languages speak Central Thai additionally.
Standard Thai is composed of many distinct registers, forms for different social contexts:
Street Thai: informal, forgoing cultured terms of location, every bit utilized between close relatives & friends.(ภาษาพูด)
Elegant Thai: official & written version, includes reverential terms of location; utilized around simplified form inside newspapers.(ภาษาเขียน)
Rhetorical Thai: utilized for oral presentation.
Sacred Thai.
Royal Thai. (ราชาศัพท์)
Less-educated Thais could speak just at a foremost level. Couple might speak a Sacred or even Royal forms.
Script
Independent article: Thai alphabet
A Thai alphabet from either a Khmer alphabet (à¸à¸±à¸?ขระเขมร), which is modeled after a Brahmic script from a Indic family. Good deal prefer a Burmese adopted a Mon script (which also has Indic origins), a Thais adopted & modified Khmer script to produce their have orthography. When a oldest known inscription in the Khmer language dates from 611 CE, inscriptions in the area of Thai writing began to pop up around 1292 CE. Notable features include:
It is an abugida script, in which a implicit vowel is a short /a/ for consonants standing alone and a short /o/ whenever the initial consonant or even clump is followed by an additional consonant.
Tone markers come laid above the initial consonant of a syllable or even on the go consonant of an initial consonant cluster.
Vowels associated with consonants come nonsequential: it may be placed prior even even to, when, above or within the image below their associated consonant, or in the combination one positions.
A latter particularly induces problems for computer encryption & text giving.
No universal standard for transliterating Thai into English. E.g., a title of King Rama IX, a present monarch, is transliterated multifariously when Bhumibol, Phumiphon, or even several more versions. Decision books, text books & lexicon can to each one watch different systems. For this cause, virtually all language courses recommend that learners master a Thai alphabet. Within scholarly usage, French scholars tend to romanize Thai by using a letter-for-letter transcription based on data from the original Sanskrit value of the characters. Anglophone scholars typically like either the simplified phonetic giving or even a few variation on the International Phonetic Alphabet. This article utilizes the simplified IPA system which does not show tone or even vowel length.
A Thai Royal Institute [http://www.royin.go.th/] publishes sets of system for transliterating Thai words into a Roman alphabet & a other way around (the Royal Thai General System of Transcription), but which are actually far from either always applied.
A ISO published an international standard for the transliteration of Thai into Roman script in September 2003 [http://www.iso.org/iso/en/CatalogueDetailPage.CatalogueDetail?CSNUMBER=20574&ICS1=1&ICS2=140&ICS3=10].
Grammar
From either a perspective of linguistic typology, Thai can exist as considered to be an analytic language. A word order is Subject-Verb-Object, although the subject is typically omitted. When within several Asian languages, a Thai pronominal technique varies based on data from a sex & proportional status of speaker & audience.
Adjectives
Adjectives follow a noun. The duplicated adjective is utilized for emphasis, e.g.
คนอ้วนๆ (khon uan uan, IPA )-
"a really fat person."
Comparatives take a form "A X กว่า (kwa, IPA )).
Verbs
Verbs do not inflect (i.e. don't vary by using human, tense, voice, mood or even total) nor come there any participles. Duplication conveys a idea of doing a verb much. A passive voice is indicated by the insertion of โดน (don, IPA ) before the verb (or even a instance expression) for the past.
Adverbs
Several adverbs are a equivalent when adjectives. Intensity may be expressed by the duplicated adjective. Adverbs unremarkably watch a verb.
Nouns
Nouns are uninflected & keep around there is no gender; there are no plural forms or articles. Plural form come expressed by adding "nouns of multitude" (ลักษณนาม) or even classifiers in the form of
noun-total-classifier, e.g. "teacher five person" for "five teachers".
When within English, such classifiers come unremarkably abstracted ("four chairs") or even optional ("two bottles of beer" or even "two beers"), the classifier is just about universally utilized around Thai (hence "chair four item" & "beer two bottle").
Pronouns
Subject pronouns are typically omitted, when nicknames are typically utilized in which English would have the pronoun. There are specialised pronouns in the royal & sacred Thai languages. A resulting come appropriate for colloquial have:
!word || RTGS || IPA || meaning
|-
| ผม || phom || || I/me (masculine)
|-
| ดิฉัน || dichan || ) || I/me (feminine)
|-
| ฉัน || chan || || I/me (masculine or even feminine; informal)
|-
| คุณ || khun || || smart shoppers (civilized)
|-
| เธอ || thoe || || your family (informal)
|-
| เรา || rao || || we
|-
| เขา || khao || || he/she
|-
| มัน || human || || it
|-
| พวกเขา || phuak-khao || ||they
|-
| พี่ || phi || ||older brother or even sister (typically utilized loosely for older non-relatives)
|-
| น้อง || nong || ||immature brother or even sister (typically utilized loosely for younger non-relatives)
|}
Particles
A particles are typically untranslatable words added to the prevent of the phrase to suggest respect, the asking, encouragement or even more moods (similar to the utilize of intonation in English), when well as variable a level of formality. It is non utilized around written Thai. A usual particles indicating respect come ครับ (khrap, IPA with the falling tone) for the woman; these can besides exist as utilized to show an affirmative.
More most common particles come:
!word || RTGS || IPA || meaning
|-
| จ๊ะ || cha || || indicating the request
|-
| จ้ะ, จ้า or even จ๋า || cha || || indicating emphasis
|-
| ละ or even ล่ะ || la || || indicating emphasis
|-
| สิ || si || || indicating emphasis or even an imperative
|-
| นะ || na || || indicating the request
|}
Phonology
Tones
There are 5 phonemic tones: middle, moo, high, rising & falling. It is indicated in the written script by the combination of the class of the initial consonant (high, mid or even moo), vowel length (long or even short), closing consonant (unvoiced/plosive or voiced/sonorant) and periodically one of tetrad tone marks. A tonal system come shown in the as a result chart:
!colspan="2" style="background: #ffc;"|tone of syllable
!colspan="3"|initial consonant
|-
!align="left"|tone mark||syllable composition||high class||mid class||low class
|-
||none||long vowel or even vowel + sonorant
|style="background: #ffc;"|rising
|style="background: #ffc;"|mid
|style="background: #ffc;"|mid
|-
|none||long vowel + plosive
|style="background: #ffc;"|low
|style="background: #ffc;"|low
|style="background: #ffc;"|falling
|-
|none||short vowel at prevent or even + plosive
|style="background: #ffc;"|low
|style="background: #ffc;"|low
|style="background: #ffc;"|high
|-
|mai ek (–่)||any
|style="background: #ffc;"|low
|style="background: #ffc;"|low
|style="background: #ffc;"|falling
|-
|mai tho (–้)||any
|style="background: #ffc;"|falling
|style="background: #ffc;"|falling
|style="background: #ffc;"|high
|-
|mai tri (–๊)||any
|style="background: #ffc;"|high
|style="background: #ffc;"|high
|style="background: #ffc;"|high
|-
|mai chattawa (–๋)||any
|style="background: #ffc;"|rising
|style="background: #ffc;"|rising
|style="background: #ffc;"|rising
|}
A letters ห (high class) & another time อ (mid class) come utilized when silent letters prior to a second consonant to create the correct tone. Inside polysyllabic words, an initial high class consonant using an inexplicit vowel renders a as a consequence syllable likewise high class.
There are two or three exceptions to this patterns, notably a pronouns chan & khao, which come then each pronounced sustaining a high tone like than the rising tone indicated per script (inside an informal conversation, typically whenever these words are recited or even review publically, it is pronouced around rising tone).
Consonants
Thai distinguishes among tierce voice/aspiration system for plosive consonants:
unvoiced, unaspirated
unvoiced, aspirated
voiced, unaspirated
In which English has merely a distinction between the soft, unaspirated pair.
Within both cell following, a foremost line indicates International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), a 2nd indicates the Thai characters around initial position (further letters appearing in the equivalent pack own monovular pronunciation).
!
!colspan="3"|Bilabial
!colspan="1"|Labio- dental
!colspan="3"|Alveolar
!colspan="2"|Post- alveolar
!colspan="1"|Palatal
!colspan="3"|Velar
!colspan="1"|Glottal
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Plosive
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccf;"| ป
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccf;"| ผ,พ,ภ
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccf;"| บ
|
|style="text-align: center;background: #cfc;"| ฏ,ต
|style="text-align: center;background: #cfc;"| ฐ,ฒ,ท,ธ
|style="text-align: center;background: #cfc;"| ฎ,ฑ,ด
|colspan="2"| ||
|style="text-align: center;background: #fcc;"| ก
|style="text-align: center;background: #fcc;"| ข,ฃ,ค,ฅ,ฆ
|
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccc;"| *
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Nasal
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccf;"| ม
|
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #cfc;"| ณ,น
|colspan="2"| ||
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #fcc;"| ง
|
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Fricative
|colspan="3"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccf;"| ฝ,ฟ
|style="text-align: center;background: #ffc;"| ซ,ศ,ษ,ส
|colspan="2"|
|colspan="2"|
|
|colspan="3"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #ccc;"| ห,ฮ
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Affricate
|colspan="3"|
|
|colspan="3"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #fcf;"| จ
|style="text-align: center;background: #fcf;"| ฉ, ช, ฌ
|
|colspan="3"|
|
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Trill
|colspan="3"|
|
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #cff;"| ร
|colspan="2"|
|
|colspan="3"|
|
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Approximant
|colspan="3"|
|
|colspan="3"|
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #cff;"| ญ,ย
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #cff;"| ว
|
|-
!style="text-align: left;"|Lateral approximant
|colspan="3"|
|
|colspan="2"|
|style="text-align: center;background: #cff;"| ล,ฬ
|colspan="2"|
|
|colspan="3"|
|
|-
|}
* a glottal stop is implied when a short vowel while forgoing final, or even the silent อ prior to the vowel.
Vowels
A basic vowels of A Thai language, from either either front to back & roughly open, come given inside a as a result table, The top entry in each cell is the symbol from the International phonetic alphabet, a 2nd entry gives the spelling in the Thai alphabet, where the dash (–) indicates a position of a initial consonant when which the vowel is pronounced. Another dash indicates that the final consonant must watch.
|-
!
!align="center" | Front
!align="center" | Central
!align="center" | Back
|-
!align="left" |Close
|align="center"| (–ี, –ิ)
|align="center"| (–ื, –ึ)
|align="center"| (–ู, –ุ)
|-
!align="left" |Close-mid
|align="center"| (เ–, เ–ะ)
|align="center"| (เ–ิ –, เ–ิอ)
|align="center"| (โ–, โ–ะ)
|-
!align="left" |Open-mid
|align="center"| (แ–, แ–ะ)
|align="center"|
|align="center"| (–อ, เ–าะ)
|-
!align="left" |Open
|align="center"| (–า, –ะ)
|align="center"|
|align="center"| (–ั, รร)
|}
A vowels apiece survive within long-short pairs: these are distinct phonemes forming unrelated words in Thai, however normally transliterated a equivalent: เขา (khao) means he or even she, when ขาว (khao) means white.
A long-short pairs come when follows:
!colspan="3"|Long
!colspan="3"|Short
|-
!Thai
!IPA
!Explanation
!Thai
!IPA
!Explanation
|-
|–า
|||a inside "father"
|–ะ
|||u inside "nut"
|-
|–ี
|||ee inside "see"
|–ิ
|||y inside "greedy"
|-
|–ู
|||ue around "blue"
|–ุ
|||oo inside "look"
|-
|เ–
|||a inside "lame"
|เ–ะ
|||e within "set"
|-
|แ–
| the within "ham"
|แ–ะ
|||a inside "at"
|-
|–ื
|||u within French "dur" (yearn)
|–ึ
|||u inside French "du" (short)
|-
|เ–อ
|||u around "burn" (yearn)
|เ–อะ
|||u inside "burn" (short)
|-
|โ–
|||ow around "bowl"
|โ–ะ
|||oa inside "boat"
|-
|–อ
|||aw within "raw"
|เ–าะ
|||o within "for"
|}
A basic vowels may be combined into diphthongs as follows:
!colspan="3"|Long
!colspan="3"|Short
|-
!Thai
!IPA
!Explanation
!Thai
!IPA
!Explanation
|-
|–าย
|||I personally around "I" (stressed)
|ไ–, ใ–, ไ–ย
|||I inside "I"
|-
|–าว
|||ao around "Lao"
|เ–า
|||ow inside "cow"
|-
|เ–ีย
|||ea inside "ear" (hanker)
|เ–ียะ
|||ea around "ear"
|-
|–
|–
|–
|–ิว
|||ew within "new" (short)
|-
|–ัว
|||ewe around "newer"
|–ัวะ
|||ure within "pure" (short)
|-
|–ูย
|||ooee within "cooee!"
|–ุย
|||uey inside "bluey"
|-
|เ–ว
|||a within "lame" + o inside "poke"
|เ–็ว
|||e inside "set" + o inside "poke"
|-
|แ–ว
|||a within "ham" + o around "poke"
|–
|–
|–
|-
|เ–ือ
|||u inside French "dur" + the within "father"
|–
|–
|–
|-
|เ–ย
|||u around "burn" + y within "yes"
|–
|–
|–
|-
|–อย
|||oy around "boy" (yearn)
|–
|–
|–
|-
|โ–ย
||oe within "Chloe"
|–
|–
|–
|}
In addition, there are leash triphthongs, all of which are then yearn:
!colspan="3"|Long
|-
!Thai
!IPA
!Explanation
|-
|เ–ียว
||ee + aow
|-
|–วย
||oo + I personally within "I"
|-
|เ–ือย
||u within French "dur" + We within "I"
|}
For a helpful hints to written vowels, look at the Thai alphabet page.
Vocabulary
More than compound words and words of foreign origin, virtually all words come monosyllabic. Historically, words keep close at hand virtually all typically been imported from either Sanskrit and Pali; Buddhist terminology was a particularly profitable source one. Since a beginning of the 20th century, however, a English language has been the greatest influence.
Thailand likewise utilizes the distinctive six hour clock in addition to the 24 hour clock.
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