Comments for Thai Language Tricks

Comment on Foreign Thai accent analysis from “The Family Guy” by David

David — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 12:03:23 +0000

Obviously he does not care if the pronunciation is correct. It’s part of the joke. It’s the same when he speaks in Spanish or Portuguese.

Comment on The shocking truth: ใจ doesn’t mean “heart”! by John Berns

John Berns — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 09:55:22 +0000

Jai (ใจ) is one of those words that you will go cray trying to pigeon-hole into an equivalent English word.

It’s meaning is related to both mind (thought, logic) and heart (feelings, emotions) because there is less of a duality between the two concepts to Thais than there is to English language speakers.

Westerners seem to take almost a Vulcan stance on the mind: facts are facts and logic is logic and that’s that. Here are the facts and this is the conclusion. How you feel about something it is secondary to the facts and logic of it.

I believe that a Thai would find that the facts and the feelings of people involved in the situation can’t be so easily separated when coming to a conclusion. A resolution that is “right” should take into account facts and the feelings of the people and that logic can’t be applied in an emotional vacuum.

So to say it’s either heart or it’s mind, thought or feeling is to diminish the term; it stands for something more that one or the other alone.

Comment on Foreign Thai accent analysis from “The Family Guy” by Patranun

Patranun — Fri, 22 May 2009 11:14:52 +0000

I think Glenn (Seth MacFarlane) didn’t said that. (เอ้ย จะไปไหน มานี่ อีดอก กูจ่ายเงินไปแล้ว ขี้โกง กูตกลงกับพ่อมึง ทำไมไม่ยอมทำ)

In fact, it should be this one instead (I have to admitted that I have to listen very carefully for about 10 times to get this.):

“เอ้ย จะไปไหน มานี่ อีดอก กูจ่ายเงินไปแล้ว ขี้โกง กูตกลงกับพวกมึง ทำไมไม่ทำตาม”

By the way, I wonder who gives the voices to those girls. I don’t think Cherry Cheva do that voice.

Comment on Foreign Thai accent analysis from “The Family Guy” by Ashley

Ashley — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 19:02:19 +0000

understand why someone of any nationality would get upset when hearing the language prnounced wrong, but you have to keep in mind…McFarlane speaks English, unless someone has lived there or studied religiously the accent won’t come off perfect, therefor maybe distorting the overall message. We all have that problem when visiting other countries for the first time. Also, the show doesn’t exactly set out to do everything perfectly which is part of it’s “charm” and if the scene upsets or offends you, join the club because the show also INTENTIONALY offends MANY people.

Comment on Tone Names: Arbitrary by MTLa

MTLa — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 09:52:12 +0000

Hi
Tone mark is have four tone mark.
There are mai-eak ่ low tone,mai-toe ้ falling tone,mai-dtree ๊ high tone,mai-jat-ta-waa ๋ rising tone.

And another is no tone mark we call saaman common tone.

And middle class consonants is ก จ ด ต ฎ ฏ บ ป อ
There are 9 consonants and they can have five tone and four tone mark.

Low class consonants is ค ฆ ง ช ซ ฌ ญ ฑ ฒ ณ ท ธ น พ ฟ ภ ม ย ร ล ว ฬ ฮ There are 23 consonants and they can have five tone but two of the tone mark.

High class consonants is ข ฉ ฐ ผ ฝ ศ ษ ส ห There are 10 consonants and they can have three tone(low,falling and rising) but two of the tone mark.

Have a nice day

MTLa

Comment on Foreign Thai accent analysis from “The Family Guy” by Sonveh

Sonveh — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 18:35:20 +0000

“The woman or women who voice the girls are not Thai speakers either”.

You are wrong on this one. The woman who voice the girls are Cherry Chevapravatdumrong, a native Thai, Family Guy writer. I guess that says something about your analyzing skills.

Comment on Foreign Thai accent analysis from “The Family Guy” by Ping

Ping — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 10:44:27 +0000

You should watch “The Man With The Golden Gun” 70’s James Bond film. Thai police officers in the film said: ขับรถภาษาอะไรวะ ขับอย่างนี้แย่นี่หว่า เบรกกระชั้นชิดอย่างนี้”.

Comment on Profanity and Hilarity: Crossing the Line by AlbinoAsian

AlbinoAsian — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 18:34:13 +0000

hey mate,
I don’t like it at all when Thai’s try their hand at English profanity… I don’t really like it much when native speakers do that either.

I have lived in Thailand for 4 years, and my formal Thai training in the Thai language, I would never call someone else โง่ but I have called myself that when I’ve done something stupid. Also have joked about too late becoming ทุเรศ but the others you mentioned I wouldn’t go near, I don’t think I understand their conotations plus I try not to get into gutter speak

Thanks for your great blog by the way

Comment on The shocking truth: ใจ doesn’t mean “heart”! by bkkunderground

bkkunderground — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 14:42:41 +0000

I think the more important thing to not re:ใจ is not a literal meaning of the heart but as the repository of feelings. The opposite correlation would be จิต the repository of thought. The way you are reading ใจ as relating more to thought than to feelings in some cases is correct but your conclusion that as a result ใจ is not feelings is oversimplified. The best I can explain it is the deepest and most sincere manifestation of thought จิต is when it is corroborated by your feelings ใจ hence จิตใจตรงกัน. So ใจ used in a meaning that represents thought means sincere thoughts or your mind at its deepest level, the level of the heart.

Comment on All Hell broke loose / นรกแตก by mananya

mananya — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 22:54:00 +0000

I am native Thai. I would like to share and give a comment as I see khun JC posted on Monday, April 14, 2008 at 11:45 am

Thanks I’m going to look for oppurtunities to use this one. (the word นรกแตก)

In my opinion, I think this word is not a good word to try to find an opportunity to use. If you use it, you may gain the negative response. This word is sometime used as an expression or exclamation word which doesn’t mean anything but exclamation!. Anyway,for the word itself, the meaning of นรกแตก is in the sense of bad things happened.It is alright to study or learn its meaning but I think if we speak, why not we learn to speak the nice words.

I remember there is thai teaching about speech that there are 5 components of good speech or วาจาสุภาษิต. I will continue telling that 5 components if anybody is interested :)

thank you