"NONG", the meaning?
Ken Small
her name now with "NONG". Could somebody please relay the meaning of this word
to me?
Thanks!
P.S. Air Mail only took TWO weeks to Canada!
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: We have just received snail mail from a friend in BKK, and she is preceding
: her name now with "NONG". Could somebody please relay the meaning of this word
: to me?
"Nong" is "younger sister" or "younger brother". It can be used to refer
to anyone you are familiar with, even though you are not actually related
to him or her by blood. The opposite of "Nong" is "Pii" which means "older
sister" or "older brother". So, when you reply her mail, you may want
to call yourself "Pii Ken". -sanpawat
----------------------------------------
Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier
cr...@bcgrizzly.com
Nong refers to being youger than you.
In article <369FB6A7...@home.com>,
Ken Small <rks...@home.com> wrote:
> We have just received snail mail from a friend in BKK, and she is preceding
> her name now with "NONG". Could somebody please relay the meaning of this word
> to me?
>
> Thanks!
>
> P.S. Air Mail only took TWO weeks to Canada!
>
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
schm...@hotmail.com
attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the same
"nong" ?
Thanks
Ueli
tch...@my-dejanews.com
schm...@hotmail.com wrote:
> Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch the
> attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the same
> "nong" ?
I think it is, if you're friends are older than the waiter/waitresses. If
they're of similar age or younger, they normally use "pii".
>
> Thanks
> Ueli
>
> -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
> http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
>
Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
Kinnear
know the persons name. If you can tell they are younger than you call them
"nong" if they are obvisiouly older than you then you call them "pii". If you
want you as a male can use the word "krup" but Pii and nong are better.
Jim
schm...@hotmail.com wrote:
> Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch the
> attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the same
> "nong" ?
>
eric servaes
tch...@my-dejanews.com wrote in message
<77q67v$ej0$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>...
>In article <77pt55$801$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
> schm...@hotmail.com wrote:
>> Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch
the
>> attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the
same
>> "nong" ?
>
>they're of similar age or younger, they normally use "pii".
>
otherwise it means ghost :-)))
Eric S.
>>
>> Thanks
>> Ueli
>>
>> -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
>> http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
>>
>
>
>Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
John Dunstan
normally be "noom" which means "young man". "Nong" would be used to
catch the attention of waitresses!
On Sat, 16 Jan 1999 08:49:19 -0500, Kinnear <kin...@usol.com> wrote:
>It is the same word. It is a respectful way of addressing someone when you dont
>know the persons name. If you can tell they are younger than you call them
>"nong" if they are obvisiouly older than you then you call them "pii". If you
>want you as a male can use the word "krup" but Pii and nong are better.
>Jim
>
>schm...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
>> Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch the
>> attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the same
>> "nong" ?
>>
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch the
: attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the same
: "nong" ?
Yes. It is the same but it is used in a far more "superficial" level. For
example, if you go to a local restaurant, you can call the waitress/er who
looks younger than you "Nong" as well. This is also a general practice in
hotels or bars. -sanpawat
tch...@my-dejanews.com
"eric servaes" <eric.s...@skynet.be> wrote:
>
> tch...@my-dejanews.com wrote in message
> <77q67v$ej0$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>...
> >In article <77pt55$801$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
> >> Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch
> the
> >> attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the
> same
> >> "nong" ?
> >
> >they're of similar age or younger, they normally use "pii".
> >
> but pronounce it with a falling tone and not with a rising tone ....
> otherwise it means ghost :-)))
Hey, with the service in some of the restaurants I've been in, that would be
appropriate.
:-)
Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
Johpa
should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
attract attention from a waiter.
Johpa
tch...@my-dejanews.com
Thanks for that. I've often felt uncomfortable using "nong" to call a waiter
because of it's age reference. To me, it's almost like saying "Boy!!". I
realize that's not it's meaning, but I still feel uncomfortable.
>
> Johpa
Pat
>
> In article <19990116233334...@ng-ch1.aol.com>,
> jo...@aol.com (Johpa) wrote:
> > If you all have to be explained when and where you might use "nong' then you
> > should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
> > attract attention from a waiter.
>
> Thanks for that. I've often felt uncomfortable using "nong" to call a waiter
> because of it's age reference. To me, it's almost like saying "Boy!!". I
> realize that's not it's meaning, but I still feel uncomfortable.
As a point of interest, the word "boy" is actually used to call waiters.
John Macvie
<jo...@aol.com> writes
>If you all have to be explained when and where you might use "nong' then you
>should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
>attract attention from a waiter.
>
I've often heard Thais simply shouting something like "Eeee" to attract
a waiter's attention. Do you know what that means?
John
--
John Macvie
To reply by email remove "nospam"
John Sharman
> In article <19990116233334...@ng-ch1.aol.com>,
> jo...@aol.com (Johpa) wrote:
> > If you all have to be explained when and where you might use "nong' then you
> > should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
> > attract attention from a waiter.
>
> Thanks for that. I've often felt uncomfortable using "nong" to call a waiter
> because of it's age reference. To me, it's almost like saying "Boy!!". I
> realize that's not it's meaning, but I still feel uncomfortable.
What leaves me uncomfortable is when the waitress responds by calling me
/luung-/ ;-)
Actually, /phii"/ and /nOOng^/ are *extremely* commonly used in spoken
Thai, especially as between friends. It's a peculiarity of the language
that seems to go with the individual speaker (particularly women)
referring to themselves by their own name (chUU" len") instead of using
a pronoun. When my wife talks to her friends by phone, nearly every
sentence seems to end with /phii"/, even when it's not needed. It
almost becomes a standard interjection.
--
Regards,
John Sharman
+====================================================================+
| John Sharman Internet: jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk |
| Tel/Fax: +44 (0)1603 452142 |
+====================================================================+
John Sharman
nospa...@dumfpc.demon.co.uk "John Macvie" writes:
> I've often heard Thais simply shouting something like "Eeee" to attract
> a waiter's attention. Do you know what that means?
It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
women. It's a kind of pronounal adjective in that it is not used on its
own. Thus /ii- chaat" maa+/ means "You dog", /ii- kuan-tiin-/
approximates to "You arsehole" etc. /ii- chib'haay+/ is particularly
offensive.
The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/; are you sure
it was a waiter and not a waitress who was being spoken to?
Joris Goetschalckx
>If you all have to be explained when and where you might use "nong' then you
>should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
>attract attention from a waiter.
Hi Johpa,
I agree that the use of phii/nong is too complex for most farangs, just as
the use of other non-neutral personal pronouns (shan-thEE, kuu-mUng,
etc.); farangs not fluent in Thai better stick to the pair phom/khun
(shan/khun for females)...
BTW, I would suggest the use of "khun khrab!" ("khun kha!" for female
speakers) as a nice and polite alternative for calling a waiter or waitress.
Literally it means something like "hey you!", but then in a polite way ;-)
Will we ever learn it?
Cheers,
Joris
--
Joris Goetschalckx
http://users.skynet.be/sky98829
Joris Goetschalckx
>What leaves me uncomfortable is when the waitress responds by
>calling me /luung-/ ;-)
My grey hairs probably...
>Actually, /phii"/ and /nOOng^/ are *extremely* commonly used in spoken
>Thai, especially as between friends. It's a peculiarity of the language
That is right, but I think there is some asymmetry between the use
of phii and the use of nong: they very easily call their friends phii, even if
about the same age (sometimes even when younger, depending on the
generation the person belongs too, in the case of relatives, but let's
not get carried away too far into the phii/nong intricacies...), but they
do not use nong nearly as often (they would rather use the chUU len).
Apparently a person has to be "junior" a lot before nong is publicly
used. A notable exception being of course the man calling his mia/fAAn
"nong" as a term of endearment (and then calling himself "phii").
What are other persons' observations concerning the Phii/Nong
Asymmetry (PNA)? Is PNA region/dialect dependent? Any info on the
diachronic characteristics of the PNA?
Will we ever learn it? ;-)
John Macvie
<jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk> writes
>In article <UEK5cBAAhbo2Ewyk@dumfpc>
> nospa...@dumfpc.demon.co.uk "John Macvie" writes:
>
>> I've often heard Thais simply shouting something like "Eeee" to attract
>> a waiter's attention. Do you know what that means?
>
>It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
>women. It's a kind of pronounal adjective in that it is not used on its
>own. Thus /ii- chaat" maa+/ means "You dog", /ii- kuan-tiin-/
>approximates to "You arsehole" etc. /ii- chib'haay+/ is particularly
>offensive.
>
>The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/; are you sure
>it was a waiter and not a waitress who was being spoken to?
occasion! Now that you mention it, I think it was a waitress who was
being addressed.
Johpa
>Actually, /phii"/ and /nOOng^/ are *extremely* commonly used in spoken
>Thai, especially as between friends.
Yes, but I have found that between strangers it has the potential to be
condescending. The proper use requires a certain cultural fluency beyond
simply linguistic fluency. One usually is absorbing both the context and the
individual. If all Thais still look alike to you (hey, at first all white kids
on campus looked alike to meet after I first returned from teaching in
Thailand) then best to keep to the more formal pronouns.
Johpa
Johpa
>nospa...@dumfpc.demon.co.uk "John Macvie" writes:
>
>> I've often heard Thais simply shouting something like "Eeee" to attract
>> a waiter's attention. Do you know what that means?
>
>It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
>women. ....
>The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/
Except of course up in the northern villages where the terms replace nong and
phii amongst friends. This is just to emphasize that Thai pronoun usage is
rather complex and most visitors should stick to more formal usages. However,
if a person becomes a friend over time and addresses you as phii or nong then
it is proper to reciprocate.
Next class: The usage of "nuu" or how a male can get himself into really hot
water : )
Johpa
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: >It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
: >women. ....
: >The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/
: Except of course up in the northern villages where the terms replace nong and
: phii amongst friends.
Nope. I am not sure if a foreigner's ear can tell the difference between "ai"
in central Thai usuage and northern Thai dialect or not. It is very difficult.
I would guess. "ai" in central Thai has a very short and abrupt tone but for
"ai" or a probably better word "aeii" (prononuce almost like "eye" but a
little longer, not abruptly ended like "ai") in northen dialect, this word
has longer tone. It is also very sweet when a true northern local uses it,
preferably Chiangmai dialect. :)
: Next class: The usage of "nuu" or how a male can get himself into really hot
: water : )
Well, not really get you into a hot water. You can use "nuu" or "nuu+" with
the same intended meaning as that of "Nong" if you go to the restaurants or
hotels or markets. Most female students often use "nuu+" as a personal
pronoun when they refer to themselves to teachers. It is polite, acceptable.
No problem. But what Khun Jopha probably meant was a word often used to
refer to prostitutes which means the same thing. Again, almost like "nong",
which has various intended meanings, depending on the circumstance.
John Sharman
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu "Sanpawat Kantabutra" writes:
> Johpa (jo...@aol.com) wrote:
> : >It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
> : >women. ....
> : >The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/
>
> : Except of course up in the northern villages where the terms replace nong and
> : phii amongst friends.
>
> Nope. I am not sure if a foreigner's ear can tell the difference between "ai"
> in central Thai usuage and northern Thai dialect or not. It is very difficult.
> I would guess. "ai" in central Thai has a very short and abrupt tone but for
> "ai" or a probably better word "aeii" (prononuce almost like "eye" but a
> little longer, not abruptly ended like "ai") in northen dialect, this word
> has longer tone. It is also very sweet when a true northern local uses it,
> preferably Chiangmai dialect. :)
I may have some of this wrong (please correct me If so) but I think that
there is some danger of confusion here. AIUI the northern /kham-
mUUang-/ word /aay"/ is not at all the same as the insult /ai"/.
Different word, different spelling, different meaning. I'm pretty sure
that /aay"/ means "oldest brother". My wife's oldest brother is the
second child in the family and is usually referred to as /aay" WOO-/
(/WOO-/ is his "nickname"). He is called that by everybody, even people
who are not members of the family. None of the other brothers is ever
addressed as /aay"/. It was hard at first for me to distinguish between
the sounds of /aay"/ and /ai"/ but it's no problem now.
The difficulty is compounded by the fact that despite /ai"/ being an
insult, nevertheless it is still quite commonly used in a friendly way
between close friends, typically people who have known each other from
childhood. In the same way that I might in fun call a very old
friend "you daft old bugger" I have heard Thais call each other things
like /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ which would be totally inappropriate
expressions to use with strangers save in the most hostile
circumstances.
Of course, as a farang, I sometimes get the opportunity to have a
certain amount of fun by pretending not to know the differences ;-).
Still, the bargirls get away with the same kind of thing when they
call farang women /maa+ dam-/ or their customers /daak'ling-/
eric servaes
Joris Goetschalckx wrote in message <77squd$jdq$2...@news1.skynet.be>...
>Johpa wrote:
>>If you all have to be explained when and where you might use "nong' then
you
>>should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
>>attract attention from a waiter.
>
>
>Hi Johpa,
>
>I agree that the use of phii/nong is too complex for most farangs, just as
>the use of other non-neutral personal pronouns (shan-thEE, kuu-mUng,
>etc.); farangs not fluent in Thai better stick to the pair phom/khun
>(shan/khun for females)...
>
>BTW, I would suggest the use of "khun khrab!" ("khun kha!" for female
>speakers) as a nice and polite alternative for calling a waiter or
waitress.
>Literally it means something like "hey you!", but then in a polite way ;-)
>
I doubt it Joris :-)
you noticed what a long tread just about the meaning of "Nong".
What would be the result if someone asks the meaning of "flying a kite" in
thai ;-)))
BTW : hoe was het in Thailand? Goed zeker?
Graag een seintje.
Eric SERVAES
Brussels BELGIUM
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: To catch the attention of waiters in a restaurant, the word used would
: normally be "noom" which means "young man". "Nong" would be used to
: catch the attention of waitresses!
Quite the opposite. "noom" can only mean "young man" but "nong" is
unisex. -sanpawat
tch...@my-dejanews.com
ff...@bellatlantic.net wrote:
> > > If you all have to be explained when and where you might use "nong' then
you
> > > should probably not use the word and just say"khoo thoot" (excuse me) to
> > > attract attention from a waiter.
> >
> > because of it's age reference. To me, it's almost like saying "Boy!!". I
> > realize that's not it's meaning, but I still feel uncomfortable.
>
Where I come from, calling a waiter with the word "boy" will get you knocked
off your chair.
:-)
tch...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> In article <UEK5cBAAhbo2Ewyk@dumfpc>
> nospa...@dumfpc.demon.co.uk "John Macvie" writes:
>
> > I've often heard Thais simply shouting something like "Eeee" to attract
> > a waiter's attention. Do you know what that means?
>
> own. Thus /ii- chaat" maa+/ means "You dog", /ii- kuan-tiin-/
> approximates to "You arsehole" etc. /ii- chib'haay+/ is particularly
> offensive.
It's also occasionally used as slang between female close friends. They will
refer to each other as "ii-(nickname)". My wife sometimes does this with close
friends. I tried it once in imitation and was told not to do it again.
> The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/; are you sure
> it was a waiter and not a waitress who was being spoken to?
I'm still not comfortable with the "official" transliteration scheme here. Is
this prounced like "eye"? (That's the way I've heard it pronounced, if we're
talking about the same word.)
> --
> Regards,
>
> John Sharman
> +====================================================================+
> | John Sharman Internet: jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk |
> | Tel/Fax: +44 (0)1603 452142 |
> +====================================================================+
>
>
tch...@my-dejanews.com
"Joris Goetschalckx" <joris.goe...@skynet.be> wrote:
> John Sharman wrote:
> >What leaves me uncomfortable is when the waitress responds by
> >calling me /luung-/ ;-)
> You are lucky being called lung, to me they sometimes say phOO ;-)
> My grey hairs probably...
>
>
> That is right, but I think there is some asymmetry between the use
> of phii and the use of nong: they very easily call their friends phii, even if
> about the same age (sometimes even when younger, depending on the
> generation the person belongs too, in the case of relatives, but let's
> not get carried away too far into the phii/nong intricacies...), but they
> do not use nong nearly as often (they would rather use the chUU len).
> Apparently a person has to be "junior" a lot before nong is publicly
> used. A notable exception being of course the man calling his mia/fAAn
> "nong" as a term of endearment (and then calling himself "phii").
> What are other persons' observations concerning the Phii/Nong
> Asymmetry (PNA)? Is PNA region/dialect dependent? Any info on the
> diachronic characteristics of the PNA?
>
It's these kinds of "intricacies" (as you two so delicately phrase them)
involving the interjection of a variety of non-translatable words into the
Thai language that alter the meaning of sentences that create problems for
me.
I returned to Angola for the first time in two years a few months ago and
have had to polish off my rusty Portuguese. I find myself adding "mai" to the
end of questions in Portuguese.
No, I will never learn. Not completely.
>
> Cheers,
> Joris
>
> --
> Joris Goetschalckx
> http://users.skynet.be/sky98829
>
>
tch...@my-dejanews.com
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu (Sanpawat Kantabutra) wrote:
> Johpa (jo...@aol.com) wrote:
> : >It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
> : >women. ....
> : >The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/
>
> : Except of course up in the northern villages where the terms replace nong
and
> : phii amongst friends.
>
> Nope. I am not sure if a foreigner's ear can tell the difference between "ai"
> in central Thai usuage and northern Thai dialect or not. It is very difficult.
> I would guess. "ai" in central Thai has a very short and abrupt tone but for
> "ai" or a probably better word "aeii" (prononuce almost like "eye" but a
> little longer, not abruptly ended like "ai") in northen dialect, this word
> has longer tone. It is also very sweet when a true northern local uses it,
> preferably Chiangmai dialect. :)
My wife (Isaan from Chaiyapum) uses "ii" when addressing close female friends
and "ai (eye)" when addressing her younger brother. She has explained it to me
that both are offensive but that close friends use them between each other
jokingly.
>
> : Next class: The usage of "nuu" or how a male can get himself into really hot
> : water : )
>
> Well, not really get you into a hot water. You can use "nuu" or "nuu+" with
> the same intended meaning as that of "Nong" if you go to the restaurants or
> hotels or markets. Most female students often use "nuu+" as a personal
> pronoun when they refer to themselves to teachers. It is polite, acceptable.
> No problem. But what Khun Jopha probably meant was a word often used to
> refer to prostitutes which means the same thing. Again, almost like "nong",
> which has various intended meanings, depending on the circumstance.
> -sanpawat
> ----------------------------------------
> Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier
>
Guy
"khun doo toa" for "waiter"?(this is seldom used , I agree)
About PNA:
of course it depends on the region or ethnical group too:
In the north they say "djeh" for elder sister "hia" for elder brother,
"tia" for father and "oei" for all people pasted their seventies....
does anybody know what they use for younger sister and brother?
Guy
Joris Goetschalckx <joris.goe...@skynet.be> wrote in message
77squd$jdq$2...@news1.skynet.be...
>BTW, I would suggest the use of "khun khrab!" ("khun kha!" for female
>speakers) as a nice and polite alternative for calling a waiter or
waitress.
>Literally it means something like "hey you!", but then in a polite way ;-)
>
>Will we ever learn it?
>
John Sharman
> > The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/; are you sure
> > it was a waiter and not a waitress who was being spoken to?
>
> I'm still not comfortable with the "official" transliteration scheme here. Is
> this prounced like "eye"? (That's the way I've heard it pronounced, if we're
> talking about the same word.)
Yes it is. But so is /aay"/. The difference is really one of duration.
Both are pronounced with falling tone, but /ai"/ is shorter and more
clipped and emphatic.
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: My wife (Isaan from Chaiyapum) uses "ii" when addressing close female friends
: and "ai (eye)" when addressing her younger brother. She has explained it to me
: that both are offensive but that close friends use them between each other
: jokingly.
Issan and northern dialects are not exactly the same. I am not an expert at
Issan lang. but I know that Laosian people use the word "ai (eye)" to address
women as well. So, I suspect that Issan people probably use it for the same
meaning. For "ii", it is rude for both Laosian lang. and Thai lang.
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: there is some danger of confusion here. AIUI the northern /kham-
: mUUang-/ word /aay"/ is not at all the same as the insult /ai"/.
: Different word, different spelling, different meaning.
Yes, you are right. Different word and spelling. /aay"/ is
three-character long and /ai"/ is two-character long if we
count only horizontally. It is /aay"/ that means "older brother".
: (/WOO-/ is his "nickname"). He is called that by everybody, even people
: who are not members of the family. None of the other brothers is ever
: addressed as /aay"/.
You mean nobody in the family is ever addressed as /aay"/ by other
family members ? It is okay if, say, the youngest brother would call
his second oldest brother /aay"/ too. No problem and perfect usuage.
: I have heard Thais call each other things
: like /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ which would be totally inappropriate
: expressions to use with strangers save in the most hostile
: circumstances.
Do not ever use those phrases with others unless you are extremely
close to them. :) I never call anyone like that, even with my brothers
and my close friends. It's extremely rude and inappropriate. -sanpawat
John Sharman
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu "Sanpawat Kantabutra" writes:
> John Sharman (jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk) wrote:
> Yes, you are right. Different word and spelling. /aay"/ is
> three-character long and /ai"/ is two-character long if we
> count only horizontally. It is /aay"/ that means "older brother".
>
> : (/WOO-/ is his "nickname"). He is called that by everybody, even people
> : who are not members of the family. None of the other brothers is ever
> : addressed as /aay"/.
>
> You mean nobody in the family is ever addressed as /aay"/ by other
> family members ? It is okay if, say, the youngest brother would call
> his second oldest brother /aay"/ too. No problem and perfect usuage.
Thanks for that, though I've never heard it used in those circumstances in
our family in a period of several years. Sounds like it's just the same
as /phii"/ then, except that it isn't used speaking to/about
females. Is there an equivalent /kham- mUUang-/ for "older sister"?
John Sharman
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu "Sanpawat Kantabutra" writes:
> : I have heard Thais call each other things
> : like /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ which would be totally inappropriate
> : expressions to use with strangers save in the most hostile
> : circumstances.
>
> Do not ever use those phrases with others unless you are extremely
> close to them. :)
Or a very long way away from them. :)
BTW, two questions about that last /kham- daa'/ - /haa'/
What's the nearest equivalent in English? I'm trying to gauge how
"strong" the insult is and in English we don't have an expression for
the evil spirit of cholera.
I have heard it used in the phrase /ii- haa' raak"/ I'm not sure of
the last word, but it sounds to me just like the Thai word for "root".
Is it in fact that word or, if not, what is it, please?
pkham...@hotmail.com
"Guy" <guy....@pandora.be> wrote:
> Or to call a waiter, is n't it correct to use " garuna " for "please" and
> "khun doo toa" for "waiter"?(this is seldom used , I agree)
Better not use it, or they might crack up. These words are mainly written
words, that's exactly wat they are, for writing. People seldom use it in
spoken language. I reserve the opportunity for really weird people who might
use it.
> About PNA:
> of course it depends on the region or ethnical group too:
> In the north they say "djeh" for elder sister "hia" for elder brother,
> "tia" for father
These are Taechiw Chinese words. I highly recommend you not to use it unless
your Thai tonal pronounciation is flawless. A slight variation from /hia-/
(neutral tone) to /hia"/ - rising tone can be gravely different. The latter
case means a big lizard - comodo type. For some reason, it is extremely
insulting word in Thai. Besides, calling Thais or even people you think look
like chinese with chinese words can have negative connotation. It's very hard
to judge when it's appropriate to use it. Even Thais don't use it properly
sometimes.
> and "oei" for all people pasted their seventies....
> does anybody know what they use for younger sister and brother?
> Guy
"Oei" or /ui"/ is respectable word that I recommend you to use with northern
elders, northeastern(Isan) though. They also use "nong" for younger brother
and sister. They have different words in local dialects for that but if
you're not speaking /kam mUUng-/ or Lao, you'd better off stick to /phii"/
and /nOOng"/. Getting too fancy will probably confuse people, having to
figure correct tones from what you say already. No offense intended but I
have never met any native european language speaker who can perfectly
pronounce Thai, and I know someone who lived in Thailand for over 30 years
and write extensively about Thai culture.
> Joris Goetschalckx <joris.goe...@skynet.be> wrote in message
> 77squd$jdq$2...@news1.skynet.be...
>
> >BTW, I would suggest the use of "khun khrab!" ("khun kha!" for female
> >speakers) as a nice and polite alternative for calling a waiter or
> waitress.
> >Literally it means something like "hey you!", but then in a polite way ;-)
> >
> >Will we ever learn it?
> >
> >Cheers,
> >Joris
Or sometimes, I just raise my right hand. Once I got the waitress's
attention, I'll make a circle in the air with index finger, which mean,
"Check, please."
Welcome back, Joris.
Regards,
Puangroi
Johpa
>Well, not really get you into a hot water. You can use "nuu" or "nuu+" with
>the same intended meaning as that of "Nong" if you go to the restaurants or
>hotels or markets. Most female students often use "nuu+" as a personal
>pronoun when they refer to themselves to teachers.
I once called a female graduate student who was about 10 years younger than me
nuu and she got pretty pissed off. It is no problem for me to call a teen nuu
but I have found it porblematic to call an older educated city girl nuu or even
nong. Pronoun usuage always changes along with the culture.
>But what Khun Jopha probably meant was a word often used to
>refer to prostitutes which means the same thing.
I am honored, but it has been longer than I can remember since my crazier
single days to know what the current language is regarding the demimondes.
Johpa
blue...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
AIUI the northern /kham-
> mUUang-/ word /aay"/ is not at all the same as the insult /ai"/.
> that /aay"/ means "oldest brother".
/aayy"/ (long rising tone) in kham muang means "older brother."
To comlicate the matter a little further, another variation /aay^/ is used in
Nan and Prae province (pronunciation inbetween /aayy"/ older brother and
/ai"/) in the same sense as /ai"/ used in standard Thai (impolite address to
a male).
The same word used in the latter sense is pronounced /ai'/ (short falling) in
kham maung used in Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Lampang, and other western parts of
the North. Example: /ai' haa"/ (particular of Chiang Mai dialect), /ai' haa'/
(for Chiang Rai and Lampang), instead of /ai" ha'/. See the difference?
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
blue...@my-dejanews.com
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu (Sanpawat Kantabutra) wrote:
> John Sharman (jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk) wrote:
> : I have heard Thais call each other things
> : like /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ which would be totally inappropriate
> : expressions to use with strangers save in the most hostile
> : circumstances.
>
> Do not ever use those phrases with others unless you are extremely
> and my close friends. It's extremely rude and inappropriate. -sanpawat
Different people are comfortable with different usage of language. Although
some people may feel comfortable using /ai" hia"/ and /ii- haa'/ with someone
really close to them, some rarely or never use such swear words. (Like Khun
Sanpawat, I have never used such words, even with my closest friends, and
would not even think of using them.) Except in some particular circumstances,
most people would consider those words extremely inappropriate. New learners
of Thai should not try using such terms. You will most likely get into
trouble.
blue...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
>
> BTW, two questions about that last /kham- daa'/ - /haa'/
>
> What's the nearest equivalent in English? I'm trying to gauge how
> "strong" the insult is and in English we don't have an expression for
> the evil spirit of cholera.
>
> I have heard it used in the phrase /ii- haa' raak"/ I'm not sure of
> the last word, but it sounds to me just like the Thai word for "root".
> Is it in fact that word or, if not, what is it, please?
Though I'm no expert in swear words, I'll give it a try. (Don't mean to sound
like a goody two shoes, but I really am not a swearer.)
The closest equivalent I can think of /ii- haa'/ is "bitch" and /ai" haa'/
"son of a bitch."
As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root" but
I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
"consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
infested/consumed by cholera." Just my two cents.
John Sharman
> In article <916601...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> AIUI the northern /kham-
> > mUUang-/ word /aay"/ is not at all the same as the insult /ai"/.
> > Different word, different spelling, different meaning. I'm pretty sure
> > that /aay"/ means "oldest brother".
>
> /aayy"/ (long rising tone) in kham muang means "older brother."
Falling tone, surely; or did you mean that anyway, Khun Busakorn?
[Reminder on SCT tone indicators:
- = normal tone
' = low tone
" = falling tone
^ = high tone
+ = rising tone ]
> To comlicate the matter a little further, another variation /aay^/ is used in
> Nan and Prae province (pronunciation inbetween /aayy"/ older brother and
> /ai"/) in the same sense as /ai"/ used in standard Thai (impolite address to
> a male).
Don't know that one. I learn my /kham- mUUang-/ in northern Chiang Rai
(Amphur Mae Chan) and there /aay"/ is quite a long, lazy sound,
definitely falling tone and readily distinguishable from the short and
much more staccato /ai"/
> The same word used in the latter sense is pronounced /ai'/ (short falling) in
> kham maung used in Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Lampang, and other western parts of
> the North. Example: /ai' haa"/ (particular of Chiang Mai dialect), /ai' haa'/
> (for Chiang Rai and Lampang), instead of /ai" ha'/. See the difference?
I would say that /haa'/ is quite long drawn out - of similar duration to
/aay"/ in fact, but very clearly low tone. It's odd that there should be
such pronunciation differences over very short geographical distances.
John Sharman
> > Do not ever use those phrases with others unless you are extremely
> > close to them. :) I never call anyone like that, even with my brothers
> > and my close friends. It's extremely rude and inappropriate. -sanpawat
>
> Different people are comfortable with different usage of language. Although
> some people may feel comfortable using /ai" hia"/ and /ii- haa'/ with someone
> really close to them, some rarely or never use such swear words. (Like Khun
> Sanpawat, I have never used such words, even with my closest friends, and
> would not even think of using them.) Except in some particular circumstances,
> most people would consider those words extremely inappropriate. New learners
> of Thai should not try using such terms. You will most likely get into
> trouble.
Thank you for your help. Obviously, I would never dream of using this
kind of low language myself. But I need to understand in order to know
when I can appropriately utter a disapproving /thu^ret"/ :)
I had half expected to hear from Khun Vj on this; he loves to talk
dirty.
How bad is it, though? If a schoolteacher heard, say, a 12 year-old
pupil calling a class-mate /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ would they be likely
to intervene and scold the child, or would they just let it go?
tch...@my-dejanews.com
blue...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> In article <916693...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> >
> > BTW, two questions about that last /kham- daa'/ - /haa'/
> >
> > What's the nearest equivalent in English? I'm trying to gauge how
> > "strong" the insult is and in English we don't have an expression for
> > the evil spirit of cholera.
> >
> > I have heard it used in the phrase /ii- haa' raak"/ I'm not sure of
> > the last word, but it sounds to me just like the Thai word for "root".
> > Is it in fact that word or, if not, what is it, please?
>
> Though I'm no expert in swear words, I'll give it a try. (Don't mean to sound
> like a goody two shoes, but I really am not a swearer.)
>
> The closest equivalent I can think of /ii- haa'/ is "bitch" and /ai" haa'/
> "son of a bitch."
>
> As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root" but
> I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
> "consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
> infested/consumed by cholera."
For someone who's not a "swearer" you seem to have done alright in this post.
:-)
Just my two cents.
Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
blue...@my-dejanews.com
tch...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> > As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root"
but
> > I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
> > "consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
> > infested/consumed by cholera."
>
> For someone who's not a "swearer" you seem to have done alright in this post.
>
> :-)
Thanks for the compliments. :-) I find swearing very unattractive (if not also
ineffectual & counterproductive), but that does not necessarily mean I should
be ignorant of it.
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
blue...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> How bad is it, though? If a schoolteacher heard, say, a 12 year-old
> pupil calling a class-mate /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ would they be likely
> to intervene and scold the child, or would they just let it go?
At least my old teachers or some teachers I know would make some comments
about such use of language. Most children won't use that kind of language in
public, especially in presence of their teachers and parents. Well-mannered
children will not use such language at all.
blue...@my-dejanews.com
>
> Falling tone, surely; or did you mean that anyway, Khun Busakorn?
Did I mean it anyway? (???) According to the SCT tone indicators, it's the
falling tone, you're right. (I'm not very in tune with the system, still,
especially the tonal system. For some reason I thought of it as a rising tone.
> [Reminder on SCT tone indicators:
>
> - = normal tone
> ' = low tone
> " = falling tone
> ^ = high tone
> + = rising tone ]
>
> > To comlicate the matter a little further, another variation /aay^/ is used
in
> > Nan and Prae province (pronunciation inbetween /aayy"/ older brother and
> > /ai"/) in the same sense as /ai"/ used in standard Thai (impolite address to
> > a male).
>
> Don't know that one. I learn my /kham- mUUang-/ in northern Chiang Rai
> (Amphur Mae Chan) and there /aay"/ is quite a long, lazy sound,
> definitely falling tone and readily distinguishable from the short and
> much more staccato /ai"/
Yes, the two are quite different, but the /aay^/ (high tone) -- same meaning
as /ai"/ used in standard Thai -- is quite unique.
> > The same word used in the latter sense is pronounced /ai'/ (short falling)
(according to the SCT tonal system, that should be the low tone)
in
> > kham maung used in Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Lampang, and other western parts
of
> > the North. Example: /ai' haa"/ (particular of Chiang Mai dialect), /ai'
haa'/
> > (for Chiang Rai and Lampang), instead of /ai" ha'/. See the difference?
>
> I would say that /haa'/ is quite long drawn out - of similar duration to
> /aay"/ in fact, but very clearly low tone.
I would beg to differ on that. Thing is you can't even impose the standard
Thai tonal system on this word /haa'/ -- with Chiang Rai accent. (As you may
know some northern Thai tones are particular and quite different from
standard Thai.) Ask you wife to say /ai' haa'/, her latter /haa'/ sound will
fall between the low tone and the falling tone, while if you ask a Chiang Mai
person to say the same word, you'll hear /ai' haa"/ with the latter word
being exactly the falling tone. And a person from Bangkok will say the same
word /ai" ha'/ (ai" = falling, ha' = low).
John Sharman
[..]
> > I would say that /haa'/ is quite long drawn out - of similar duration to
> > /aay"/ in fact, but very clearly low tone.
>
> I would beg to differ on that. Thing is you can't even impose the standard
> Thai tonal system on this word /haa'/ -- with Chiang Rai accent. (As you may
> know some northern Thai tones are particular and quite different from
> standard Thai.) Ask you wife to say /ai' haa'/, her latter /haa'/ sound will
> fall between the low tone and the falling tone, while if you ask a Chiang Mai
Well, actually, I have this on tape already (not my wife, but one of her
friends). I habitually make clandestine tape recordings when we have
parties at our house and then try to go through the tapes later, looking
for expressions that I don't know. My wife is supposed to help by
translating and explaining these, but she usually loses patience with me
after a couple of minutes. According to her, these tapes are only
slightly less boring than Internet/computer stuff :(
Anyway, since reading your post I've several times played back this
recording of a 28 year old woman calling her (male) cousin /ai" haa'/
and the /haa'/ certainly sounds low tone to me, though drunkenness
and laughter may have led to some distortion.
> person to say the same word, you'll hear /ai' haa"/ with the latter word
> being exactly the falling tone. And a person from Bangkok will say the same
> word /ai" ha'/ (ai" = falling, ha' = low).
I think that you are /khon- mUUang-/ yourself, are you not, Khun
Busakorn? You may not realise quite how difficult we farangs find words
in /kham- mUUang-/ which begin with an "h" sound. You know - in /Chiang-
haay-/ /mai" ruu^/ is /ba' huu"/ But how do the tone rules work (if at
all) with these artificial "h" sounds? Is there any reliable pattern, or
do I just have to learn the words one by one?
I think it's worth putting in some effort into grasping the basics
of the dialect. It keeps one in touch (a little) with what's *really*
being said about you and the locals do appreciate it. They seem to revel
in their language and seem to regard it as evidence (if any were needed)
of their cultural superiority over the Bangkok folk ;-)
puan...@my-dejanews.com
blue...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> In article <916693...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> >
> > BTW, two questions about that last /kham- daa'/ - /haa'/
> >
> > What's the nearest equivalent in English? I'm trying to gauge how
> > "strong" the insult is and in English we don't have an expression for
> > the evil spirit of cholera.
> >
> > I have heard it used in the phrase /ii- haa' raak"/ I'm not sure of
> > the last word, but it sounds to me just like the Thai word for "root".
> > Is it in fact that word or, if not, what is it, please?
>
> Though I'm no expert in swear words, I'll give it a try. (Don't mean to sound
> like a goody two shoes, but I really am not a swearer.)
>
> The closest equivalent I can think of /ii- haa'/ is "bitch" and /ai" haa'/
> "son of a bitch."
I'm not an expert on cuss words either. However, I don't think there really
is a parallel word in English to convey the concept of this insult. In the
old days, cholera was the most fearsome way to die, because it's the most
arduous and humiliating way to go. Think of what cholera could effect a
patient in clinical sense and you'll get the picture. Therefore, cursing
someone to die gruesome death is the harshest spite you can inflict on
someone. It's like saying "I hate you so much, I wish you die the most
torturous and humiliating death.". Of course, it had lost it's original
strength of the word but still carries strong sense of contempt. Then, it
got complicated with the Thai style irony that, in some case, with some
people, it could pattern an expression of endearment. That's the beauty of
Thai language, you can design your own frame of dictation that may defy some
social protocol. We gotta have something to relieve our repressive culture,
don't we? ;-)
>
> As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root" but
> I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
> "consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
> infested/consumed by cholera." Just my two cents.
>
> -busakorn
You might have forgotten something, Khun Busakorn. "R" is pronounced "h" in
gum mueng. (I had produced a table for tone-shift between central-northern-
noreasten dialects in the past. One can search Deja News under keyword
"Central" in the subject field. I can't remember the whole thread name,
sorry.) So, in this case, it's the same word as /haak"/ in northern &
northeastern dialect which means "puke" - vomit. It's higher degree of
severity in cholera symptom, I suppose. In a sense, /... haa'/ could mean a
curse for so and so to shit one's guts out to death. The /... haa' raak"/
adds on the puking aspect to it.
Sounds like you folks are having fun. So I can't resist to join in. :-)
Regards,
Puangroi
Johpa
>But how do the tone rules work (if at
>all) with these artificial "h" sounds? Is there any reliable pattern, or
>do I just have to learn the words one by one?
All, or many of the /r/ sounds in Central Thai being /h/ sounds in Kham Muang
don't sound particularly artificial to me. We do not call the shift in /p/
sounds and /f/ sounds (pater vs. father or pisces vs. fish ) in Indo European
languages artificial. Although I have never seen a good phoenetic rule I am
sure, by definition, such a rule exists.
And I like it when Busakorn swears <blush>
Johpa
tch...@my-dejanews.com
and now you're posting this stuff??? You guys are all sick. I'm starting to
miss Joris' bug stories.
;-)
In article <7840tm$k6n$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
John Sharman
jo...@aol.com "Johpa" writes:
[Shh! If she knows you like it, she'll stop doing it.]
That is not what I meant by "artificial". In some instances in
/kham- mUUang-/ they pronounce /rOO- rUUa-/ as though it were /hOO+
hiib'/. Nb. this is not just the replacement of a, "r" sound with an "h"
sound. It goes beyond that. In some instances which spring to mind you
get all the tonal implications of the replacement of a low class
consonant with a high class consonant. Thus /mai" ruu^/ becomes /ba'
huu"/ In the case of P-F shifting, it really is another separate
character that is written and pronounced. Here we are talking about
pronouncing /rOO-/ as though it were /hOO+/ even though they are of
different classes and even though there is no change in the accompanying
spelling. BUT if you look as a phrase like /rab^ jaang"/ this will be
pronounced in the North as /hab^ jaang"/ Note: there has been no
change in tone; this is only explicable within the standard tone rules
if on this occasion /rOO-/ has been replaced by /hOO- nok^ huuk"/.
Otherwise it would be /hab' jaang"/.
So my questions on /kham mUUang-/ must include the following:
1. How does one know when to use /hOO+/ cf /hOO-/ to replace /rOO-/ ?
2. Alternatively, are the tone rules different in /kham mUUang-/ ?
pkham...@hotmail.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> That is not what I meant by "artificial". In some instances in
> /kham- mUUang-/ they pronounce /rOO- rUUa-/ as though it were /hOO+
> hiib'/. Nb. this is not just the replacement of a, "r" sound with an "h"
> sound. It goes beyond that. In some instances which spring to mind you
> get all the tonal implications of the replacement of a low class
> consonant with a high class consonant. Thus /mai" ruu^/ becomes /ba'
> huu"/
You could also say it as /ba' huu^/, /bOO' huu^/. I don't believe you could
apply standard Thai grammar, in particular, tone rules, directly onto
northern and northerneastern dialects, especially tones. They are fluid,
that is tone for a word is not necessary fixed, unchangable the same way
central Thai does. I notice that the northern & northern peopl have easier
time capturing tones change in English than one who speak central Thai.
Since there almost no tonal fluidity in central Thai. That is, the tones for
a word doesn't change no matter where it is in the sentence.
> In the case of P-F shifting, it really is another separate
> character that is written and pronounced. Here we are talking about
> pronouncing /rOO-/ as though it were /hOO+/ even though they are of
> different classes and even though there is no change in the accompanying
> spelling. BUT if you look as a phrase like /rab^ jaang"/ this will be
> pronounced in the North as /hab^ jaang"/ Note: there has been no
> change in tone; this is only explicable within the standard tone rules
> if on this occasion /rOO-/ has been replaced by /hOO- nok^ huuk"/.
> Otherwise it would be /hab' jaang"/.
>
> So my questions on /kham mUUang-/ must include the following:
>
> 1. How does one know when to use /hOO+/ cf /hOO-/ to replace /rOO-/ ?
I think it's safer to stick to /hOO- nok^ huuk"/ since it's in the /ak' sOOn+
klaang-/ group as does /rOO-/.
> 2. Alternatively, are the tone rules different in /kham mUUang-/ ?
If's there ARE tone rules, I don't think it's as rigid as central Thai.
> --
> Regards,
>
> John Sharman
pkham...@hotmail.com
tch...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> To think that you guys all whined about me and dbrenn fighting all last year
> and now you're posting this stuff??? You guys are all sick. I'm starting to
> miss Joris' bug stories.
>
> ;-)
So you're getting the idea how "strong" this insult is in English, I suppose.
If you don't quite have the "stomach" for it, don't try to use it. Stick to
Joris's bug'll be safer.
;-)
Regards,
Puangroi
> Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
Johpa
>
>That is not what I meant by "artificial". In some instances in
>/kham- mUUang-/ they pronounce /rOO- rUUa-/ as though it were /hOO+
>hiib'/. Nb. this is not just the replacement of a, "r" sound with an "h"
>sound. It goes beyond that. In some instances which spring to mind you
>get all the tonal implications of the replacement of a low class
>consonant with a high class consonant.
The written consonants came after the fact and I believe reflect phonemic
values of Central Thai and not Kham Muang. At some point a phonetic shift
occured between Kham Muang and Central Thai probably before anyone devised
consonant classes. The end result was a consonant shift although I do not know
enough about Tai historical linguistics to know in which direction the shift
occured and whether or not a tonal shift occured as well.
What academic linguistic analysis over the past 200 years tells us from past
experience is that all phonetic shifts (consonants, vowels or tones) will be
consistent across phonetic environments and will not be random.
>So my questions on /kham mUUang-/ must include the following:
>
>1. How does one know when to use /hOO+/ cf /hOO-/ to replace /rOO-/ ?
>2. Alternatively, are the tone rules different in /kham mUUang-/ ?
The short answer is unless a linguist describes the rule which every native
Kham Muang speaker internalized when learning the language, we must grasp at
straws and try our best.
It would be interesting if someone versed in the old Kham Muang text could
describe a different set of tone rules for Kham Muang than Central Thai, but
the Central Thai tone rules as we describe them are based upon text.
Interesting to note that even in English short vowels often have a higher tone
than do longer vowels: compare beet vs bead or feet vs fed. The duration of
the vowel is influenenced by the final consonant being either voiced or
voiceless.
Happy Trails
Johpa
Johpa
>Interesting to note that even in English short vowels often have a higher
>tone
>than do longer vowels: compare beet vs bead or feet vs fed.
Should have been feet vs feed. The words (syllables) using the voiceless
final consonants like /t/ produce a higher tone and a shorter vowel than final
voiced consonants like /d/ although neither the tone nor the vowel length have
any phonemic value in English.
Johpa
Chanchao
>You could also say it as /ba' huu^/, /bOO' huu^/. I don't believe you could
>apply standard Thai grammar, in particular, tone rules, directly onto
>northern and northerneastern dialects, especially tones.
Yes, it would be so nice if there was just one set of rules you could
apply to central Thai to convert to Kam Muang. Then there are also
differences between for example Chiang Mai-Muang and Chiang Rai-Muang.
*** Someone said I could look up his message about kam muang rules
from DejaNews. (Using search keyword 'central' in the subject line) I
just tried, but didn't find it. Any chance at a repost?? ***
Needless to say, kam muang is a far more beautiful language than
central Thai, with more opportunities for playing with words. Bangkok
Thais somehow always manage to sound like they're reading a list of
stock exchange quotes or something.
My favourite Lamphunese Som Tam lady however, can talk about changing
a lightbulb and have everyone on the floor laughing no matter if they
understand her or not.
Chanchao
Sanpawat Kantabutra
One professor (Dr.Chaiyawat?) at dept. of Thai lang. of the faculty of
Humanities, Chiangmai U. has studied and developed a textbook on
the dialect. He gave a reason that the dialect has never been formalized
and recorded, and it may disappear from our northern culture in the
future. Some children of younger generations now cannot even speak
northern dialect. -sanpawat
John Sharman
jo...@aol.com "Johpa" writes:
> John Sharman in Message-id: <916847...@norvic.demon.co.uk>
> >That is not what I meant by "artificial". In some instances in
> >/kham- mUUang-/ they pronounce /rOO- rUUa-/ as though it were /hOO+
> >hiib'/. Nb. this is not just the replacement of a, "r" sound with an "h"
> >sound. It goes beyond that. In some instances which spring to mind you
> >get all the tonal implications of the replacement of a low class
> >consonant with a high class consonant.
>
> The written consonants came after the fact
Agreed in that one cannot sensibly suppose that the writing of this language
preceded the speaking of this language.
> and I believe reflect phonemic
> values of Central Thai and not Kham Muang. At some point a phonetic shift
> occured between Kham Muang and Central Thai probably before anyone devised
> consonant classes.
This seems to me to be unlikely in that AIUI /kham- mUUang-/ still is or
is very close to /laan^ naa-/ which had its own script and, I believe,
consonant classes.
> The end result was a consonant shift although I do not know
> enough about Tai historical linguistics to know in which direction the shift
> occured and whether or not a tonal shift occured as well.
>
> What academic linguistic analysis over the past 200 years tells us from past
> experience is that all phonetic shifts (consonants, vowels or tones) will be
> consistent across phonetic environments and will not be random.
Hmm. Seems to me that I am going to find the answer to my questions only
by learning /laan^ naa-/ Pity. I have been putting that off and had
hoped to avoid it. The character set is rather formidable. Some time ago
I asked (more in forlorn hope than expectation) whether anyone knew of a
.ttf font for /laan^ naa-/. I don't suppose anyone has got round to
writing one?
John Sharman
> I'm not an expert on cuss words either. However, I don't think there really
> is a parallel word in English to convey the concept of this insult. In the
> old days, cholera was the most fearsome way to die, because it's the most
> arduous and humiliating way to go. Think of what cholera could effect a
> patient in clinical sense and you'll get the picture. Therefore, cursing
> someone to die gruesome death is the harshest spite you can inflict on
> someone. It's like saying "I hate you so much, I wish you die the most
> torturous and humiliating death."
That's /ii- taai- hoong+/ isn't it?
> Of course, it had lost it's original
> strength of the word but still carries strong sense of contempt. Then, it
> got complicated with the Thai style irony that, in some case, with some
> people, it could pattern an expression of endearment. That's the beauty of
> Thai language, you can design your own frame of dictation that may defy some
> social protocol. We gotta have something to relieve our repressive culture,
> don't we? ;-)
>
> > As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root" but
> > I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
> > "consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
> > infested/consumed by cholera." Just my two cents.
I have now been told that it's not /raak"/ but /raad"/ (ending with dOO-
dek'). Apparently this means "useless" or "hopeless". Can't find it with
those meanings in Sethaputra's dictionary, though, so I assume it must
be /kham- mUUang-/. Does that sound right to you, Khun Busakorn, Khun
Puangroi?
John Sharman
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu "Sanpawat Kantabutra" writes:
I think you may be referring to /khon- mUUang- uu" kham- mUUang-/ by
Bunkhid Watcharasaat (?); I have a copy, but unfortunately it's in
Thailand. My /khon- mUUang/ friends and relatives love it, especially
the very frank and unrestrained bits which invariably bring forth wide
smiles.
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: I think you may be referring to /khon- mUUang- uu" kham- mUUang-/ by
: Bunkhid Watcharasaat (?); I have a copy, but unfortunately it's in
: Thailand. My /khon- mUUang/ friends and relatives love it, especially
: the very frank and unrestrained bits which invariably bring forth wide
: smiles.
I recalled the professor's name now. Dr.Chaiyawat Rungruengsri. So, it
is not the same book. Dr.Chaiyawat's research is a larger scale research.
He not only works on the northern dialect (of all possible versions) and
its origin but also works on northern cultures as well, especially Lanna's.
-sanpawat
----------------------------------------
Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier
Johpa
>Needless to say, kam muang is a far more beautiful language than
>central Thai,
>My favourite Lamphunese Som Tam lady however, can talk about changing
>a lightbulb and have everyone on the floor laughing no matter if they
>understand her or not.
Well the one thing I first noticed about Kham Muang in contrast to Central Thai
is the larger degree of nasalization of the consonants.
And I though in Lampoon they don't exactly speak Kham Muang but "Yong". : )
Johpa
pkham...@hotmail.com
Rather aspirated? My northeastern(lao) dialect is much better than kham
muang. I noticed the difference is that Kham muang words are almost entirely
asperated, forgive me if I'm butchering linguistic jargon here. Lao
language, is more non-aspirated, while central Thai is a mix. For example,
we have "bp" like in bpoh bplaa, and "p" as in poh paan. Just from my
empirical observation, I think central Thai is a mix of many influence. When
you look at European languages(Just the few I've heard), the difference
between aspirated and non-aspirated, is pretty obvious such as the difference
in pronounciation between Spanish and English. The Spanish speaking people
I've heard from can't say "p", they all pronounce it with 'bp' like the
Thai's bpoh bplaa. (I'll skip SCT script this time because not everyone
knows it.)
I'm attaching old post about Kham muang below. This is just complied from my
own hearing. I'd like to emphasize agian that I have no formal training in
linguistics, so please this is not formal textbook kind of information, and it
might even be wrong!
Regards,
Puangroi
----------------------------------------------------
Comparison of Central, Northern, and Northeastern
Thai(Re: ETYMOLOGY: Butterfly)
Author: Puangroi Khamriang <pkham...@hotmail.com>
Date: 1997/12/04
Forum: soc.culture.thai
kb wrote:
> I like your post, it is very informative and fastinating, wow:)
Thanks for your kind words, I sure do need it these days.
>
> May I ask what is the "kam mueng" in the North for the word "phii-sua"?
> Is it the same as the Thai(I believe) phii-sua or different?
>
> "Hoh" and "roh" sound are understandable, such as ruk(love) and huk in
> northern dialect. I can't remember the s and the ch sound, though.
>
> I just don't know how on earth that I become interested in this word??
>
> Kanitta
>
Sorry if this will be a very long answer. It's going to tell you that
when a one doesn't really know the right answer, one usually beats
around the bush until you can come up with an answer yourself! ;-)
I don't know if you are aware of the differences between Lao, as in Lao
Isan, and Kham mueng that is spoken in the northern part of Thailand or
not. If you do, please disregard my explanation and forgive me if I'm
starting to insult your knowledge.
I'm more proficient in Lao than Kham Mueng, I think the way Khon Mueng
say it would be 'Gum Mueng'. However, I was born and raised in the
central Thailand, so my Lao may not be right either. Any khon mueng or
khon lao out there please help correcting me if I'm wrong.
From my own observation, Gum Mueng, though very similar to Lao, still
has its differences from Lao. It's more 'explosive' in pronounciation,
I can't remember the linguistic jargon for it. If you think of spanish,
it migh help to explain better. For example, Gum Mueng pronounces 'toh
tahan' with 'dtoh dtao(turtle)', 'poh pan(footed dish)' with 'poh
plah(fish)', etc. Thai people call the city 'Chiangmai', khon mueng
calls it 'Jiang mai', a Lao person would call it 'Siang Mai'(or in Laos,
they prefer to use 'X' instead of 'S' so it would be 'Xiang Mai' like
the way Sam spells it, get it?
The name 'Khamriang' would be 'Gum-hiang' in gum mueng, and 'Kham-hiang'
in Lao, as another example.
I can't recall what khon mueng call 'Phii sua'. From my own hypothesis,
it might be 'Pii+ sua', spelled with 'poh pla, sra ee, mai jattawa' for
'Phii' and 'sua' remains the same. I lived in the north for only less
than a year once, and don't recall even seeing a butterfly there. For
the sake of comparison, I'd summarize as follows:
Comparison between Central, Northern, and Northern Thai:
Central Northern Northeastern(Isan)
Khaam Thai Gum Mueng Khaam Lao
Roh (rua) Hoh Hoh, or Loh
CHoh (chang) Soh (saang) Soh (saang)
Poh (paan) Poh (pla, Poh (paan)
more explosive)
Koh (kham) Goh (gum) Koh (kham)
Sra -uea ? Sra -ia
Luead (=blood) Liad
some words:
Pood(speak) Oo Wao, Baak, Ern(suppress r)
Tiao Aew Aew
Yai(grandma) Dtoo Mae Yai, some say Dtoo also
(Yai means big, grand)
Kham(word) Gum Kham
Tong(gold) Gum Kham
(also Tong Kham)
I mentioned in my previous post about the Lao family could not pronounce
the double consonants but I just remember another example that is the
doubling of 'Koh' and 'Woh'. The sound like 'Kwam' is 'Faam' even in
rural Central Thai or change the vowels like 'Kwaam'(long aa) to
'Kuam'(short -a + woh, more like sra -ua, Dtua - body) in Lao. Another
good example for that is the word 'Kwaai' is changed to the famous word
for 'Lao buffalo' :-) , that I can't say it unless I'm speaking Lao and
pretend that I don't know what it means in Central dialect.
I remember that people in the rural area who have not been through
formal schooling normally can't pronouce 'KR', 'KL', 'KW', or 'R' - roll
tongue sounds and it was somewhat being looked down upon. Could it be
because that pronounciation comes from the Mon-khmer influence that came
LATER into Thai language, that's why it is so unnatural for Thais to
pronounce those sounds and has to be taught in school?
Just a thought.
Regards,
blue...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> In article <7874q9$3pq$1...@news3.tufts.edu>
> sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu "Sanpawat Kantabutra" writes:
>
> > Just in case anyone is seriously interested in Thai northern dialect.
> > One professor (Dr.Chaiyawat?) at dept. of Thai lang. of the faculty of
> > Humanities, Chiangmai U. has studied and developed a textbook on
> > the dialect. He gave a reason that the dialect has never been formalized
> > and recorded, and it may disappear from our northern culture in the
> > future. Some children of younger generations now cannot even speak
> > northern dialect. -sanpawat
>
> Bunkhid Watcharasaat (?);
Last time I was back in Chiang Mai, I found several books written on Lanna
and the Kham Muang subject. It's wonderful. I believe there are more than a
few northern Thai scholars who are well-versed on this issue and have written
books about it. (Don't ask me for their names, I only know that at least a
few such scholars are associated with Chiang Mai Univ and Rajabhat Chiang Mai
(formerly Teacher's College). I also have the book Khun John mentioned. It
has a short history of Lanna and contains a rich glossory of /kham- mUUang-/.
Fun to read.
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
blue...@my-dejanews.com
> And I though in Lampoon they don't exactly speak Kham Muang but "Yong". : )
Or rather (nasalized) /NhYong/. (Nh=My own transciption system)
pkham...@hotmail.com
"nong" for a while.
In article <916933...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> In article <7840tm$k6n$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com> puan...@my-dejanews.com writes:
>
> > I'm not an expert on cuss words either. However, I don't think there really
> > is a parallel word in English to convey the concept of this insult. In the
> > old days, cholera was the most fearsome way to die, because it's the most
> > arduous and humiliating way to go. Think of what cholera could effect a
> > patient in clinical sense and you'll get the picture. Therefore, cursing
> > someone to die gruesome death is the harshest spite you can inflict on
> > someone. It's like saying "I hate you so much, I wish you die the most
> > torturous and humiliating death."
>
> That's /ii- taai- hoong+/ isn't it?
/Taai- hoong+/ means to die from violent and sudden death, such as from car
accident, murder, war, by lightning, but mostly not from deseases because
deseases take longer time to do the work. /Taai- haa'/ is worse than /taai-
hoong+/ because not only it's violent, painful, it's very humiliating when one
can't control one's bodily function, let alone to die from it.
>
> > Of course, it had lost it's original
> > strength of the word but still carries strong sense of contempt. Then, it
> > got complicated with the Thai style irony that, in some case, with some
> > people, it could pattern an expression of endearment. That's the beauty of
> > Thai language, you can design your own frame of dictation that may defy some
> > social protocol. We gotta have something to relieve our repressive culture,
> > don't we? ;-)
> >
> > > As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root"
but
> > > I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
> > > "consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that
is
> > > infested/consumed by cholera." Just my two cents.
>
> I have now been told that it's not /raak"/ but /raad"/ (ending with dOO-
> dek'). Apparently this means "useless" or "hopeless". Can't find it with
> those meanings in Sethaputra's dictionary, though, so I assume it must
> be /kham- mUUang-/. Does that sound right to you, Khun Busakorn, Khun
> Puangroi?
> --
> Regards,
>
> John Sharman
IMHO, not likely. I presume it's mispelling like I hear a lot among
Americans. For example, "pitcher" for "picture". The 'k' ending consonants
got shifted into 'd' ending consonant. It's interesting that it occurs among
people with totally system of pronounciation too. Maybe we have more in
common in penchant for mispronounciation than we know.
/Raak"/ in central Thai almost lost its meaning of vomit such that most Thai
don't see the connection. It just occured to me after I learned Lao and see
they use a lot. There're some expressions remain in central Thai that exhibit
this use of /raak"/ in such way. For example,
/raak" tAAk' raak" tAAn-/ = puking one's guts out, as in
/aai" ... man- mao- jon- raak" tAAk' raak" tAAn-/
... got so drunk, he just about puked his guts out.
/ii- haa' raak" sai"/ previously explained, to a little higher degree.
While in Lao, there's still more use of it. For example,
/haak" tAAk' haak" tAAn-/ same as above.
/pen- ta' haak"/ = nausiating.
/kai" haak"/ = feeling nauseous.
I feel that we've discuss the etymology of the word /raak"/ ad nauseum, pun
intended. ;-)
Regards,
Puangroi
pkham...@hotmail.com
chan...@earthling.net wrote:
> On Thu, 21 Jan 1999 00:50:52 GMT, pkham...@hotmail.com wrote:
> *** Someone said I could look up his message about kam muang rules
> from DejaNews. (Using search keyword 'central' in the subject line) I
> just tried, but didn't find it. Any chance at a repost?? ***
I just reposted it, hope you can get it. Try searching "Comparison", "Dtai"
again, there are few more posts related to Kham muang on them. Perhaps
"central" didn't work because there's a comma next to it and the search engine
can only see "central," and couldn't separate comma out.
>
> Needless to say, kam muang is a far more beautiful language than
> central Thai, with more opportunities for playing with words. Bangkok
> Thais somehow always manage to sound like they're reading a list of
> stock exchange quotes or something.
>
> My favourite Lamphunese Som Tam lady however, can talk about changing
> a lightbulb and have everyone on the floor laughing no matter if they
> understand her or not.
>
> Chanchao
>
I also like northeastern. Here's some 'kham paya' - folk poem, in this case
for courtship that I had translated to Thai. The original Lao were written
by a couple of very talented northeasterners.
....
(Woman)
(Lao)>> แมนบ่น้อ...
>> อย่ามาตั๋วะให้หัวใจอีนางโหย่น โตงเตงติ้โต๋งเต๋งเถาะหนา
>> อย่ามาติแถลงคุบเขียดจนาหัวเลิก เถาะน่า
(Central Thai)จริงหรือเปล่าน้อ
อย่ามาลวงให้น้องใจระทึก ตึกเต้น โตงเตงเถิดหนา
อย่ามาหลอกล่อ จะทุบหัวเขียดจนา หรอกน่า
(Woman) Is that true what you said? Please don't play with my heart.
You're just making it pounding, swinging for nothing, I'm afraid. You're
tricking me like a you trick a frog before you whack its head to catch it, I
know.
(Man)
(Lao)>บ่ฮักบ่เว้า บ่เอาบ่ว่าตั่วล่ะหล่า ฮับฟ้าผ่าห่ากิน
>ห่าตำใส้ก็ได้ใจนั่นเที่ยงซัน
(Central Thai)ไม่รักก็ไม่เอ่ย ไม่เอาก็ไม่มาบอก ดอกนะน้อง
พี่ยอมรับให้ฟ้าผ่าห่ากิน
ให้อหิวาต์ลงท้องก็ได้ ใจก็ยังเที่ยงตรงต่อน้อง ละนา
(Man) If I don't love you, I wouldn't say it.
If I don't want you, I wouldn't have asked.
My heart's faithful to you even if I got struck by lighning, cholera
settle in my stomach. I still forever love you.
IMHO, Thai language is very fluid, either in pronounciation and grammar, long
before the current rules were 'fitted' onto it. If you go out to the rural
area, even in central Thais, where not many tourists go to, and talk to the
farmers, you'll get pretty much the same flavors as you would in the north or
northeast. Of course, men usually are biased towars the soft and sweet /jao^/
used by northen women but that doesn't have anything to do with cultural
richness of the language, does it? ;-)
pkham...@hotmail.com
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu (Sanpawat Kantabutra) wrote:
> Just in case anyone is seriously interested in Thai northern dialect.
> One professor (Dr.Chaiyawat?) at dept. of Thai lang. of the faculty of
> Humanities, Chiangmai U. has studied and developed a textbook on
> the dialect. He gave a reason that the dialect has never been formalized
> and recorded, and it may disappear from our northern culture in the
> future. Some children of younger generations now cannot even speak
> northern dialect. -sanpawat
>
Dear Khun Sanpawat,
I wholeheartedly agree with you. My knowledge of Thai improved tremendously
after I studied Lao and Kam Muang. I firmly believe that the local dialects
were the roots of Thai language, much more so that the adopted Pali and
Sanskrit. Please advice me of how I could get the book you mentioned. I got
a Kam Muang Dictionary and was looking all over Bangkok to find textbooks on
Kam muang and Lao and came up with only a few. I could ask my relative in
Bangkok to send to me from Thailand. Thanks
pkham...@hotmail.com
blue...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> In article <19990121124603...@ng-ch1.aol.com>,
> jo...@aol.com (Johpa) wrote:
>
> > And I though in Lampoon they don't exactly speak Kham Muang but "Yong". :
)
>
> Or rather (nasalized) /NhYong/. (Nh=My own transciption system)
>
> -busakorn
The same as in Spanish "n" with the "~" on top of it? I find it's very
interesting that Kam muang has so much in common, in term of pronounciation,
with Spanish.
blue...@my-dejanews.com
> > And I like it when Busakorn swears <blush>
>
> [Shh! If she knows you like it, she'll stop doing it.]
Okay, gentlemen. "She" can hear your gossip.
In order to answer some of the questions posed mainly by Khun John in this
thread so far, I had to dig up a thin Lanna gramma text by Ajarn Lamoon
Chanhom+ of Chiang Mai Rajabhat which I bought while in Chiang Mai last
summer. (It's been my aspiration for a long time to learn Lanna, or "Tua+
MUUang-". This book is my first effort. So don't expect any fancy insight
from me, just yet.) :-)
Yes, as some of us suspect, we can't, shouldn't, impose the standard Thai
rules directly to the /kam- mUUang-/, although /kam- mUUang-/ is typically
explained using the structural context of standard Thai. There are slight,
subtle, but significant differences and variations between the two
dialect/language systems.
Historically, /Ak' sOOn+ lan^ na-/ or /tua+ mUUang-/ [tua+ = ak'sOOn- =
letters] originated from ancient Mon language, while current standard Thai
/Ak' sOOn+ rat^ ta' na^ ko- sin+/ developed from ancient Khmer. When
Sukhothai (King Ramkhamhaeng) came up with the early form of what later
evolved to be standard Thai, Lanna texts were already in existence. However,
later Lanna and Thai Ramkhamhaeng merged and became /Ak' sOOn+ fak' kham+/
(as written in the edict of Wat Chiang Man over 300 years ago). After the
development of FakKham, a /khom+ mUUang-/ or /thai- ni^ thed"/ evolved
around two hundred years ago, which applied Lanna writing system and adopted
the Khmer characteristic, called /sok'/.
Accoding to Ajarn Udom Rungruengsri, ancient Lanna linguists grouped Lanna
consonants into 3 groups: high, middle and low consonants, with 16, 4, and 23
consonants respectively.
As we discussed earlier about differences in tones between standard Thai and
kam mUUang, indeed, as validated by Ajarn Lamoon, kam mUUang has 6 tones,
instead of 5.
Kam mUUang tones are classified into 6 levels as follows:
0 = mid tone e.g. /ma-/ = come
1 = low tone e.g. /ha'/ = cholera
2 = falling tone e.g. /fang"/ = (Thai: riib") haste
3 = high tone e.g. /paay^/ = (Thai: pai'/ cards
4 = rising tone e.g. /ma+/ = dog
5 = high falling e.g. /ha^"/ = (Thai: ha"/ number five
With regard to the /hOO-/ and /hOO+/ Khun John questioned, I am not so clear
about how Khun John thinks /rOO-/ in standard Thai may become /hOO+/ in some
instances. (Please give more examples.) As a general rule, one can almost
always expect a /rOO-/ in standard Thai to become /hOO-/ in kam mUUang, e.g.
/rak^/ = /hak^/ (love), /rian-/ =/hian-/ (study, learn), /rOOng" roy-/ =
/hOOng" hoy-/ (trace, track, lead).
However, there is another suddle aspect which is potentially confusing,
/hOO-/ in kam mUUang (I speculate) is found as as initial consonant, instead
of /hOO+/ in standard Thai, perhaps because of the tonal differences and/or
the historical assimilation back and forth betweenthe two languages/dialects.
Example: Khun John favorite word: cholera; kam mUUang Chiang Mai /ha"/
(hOO-, as a low consonant) becomes /ha'/ (hOO+, as a high consonant) in
standard Thai. As the two languages developed around the same time, with
Lanna being possibly older, we don't know where this /ha"/ or /ha'/ word
comes from. It could be that it was first used in kam mUUang in Lanna and
later introduced into the vocabulary of what later became standard Thai, or
it could be that it came from standard Thai which initially created it or
borrowed it from elsewhere. So, in this instance it wouldn't be logical to
expect any rigid /rOO-/ - /hOO-/ conversion between the two lanaguages,
because /hOO-/ in kam mUUang does not always convert to /rOO-/ in standard
Thai.
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
Sanpawat Kantabutra
Dear Khun Puangroi,
The professor name is Udom Roongruangsri, Ph.D.(Buddhology). You can ask
your relative in Thailand to contact him at the department of Thai
langauge, Faculty of Humanities, Chiang Mai university, Chiang Mai,
50200, Thailand.
I had an opportunity to listen to his lecture some 2 years ago and at
that time he said that he was doing his research on northern dialects
and Lanna language and cultures. I am not sure if his text is already
available. But if you contact him, he may be able to share some of
his findings with you. Regards, Sanpawat
Johpa
>Date: 1/21/99 1:10 PM Pacific Standard Time
>Message-id: <78854p$8n3$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>
>Rather aspirated? My northeastern(lao) dialect is much better than kham
>muang. I noticed the difference is that Kham muang words are almost entirely
>asperated
I refered to the nasalization of vowels and not the aspiration of consonants.
Again you would need to look at the the rather droll comparative linguistic
journals to find explanations of phonetic shifts that have occured over the
centuries between the various Tai languages in the area.
>Another
>good example for that is the word 'Kwaai' is changed to the famous word
>for 'Lao buffalo' :-) , that I can't say it unless I'm speaking Lao and
>pretend that I don't know what it means in Central dialect.
LOL, use the Lao pronunciation of a certain area in Bangkok just south of Moh
Chit Bus Station and watch your taxi driver smile.
>I remember that people in the rural area who have not been through
>formal schooling normally can't pronouce 'KR', 'KL', 'KW', or 'R' - roll
>tongue sounds and it was somewhat being looked down upon.
Hmmm, just as the educated Bangkok people may have problems pronouncing certain
sounds not contained in their language or dialect. Has nothing to do with
education whatsoever.
Johpa
Johpa
>I am not so clear
>about how Khun John thinks /rOO-/ in standard Thai may become /hOO+/ in some
>instances. (Please give more examples.) As a general rule, one can almost
>always expect a /rOO-/ in standard Thai to become /hOO-/ in kam mUUang, e.g.
The question that is difficult to answer is whether the consonant shift occured
from Central Thai to Kham Muang or the other way around. But since it is a
syllable initial shift, I do not believe there is any phonetic environment
where the shift did not occur. And although I am not 100% certain, I believe
that the vowel after the /h/ is nasalized where it is not nasalized in Central
Thai.
Any linguists on board here with a copy or Dr. Brown's text or perhaps a more
updated text?
Johpa
Kinnear
Jim
tch...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> In article <77qn96$s4n$1...@news0.skynet.be>,
> "eric servaes" <eric.s...@skynet.be> wrote:
> >
> > tch...@my-dejanews.com wrote in message
> > <77q67v$ej0$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>...
> > >In article <77pt55$801$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
> > > schm...@hotmail.com wrote:
> > >> Hi Sanpawat My friends use something similar-sounding to "nong" to catch
> > the
> > >> attention of a waiter in a restaurant (nong, nong, nong). Is this the
> > same
> > >> "nong" ?
> > >
> > >I think it is, if you're friends are older than the waiter/waitresses. If
> > >they're of similar age or younger, they normally use "pii".
> > >
> > but pronounce it with a falling tone and not with a rising tone ....
> > otherwise it means ghost :-)))
>
> Hey, with the service in some of the restaurants I've been in, that would be
> appropriate.
>
> :-)
>
> Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
Kinnear
sign that you are mad or upset at them. If for instance your son does something
stupid and you are mad about it you say ii- haa tum alari with the name of the person
that is something like what the hell are you doing.
Jim
John Sharman wrote:
> In article <77t8th$60r$1...@news3.tufts.edu>
> sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu "Sanpawat Kantabutra" writes:
>
> > Johpa (jo...@aol.com) wrote:
> > : >It is an extremely rude expression of contempt used to address or scold
> > : >women. ....
> > : >The equivalent word for use to a male addressee is /ai"/
> >
> > : Except of course up in the northern villages where the terms replace nong and
> > : phii amongst friends.
> >
> > Nope. I am not sure if a foreigner's ear can tell the difference between "ai"
> > in central Thai usuage and northern Thai dialect or not. It is very difficult.
> > I would guess. "ai" in central Thai has a very short and abrupt tone but for
> > "ai" or a probably better word "aeii" (prononuce almost like "eye" but a
> > little longer, not abruptly ended like "ai") in northen dialect, this word
> > has longer tone. It is also very sweet when a true northern local uses it,
> > preferably Chiangmai dialect. :)
>
> I may have some of this wrong (please correct me If so) but I think that
> there is some danger of confusion here. AIUI the northern /kham-
> mUUang-/ word /aay"/ is not at all the same as the insult /ai"/.
> Different word, different spelling, different meaning. I'm pretty sure
> that /aay"/ means "oldest brother". My wife's oldest brother is the
> second child in the family and is usually referred to as /aay" WOO-/
> (/WOO-/ is his "nickname"). He is called that by everybody, even people
> who are not members of the family. None of the other brothers is ever
> addressed as /aay"/. It was hard at first for me to distinguish between
> the sounds of /aay"/ and /ai"/ but it's no problem now.
>
> The difficulty is compounded by the fact that despite /ai"/ being an
> insult, nevertheless it is still quite commonly used in a friendly way
> between close friends, typically people who have known each other from
> childhood. In the same way that I might in fun call a very old
> friend "you daft old bugger" I have heard Thais call each other things
> like /ai" hia"/ or /ii- haa'/ which would be totally inappropriate
> expressions to use with strangers save in the most hostile
> circumstances.
>
> Of course, as a farang, I sometimes get the opportunity to have a
> certain amount of fun by pretending not to know the differences ;-).
> Still, the bargirls get away with the same kind of thing when they
> call farang women /maa+ dam-/ or their customers /daak'ling-/
pkham...@hotmail.com
sanp...@allegro.cs.tufts.edu (Sanpawat Kantabutra) wrote:
>
> Dear Khun Puangroi,
> The professor name is Udom Roongruangsri, Ph.D.(Buddhology). You can ask
> your relative in Thailand to contact him at the department of Thai
> langauge, Faculty of Humanities, Chiang Mai university, Chiang Mai,
> 50200, Thailand.
>
> I had an opportunity to listen to his lecture some 2 years ago and at
> that time he said that he was doing his research on northern dialects
> and Lanna language and cultures. I am not sure if his text is already
> available. But if you contact him, he may be able to share some of
> his findings with you. Regards, Sanpawat
KOOb' kon- maak" ka", Khun Sanpawat. Do you know if he has email address, by
any chance?
Regards,
Puangroi
pkham...@hotmail.com
jo...@aol.com (Johpa) wrote:
> >pkham...@hotmail.com
> >Date: 1/21/99 1:10 PM Pacific Standard Time
> >Message-id: <78854p$8n3$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>
>
> >muang. I noticed the difference is that Kham muang words are almost entirely
>
> I refered to the nasalization of vowels and not the aspiration of consonants.
You're right, I was talking about different thing from your previous post.
But don't you agree about the aspiration aspect of Kam Muang?
> Again you would need to look at the the rather droll comparative linguistic
> journals to find explanations of phonetic shifts that have occured over the
> centuries between the various Tai languages in the area.
I'll take your word for it, thank you. The day I read the "rather droll
comparative linguistic journals" will be the day I read Journal for
Atmospheric Scince's or American Geophysical Union's papers for fun!
>
> >Another
> >good example for that is the word 'Kwaai' is changed to the famous word
> >for 'Lao buffalo' :-) , that I can't say it unless I'm speaking Lao and
> >pretend that I don't know what it means in Central dialect.
>
> LOL, use the Lao pronunciation of a certain area in Bangkok just south of Moh
> Chit Bus Station and watch your taxi driver smile.
Joris also gave another good one. Be careful when you speak to Lao people to
use the proper pronounciation for the word /kui-/ - talk in central Thai
because that's what the Lao use to call "Thai Buffalo". ;-)
>
> >I remember that people in the rural area who have not been through
> >formal schooling normally can't pronouce 'KR', 'KL', 'KW', or 'R' - roll
> >tongue sounds and it was somewhat being looked down upon.
>
> Hmmm, just as the educated Bangkok people may have problems pronouncing
certain
> sounds not contained in their language or dialect. Has nothing to do with
> education whatsoever.
>
> Johpa
>
It doesn't. But the looking down on someone is Thai's national pastime. ;-)
In fact, I'm not sure if it's only in Thai culture. I remember reading in
"The Story of Ah O" by Lu Xun. Ah O, a transient in Chinese village who had
been to many other places, looked down on people in a village because they
sliced green onion longer(or shorter I can't remember) than the supposedly
"more civilized" way. Don't take this looking down so seriously. People in
rural area got something to look down upon the city slickers or what you call
- "Bankok elites" too. They might not let you know about that but they do.
These behaviours are just a sign of insecurity or immaturity and lack of
information. In the 70's, I had pretty much the same ideas as you do, -
judging people by economic makeups, rich people were bad, poor people were
good. Then, as I spent more time living among them, I found they were all
made up with the same elements of the society. Their personal traits are not
influenced by their material possession alone.
Regards,
Puangroi
blue...@my-dejanews.com
pkham...@hotmail.com wrote:
> ... In the 70's, I had pretty much the same ideas ...
> judging people by economic makeups, rich people were bad, poor people were
> good. Then, as I spent more time living among them, I found they were all
> influenced by their material possession alone.
Indeed, there is a romantic fallacy that poverty equals virtue. Although, I am
partial to the disadvantaged and recognize the unearned privileges of the rich
and powerful few, I think everybody, rich or poor, is entitled to the same
right to be judged on the basis of their own individuality and character.
I come from a small village, too, and agree with you Khun Puangroi that you
can find all the good and bad elements in the romanticized poor. In the
village, there are as many humanly incidents of malicious gossips, back
stabbing, funny politics, lack of morality, dirty scandals, etc., as there
are kindness, love, honesty, and other honorable virtues.
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
John Sharman
> I thought( there is my biggest problem thinking again) that the using of ii-
> haa is a sign that you are mad or upset at them. If for instance your son
> does something stupid and you are mad about it you say ii- haa tum alari
> with the name of the person that is something like what the hell are you
> doing.
Yes, that's right, except that if it were your son, it should be /ai"
haa'/
Words like this are called /kham- daa'/ - "scolding words".
John Sharman
> In article <916933...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
[..]
> > > > As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like
> > > > the word "root" but I think it suggests greater intensity
> > > > in that /raak"/ means "infested" or "consumed." So in a way
> > > > you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
> > > > infested/consumed by cholera." Just my two cents.
> >
> > I have now been told that it's not /raak"/ but /raad"/ (ending with dOO-
> > dek'). Apparently this means "useless" or "hopeless". Can't find it with
> > those meanings in Sethaputra's dictionary, though, so I assume it must
> > be /kham- mUUang-/. Does that sound right to you, Khun Busakorn, Khun
> > Puangroi?
> IMHO, not likely. I presume it's mispelling like I hear a lot among
> Americans. For example, "pitcher" for "picture". The 'k' ending consonants
> got shifted into 'd' ending consonant. It's interesting that it occurs among
> people with totally system of pronounciation too. Maybe we have more in
> common in penchant for mispronounciation than we know.
I've put your point of view to my informant (a native of Mae Sai) and
he smiled and said, "Yes" and then repeated that the word is /raad"/ and
that it means "useless" or "valueless". /Kham- mUUang-/ is his mother
tongue, so I'm wary of dismissing what he says. Maybe you're both right.
BTW he also pointed out that /haa'/ is firmly low tone in the North, and
that /haa-/ with middle tone is a first personal pronoun, which I knew but
had overlooked. He also claims that /UUay"/ is the female equivalent of
/aay"/.
But I greatly prefer your interpretation of /raak"/ - all these
implications of vomiting are so much more colourful ;-) Mind you,
I've always liked the word /uak'/ too, for its wonderful onomatopoeia.
> /Raak"/ in central Thai almost lost its meaning of vomit such that most Thai
> don't see the connection. It just occured to me after I learned Lao and see
[..]
> I feel that we've discuss the etymology of the word /raak"/ ad nauseum, pun
> intended. ;-)
I'm duly grateful and have carefully noted it all. It's going to come in
useful at (or immediately after) parties. You just don't find this sort
of information in textbooks and it's not the kind of subject on which
the average language teacher usually wants to dwell.
John Sharman
> In article <916847...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
>
> > > And I like it when Busakorn swears <blush>
> >
> > [Shh! If she knows you like it, she'll stop doing it.]
>
> Okay, gentlemen. "She" can hear your gossip.
>
> In order to answer some of the questions posed mainly by Khun John in this
> thread so far, I had to dig up a thin Lanna gramma text by Ajarn Lamoon
> Chanhom+ of Chiang Mai Rajabhat which I bought while in Chiang Mai last
> summer. (It's been my aspiration for a long time to learn Lanna, or "Tua+
> MUUang-". This book is my first effort. So don't expect any fancy insight
> from me, just yet.) :-)
You seem to be doing just fine. The only book on /kham- mUUang/ that I
have with me is a tiny volume (just 120 pages but superb value at 25
baht) /tam-raa- rian- nang+sUU+ laan-naa- thai-/ by Aj. Manee Payaumyong
of Faculty of Humanities at CM Uni. It's a bit hard for me to use
because most of it appears to be printed by photo-litho from the
original manuscript but there's a wealth of information in that small
package.
> Yes, as some of us suspect, we can't, shouldn't, impose the standard Thai
> rules directly to the /kam- mUUang-/, although /kam- mUUang-/ is typically
> explained using the structural context of standard Thai. There are slight,
> subtle, but significant differences and variations between the two
> dialect/language systems.
IIRC one of the things that scared me away from getting seriously
into Lanna was the fact that the differences seemed to be substantial! I
hope I was wrong. We already know the problems arising from the fact
that a learner of a second language (with a second character set)
naturally inclines to represent the sounds of the new language in the
characters of his existing familiar character set and the mapping may
well be inexact (hence the problems with SCT script). But some of the
characters of Lanna really do look horribly complex, all curly and
convoluted - and I thought that /tua- ak-sOOn+ thai-/ were bad enough
already. Have you got far enough yet to know how you write so as to
produce a /siang+ jat'ta'waa-/ with a middle class leading consonant?
Lanna doesn't appear (to me) to have a tone mark equivalent to /mai^
jat'ta'waa/
> Historically, /Ak' sOOn+ lan^ na-/ or /tua+ mUUang-/ [tua+ = ak'sOOn- =
> letters] originated from ancient Mon language, while current standard Thai
> /Ak' sOOn+ rat^ ta' na^ ko- sin+/ developed from ancient Khmer. When
> Sukhothai (King Ramkhamhaeng) came up with the early form of what later
> evolved to be standard Thai, Lanna texts were already in existence. However,
> later Lanna and Thai Ramkhamhaeng merged and became /Ak' sOOn+ fak' kham+/
> (as written in the edict of Wat Chiang Man over 300 years ago). After the
> development of FakKham, a /khom+ mUUang-/ or /thai- ni^ thed"/ evolved
> around two hundred years ago, which applied Lanna writing system and adopted
> the Khmer characteristic, called /sok'/.
So what vintage of Lanna script do we see in e.g. /khon- mUUang- uu"
kham- mUUang/? I had assumed that it was ancient Lanna before the Pali/
Sanskrit additions.
> Accoding to Ajarn Udom Rungruengsri, ancient Lanna linguists grouped Lanna
> consonants into 3 groups: high, middle and low consonants, with 16, 4, and 23
> consonants respectively.
>
> As we discussed earlier about differences in tones between standard Thai and
> kam mUUang, indeed, as validated by Ajarn Lamoon, kam mUUang has 6 tones,
> instead of 5.
>
> Kam mUUang tones are classified into 6 levels as follows:
> 0 = mid tone e.g. /ma-/ = come
> 1 = low tone e.g. /ha'/ = cholera
> 2 = falling tone e.g. /fang"/ = (Thai: riib") haste
> 3 = high tone e.g. /paay^/ = (Thai: pai'/ cards
> 4 = rising tone e.g. /ma+/ = dog
> 5 = high falling e.g. /ha^"/ = (Thai: ha"/ number five
Is this last tone anywhere near the sixth tone which McFarland claimed to
hear in /phaa-saa+ thai- klaang-/ (I think he called it the "brief
emphatic" tone or something like that)?
> With regard to the /hOO-/ and /hOO+/ Khun John questioned, I am not so clear
> about how Khun John thinks /rOO-/ in standard Thai may become /hOO+/ in some
> instances. (Please give more examples.) As a general rule, one can almost
> always expect a /rOO-/ in standard Thai to become /hOO-/ in kam mUUang, e.g.
> /rak^/ = /hak^/ (love), /rian-/ =/hian-/ (study, learn), /rOOng" roy-/ =
> /hOOng" hoy-/ (trace, track, lead).
Well, it is possible either that my ears have been deceiving me or
perhaps I may have spent too much time in a pocket of peculiar
pronunciation, but I always hear e.g. /ba' huu" ba' han+/ (don't know,
don't see) or /hod' nam^/ (sprinkle water) which would be consistent
with /rOO-/ being replaced by /hOO+/ but in each case the word retaining
its written tone mark or absence of tone mark. I agree with all your
examples though - that is why I asked the question. But maybe I have
been perceiving an inconsistency where there is none. I have noticed a
tendency anyway for my neighbours to pronounce many words with a falling
tone which should really be high tone (e.g. /lAAw"/ instead of /lAAw^/
and /riab" rOOy"/ instead of /riab" rOOy^/)
> However, there is another suddle aspect which is potentially confusing,
> /hOO-/ in kam mUUang (I speculate) is found as as initial consonant, instead
> of /hOO+/ in standard Thai, perhaps because of the tonal differences and/or
> the historical assimilation back and forth betweenthe two languages/dialects.
> Example: Khun John favorite word: cholera; kam mUUang Chiang Mai /ha"/
> (hOO-, as a low consonant) becomes /ha'/ (hOO+, as a high consonant) in
> standard Thai. As the two languages developed around the same time, with
That is a very good point. I had always assumed (without any real
evidence) that in standard central Thai the use of a leading /hOO+/ was
in many cases an artifice adopted when the script was devised so as to
allow certain syllables to be written with rising or low tone when the other
tone rules otherwise would not allow this. In the modern central system,
a syllable starting with a low class (written) consonant can never have
rising or low tone. This device does not seem to be there in Lanna.
> Lanna being possibly older, we don't know where this /ha"/ or /ha'/ word
> comes from. It could be that it was first used in kam mUUang in Lanna and
> later introduced into the vocabulary of what later became standard Thai, or
> it could be that it came from standard Thai which initially created it or
> borrowed it from elsewhere. So, in this instance it wouldn't be logical to
> expect any rigid /rOO-/ - /hOO-/ conversion between the two lanaguages,
> because /hOO-/ in kam mUUang does not always convert to /rOO-/ in standard
> Thai.
Yes. I think you would be fully justified in telling me to stop asking
these silly questions and better go off and learn the language myself!
Sanpawat Kantabutra
: any chance?
Mai Pen Rai krub. :)
udomrrs Udom Roongruangsri pts/6 <Dec 14 08:11> 192.203.247.107
His email address is "udo...@chiangmai.ac.th". But I do not think he
checks his emails often. The info. above indicates that he last checked
his emails on 14 of December 1998. Some month ago.
Joris Goetschalckx
>implications of vomiting are so much more colourful ;-) Mind you,
>I've always liked the word /uak'/ too, for its wonderful onomatopoeia.
Good old John, always finding the right words...
>I'm duly grateful and have carefully noted it all. It's going to come in
>useful at (or immediately after) parties.
I would say: *after* the party... ;-)
I once went to a party where everybody was already drunk when I arrived.
They were having a great time. Ignorant of the blissful state of the
participants, I asked one of them *how* good the party was. He answered:
"sanuk jon uak", and ten minutes later I saw him fulfilling the prophesy...
Anybody heard this idiom too?
Kind regards,
Joris
--
Joris Goetschalckx
http://users.skynet.be/sky98829
Joris Goetschalckx
>Joris also gave another good one. Be careful when you speak to Lao people to
>because that's what the Lao use to call "Thai Buffalo". ;-)
Hi PK,
And as I told you, this pronunciation peculiarity of Lao (Isaan) people
even caused me to completely avoid the use of the word kui, and to
use circumlocutions like sontanaa, until I was sure to master the difference
between initial kOO kai and khOO khwaay without any ambiguity....
You BKK people can't possibly know how close (for farang ears)
the words kui and khuy can be...
puangroi_...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> In article <78871i$acf$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com> pkham...@hotmail.com writes:
>
> > In article <916933...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> > jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> > > I have now been told that it's not /raak"/ but /raad"/ (ending with dOO-
> > > dek'). Apparently this means "useless" or "hopeless". Can't find it with
> > > those meanings in Sethaputra's dictionary, though, so I assume it must
> > > be /kham- mUUang-/. Does that sound right to you, Khun Busakorn, Khun
> > > Puangroi?
>
> > IMHO, not likely. I presume it's mispelling like I hear a lot among
> > Americans. For example, "pitcher" for "picture". The 'k' ending consonants
> > got shifted into 'd' ending consonant. It's interesting that it occurs among
> > people with totally system of pronounciation too. Maybe we have more in
> > common in penchant for mispronounciation than we know.
>
> I've put your point of view to my informant (a native of Mae Sai) and
> he smiled and said, "Yes" and then repeated that the word is /raad"/ and
> that it means "useless" or "valueless". /Kham- mUUang-/ is his mother
> tongue, so I'm wary of dismissing what he says. Maybe you're both right.
I have to emphasize again that my Kham Muang is very basic. Maybe /raad"/ is
indeed another word. One thing I'm curious, though, he pronounces it with
"r" instead of "h"? Khun Busakorn, you have any better idea?
In Central Thai, /raad"/ "ราด" is a verb meaning to splash, to pour (liquid)
over something. There's another incident /raad"/ is used as /kham- sooi"/
คำสร้อย an attachment to a word without meaning in itself, that is, /riia"
raad"/ or /ga' riia" ga' raad"/ adv, adj. = (messy stuff) strewn over
everywhere. I remember you once asked for the meaning of the word /ga' hEE^
ga' ha^/ or something like that, that you overheard your wife muttered about
your place when she first saw it. I'm not sure but it sounded like
equivalence of central Thai /ga' riia" ga' raad"/. From my own discovery
after learning Lao, these /kam- sooi"/ actually have meaning that you can
trace back to Lao which I presume was common with Thai before the
proliferation of Pali and Sanskrit.
> BTW he also pointed out that /haa'/ is firmly low tone in the North,
It's the same in central Thai too.
> and
> that /haa-/ with middle tone is a first personal pronoun, which I knew but
> had overlooked.
You're talking about /haa-/ as part of the pronoun pair - /king-/ and /haa-/,
aren't you? I understand that they are used only by men, with friends, sort
of like the way central Thai guys would use /guu-/, /mUng-/ กู , มึง (Sorry,
I can't find my SCT Script sheet.). So, as a lady, I never used it, I swear.
;-)
> He also claims that /UUay"/ is the female equivalent of
> /aay"/.
Yes, it's the same in Lao too. /UUay"/ also means first-born female child.
/ii'/ อี่ in old Thai is for the second female child. I used to have a Thai
friend whose name is /UUay"/ and her younger sister's name is /ii'/.
>
> But I greatly prefer your interpretation of /raak"/ - all these
> implications of vomiting are so much more colourful ;-) Mind you,
> I've always liked the word /uak'/ too, for its wonderful onomatopoeia.
I learn a new word too. Never thought there was such word, onomatopoeia! ;-)
I think you mean /uak"/ อ้วก . My freind, a female American, begged my to
teach her the F... word to ward off creepy Thai guys who bothered her at the
beach. I told her the more effective way to respond is to tell them /uak"
ja' taak'/. Sure enough, that sent those men flying, laughing and stop
bothering her.
>
> > I feel that we've discuss the etymology of the word /raak"/ ad nauseum, pun
> > intended. ;-)
>
> I'm duly grateful and have carefully noted it all. It's going to come in
> useful at (or immediately after) parties. You just don't find this sort
> of information in textbooks and it's not the kind of subject on which
> the average language teacher usually wants to dwell.
> --
> Regards,
>
> John Sharman
I almost became a Thai teacher for Peace Corps once. A friend of my got the
job and came back trying to recruit me to join her. I asked to take a look
at the curriculum then I just didn't think I could stomach it. The
ridiculously formal Thai they were trying to teach those poor volunteers just
made me wanted to /haak"/.
Regards, Puangroi ps I could teach you anything you want to know in Thai if
you want to barter with Kham Muang textbooks you could find for me. But
please forward your post to me via email because I don't normally read SCT
everyday except when there's something interests me like this.
blue...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> IIRC one of the things that scared me away from getting seriously
> into Lanna was the fact that the differences seemed to be substantial! I
Indeed, when you get down to the deeper level, you see quite significant
differences between the two dialects that are said to be ostensibly "the
same." (Still remember /pai- nai+ ma-/ thread, Khun John, Jopha?) I think as
long as you threat kam mUUang as a _different_ dialect and not assuming too
much about its similarities with standard Thai, you may be able to see things
in a different perspective.
> characters of Lanna really do look horribly complex, all curly and
> convoluted - and I thought that /tua- ak-sOOn+ thai-/ were bad enough
> already. Have you got far enough yet to know how you write so as to
> produce a /siang+ jat'ta'waa-/ with a middle class leading consonant?
No, in fact I have not started the writing part. It probably will be a long
time before I begin any writing effort. I just have too much on my hand right
now.
> Lanna doesn't appear (to me) to have a tone mark equivalent to /mai^
> jat'ta'waa/
I think we have to be careful with the tone stuff because the provincial
variations of accent in kam mUUang can significantly complicate things more
than you can manage. I am inclined to believe that the 6-tonal system I wrote
in the earlier post represents primarily kam mUUang Chiang Mai. I don't think
it really covers all the sound variations found in other kam mUUang accents.
(Again, like /haa"/ cholera is a falling tone in Chiang Mai, while it is
/haa'/ in Chiang Rai, Payao & Lampang, if anything I think is high-falling
because it doesn't sound like any of the 5 tones used in standard Thai, but
falls between the falling and rising tone. While the same word /ha'/ is a
straightforward low tone in standard Thai. Note also that the first two
variations in kam mUUang of cholera are spelled with /hOO-/, but /hOO+/ in
standard Thai. Same meaning. Go figure!)
> So what vintage of Lanna script do we see in e.g. /khon- mUUang- uu"
> kham- mUUang/? I had assumed that it was ancient Lanna before the Pali/
> Sanskrit additions.
Yes, I think all or almost all words in that book are ancient Lanna (though I
am familiar with many of them). Like Thai, Lanna was originally single-
syllabic, but later incorporated a number of Pali words, as well as Bermese,
ThaiYai, and also standard Thai.
> Is this last tone anywhere near the sixth tone which McFarland claimed to
> hear in /phaa-saa+ thai- klaang-/ (I think he called it the "brief
> emphatic" tone or something like that)?
I am not well informed enough to comment on that.
> Well, it is possible either that my ears have been deceiving me or
> perhaps I may have spent too much time in a pocket of peculiar
> pronunciation, but I always hear e.g. /ba' huu" ba' han+/ (don't know,
> don't see) or /hod' nam^/ (sprinkle water) which would be consistent
> with /rOO-/ being replaced by /hOO+/ but in each case the word retaining
> its written tone mark or absence of tone mark.
Or perhaps you have overextended the rOO- to hOO- conversion rule. You can't
forget that there are both hOO- and hOO+ in kam mUUang. /ba' hu" ba' han+/ or
/bOO' ho" bOO' han+/ is a direct parallel to /mai" ru^ mai" hen+/ . See that
/hu"/, spelled with /hOO- nok^ huk"/ is directly from /ru^/ with /rOO- rUUa-/
[know].
/han+/, on the other hand, is compared with /hen+/ [see], both spelled with
/hOO+ hiib'/. I don't see anything tricky in that, unless you play with the
meaning of the word /han+/, which means "see" in kam mUUang, but "turn" in
standard Thai.
As for /hod' nam^/ , yes this one is really tricky because it is indeed
spelled with /hOO+ hiib+/ and is a direct parallel with /rod^/ [sprinkle,
pour] in Thai. However, here's my two satangs. If you try to pronounce the
word very carefully both in standard Thai and in kam mUUang, you will that
they have different tones. **standard Thai /hod'/ is a low tone (and
definitely has to be spelled with hOO+ hiib+/ **kam mUUang /hod^/ is in fact
a high tone (and can be spelled with hOO- nok^ huk"/ and a /mai^ tri-/ tone
mark, although I have always seen it spelled with hOO+ and /dOO- dek') What's
your take?
Speaking like /khon- taa- bod' klam- chang^/ [the blinds and elephant], we may
stumble on something big here. :-)
> tendency anyway for my neighbours to pronounce many words with a falling
> tone which should really be high tone (e.g. /lAAw"/ instead of /lAAw^/
> and /riab" rOOy"/ instead of /riab" rOOy^/)
/lAAw"/ would be a correct Chiang Rai accent and /lAAw^/ a correct Chiang Mai
accent. Same thing with /riab" rOOy^/. You may have noticed, Chiang Mai accent
is more compatible with standard Thai tonal system than other kam mUUang
accents. Also note that khon mUUang tend to borrow a significant number of
words from standard Thai and a shift to or assimilation of standard Thai
vocaburary may not be so noticable in their speech. Kam mUUang has been
assimilated to a great extent. I don't think you can apply any strict rule of
expectation to modern khon mUUang speakers.
> Yes. I think you would be fully justified in telling me to stop asking
> these silly questions and better go off and learn the language myself!
I can say the same thing about myself! Speculate this and theorize that. We
both should start learning the dialect seriously.
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
Johpa
>Indeed, there is a romantic fallacy that poverty equals virtue....
>I come from a small village, too, and agree with you Khun Puangroi that you
>can find all the good and bad elements in the romanticized poor. In the
>village, there are as many humanly incidents of malicious gossips, back
>stabbing, funny politics, lack of morality, dirty scandals, etc., as there
>are kindness, love, honesty, and other honorable virtues.
Having spent almost 20 years in rural Chiang Mai I can attest that even the
smallest villages can give Peyton Place a run for the money. I have seen monks
literally chased down the road after being found in the process of doing the
"deed" with a local lass, have seen murder suicides involving spouses, I've
seen countless affairs, as well as having seen laughter and mirth and
compassion.
Happy Trails
Johpa
Johpa
>I think we have to be careful with the tone stuff because the provincial
>variations of accent in kam mUUang can significantly complicate things more
I have found in the rural areas that the Kham Muang spoken can vary greatly
between villages as if each valley has a different dialect of the language, and
I do classify Kham Muang as a separate language from central Thai. In my
wife's village the local dialect is heavily influenced by K'mu since the entire
area was K'mu speaking as recently as 3 generations ago. I have seen my wife
bemused by speakers from small villages out by Sankampeng which is not that far
away but is across the river and have even been told of language differences
from villages over the hills in an adjoining valley.
I once read an explanation for all these variances in language as being a
result of political wars and disputes that were usually waged over populations
and not over land. The theory was that the nascent states (muangs) had all the
land they could want but not enough people to farm the land for surplus. Thus
most wars were fought to bring captive populations back to farm the land.
These populations brought with them their dialect and language (and crafts)
and that was the given explanation for the tremendous language variance up
north.
Johpa
John Sharman
puangroi_...@my-dejanews.com writes:
> > > In article <916933...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> > > jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
[..]
> > I've put your point of view to my informant (a native of Mae Sai) and
> > he smiled and said, "Yes" and then repeated that the word is /raad"/ and
> > that it means "useless" or "valueless". /Kham- mUUang-/ is his mother
> > tongue, so I'm wary of dismissing what he says. Maybe you're both right.
>
> I have to emphasize again that my Kham Muang is very basic. Maybe /raad"/ is
> indeed another word. One thing I'm curious, though, he pronounces it with
> "r" instead of "h"? Khun Busakorn, you have any better idea?
/rOO- rUUa-/ though it's not a fair indication because he knows he's
talking to a struggling farang. There is also the fact that we were
talking specifically about /ii- haa' raad"/ and /ii- haa' haad"/ is
noticeably harder to say because it requires a glottal stop before the
"h". Although this fellow is working as a chef in UK right now, I've
met him also in Mae Sai and heard him talking to his brother there and
in their conversation the shift from "r" to "h" is the norm.
BTW are you familiar with the /daa'/ expression /ii- haa" pak' ii- haa"
kin-/? It's just occurred to me that here the /haa"/ is most definitely
falling tone. Is it the same "H"-word?
> In Central Thai, /raad"/ "ราด" is a verb meaning to splash, to pour (liquid)
> over something. There's another incident /raad"/ is used as /kham- sooi"/
> คำสร้อย an attachment to a word without meaning in itself, that is, /riia"
> raad"/ or /ga' riia" ga' raad"/ adv, adj. = (messy stuff) strewn over
> everywhere. I remember you once asked for the meaning of the word /ga' hEE^
> ga' ha^/ or something like that, that you overheard your wife muttered about
You have an excellent memory. It's a matter that I've not taken up with
her since; she would inevitably fail to answer the question and instead
elect to dwell on the fact that during the years since she first uttered
the expression, she's the only one who has /tham- hai" riap" rOOy^/
> your place when she first saw it. I'm not sure but it sounded like
> equivalence of central Thai /ga' riia" ga' raad"/. From my own discovery
That could easily be it. I'll have to check by asking one of my nieces.
[..]
> > that /haa-/ with middle tone is a first personal pronoun, which I knew but
> > had overlooked.
>
> You're talking about /haa-/ as part of the pronoun pair - /king-/ and /haa-/,
> aren't you? I understand that they are used only by men, with friends, sort
> of like the way central Thai guys would use /guu-/, /mUng-/ กู , มึง (Sorry,
> I can't find my SCT Script sheet.). So, as a lady, I never used it, I swear.
You mean you *don't* swear? :)
Oops! I had thought that this was reasonably polite, but archaic - sort
of on a level with /chan+ thEE-/ between equals. If you're right,
then I've been misbehaving. One of my stock phrases for refusing to obey
a wifely command (like to help clean up the house) has been /haa- bO'
ngiak"/ Are you telling me that this is inappropriate? (The language, I
mean, not the sense).
[..]
> > But I greatly prefer your interpretation of /raak"/ - all these
> > implications of vomiting are so much more colourful ;-) Mind you,
> > I've always liked the word /uak'/ too, for its wonderful onomatopoeia.
>
> I learn a new word too. Never thought there was such word, onomatopoeia! ;-)
> I think you mean /uak"/ อ้วก .
Yep, /uak"/ is what I meant. Tono, I'm afraid (that's like a typo, only when
you indicate the wrong tone).
> My freind, a female American, begged my to
> teach her the F... word to ward off creepy Thai guys who bothered her at the
> beach. I told her the more effective way to respond is to tell them /uak"
> ja' taak'/. Sure enough, that sent those men flying, laughing and stop
> bothering her.
Excellent! Another one for the book. I do enjoy these language threads!
I guess my equivalent is the one that I use if I'm hailed by a
particularly ghastly hooker while walking past a Pattaya beer-bar:
/diaow+ mao- klap' maa-/ ("I'll come back in a little while, when I'm
drunk")
> Regards, Puangroi ps I could teach you anything you want to know in Thai if
> you want to barter with Kham Muang textbooks you could find for me. But
> please forward your post to me via email because I don't normally read SCT
> everyday except when there's something interests me like this.
Okay - deal. I'll be visiting Chiang Mai for a few days during March and
intend to buy every book on /kham- mUUang/ that I can find. I'll e-mail
you from there and tell you what's available.
John Sharman
> In article <917037...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
>
> > IIRC one of the things that scared me away from getting seriously
> > into Lanna was the fact that the differences seemed to be substantial! I
>
> Indeed, when you get down to the deeper level, you see quite significant
> differences between the two dialects that are said to be ostensibly "the
> same." (Still remember /pai- nai+ ma-/ thread, Khun John, Jopha?) I think as
Who could ever forget that thread? :) But that was Khun Thanit; a degree
of surrealism was to be expected.
> long as you threat kam mUUang as a _different_ dialect and not assuming too
> much about its similarities with standard Thai, you may be able to see things
> in a different perspective.
I'm reluctantly concluding that you are right. It's a pity, because it
means that Lanna is going to be that much harder to learn. I may decide
to attempt Burmese instead.
> > characters of Lanna really do look horribly complex, all curly and
> > convoluted - and I thought that /tua- ak-sOOn+ thai-/ were bad enough
> > already. Have you got far enough yet to know how you write so as to
> > produce a /siang+ jat'ta'waa-/ with a middle class leading consonant?
>
> No, in fact I have not started the writing part. It probably will be a long
> time before I begin any writing effort. I just have too much on my hand right
> now.
I know the feeling. I've been considering language learning as a useful
way of spending my time when I move to Chiang Rai more-or-less full
time.
> > Lanna doesn't appear (to me) to have a tone mark equivalent to /mai^
> > jat'ta'waa/
>
> I think we have to be careful with the tone stuff because the provincial
> variations of accent in kam mUUang can significantly complicate things more
> than you can manage. I am inclined to believe that the 6-tonal system I wrote
> in the earlier post represents primarily kam mUUang Chiang Mai. I don't think
> it really covers all the sound variations found in other kam mUUang accents.
> (Again, like /haa"/ cholera is a falling tone in Chiang Mai, while it is
> /haa'/ in Chiang Rai, Payao & Lampang, if anything I think is high-falling
> because it doesn't sound like any of the 5 tones used in standard Thai, but
> falls between the falling and rising tone. While the same word /ha'/ is a
> straightforward low tone in standard Thai. Note also that the first two
> variations in kam mUUang of cholera are spelled with /hOO-/, but /hOO+/ in
> standard Thai. Same meaning. Go figure!)
This is where we start getting close to the philosophy of language.
You're quite right about the differences. I can understand maybe 40% of
/kham- mUUang-/ as spoken in Chiang Mai against 70% in Chiang Rai. While
I feel sentimentally that the dialect and its preservation is a matter
of cultural importance, the fact remains that language is for
communication and that overriding purpose almost certainly means that
/kham- mUUang-/ is doomed as a living language. /klaang-/ will overwhelm
it purely by reason of practical usefulness. I'm pleased that I shall be
dead before that happens, though.
[..]
> Or perhaps you have overextended the rOO- to hOO- conversion rule. You can't
> forget that there are both hOO- and hOO+ in kam mUUang. /ba' hu" ba' han+/ or
> /bOO' ho" bOO' han+/ is a direct parallel to /mai" ru^ mai" hen+/ . See that
> /hu"/, spelled with /hOO- nok^ huk"/ is directly from /ru^/ with /rOO- rUUa-/
> [know].
>
> /han+/, on the other hand, is compared with /hen+/ [see], both spelled with
> /hOO+ hiib'/. I don't see anything tricky in that, unless you play with the
> meaning of the word /han+/, which means "see" in kam mUUang, but "turn" in
> standard Thai.
No, it was just the /huu"/ on which I was concentrating, bearing in mind
that if it were to be written with /mai^ thoo-/ then it would have to be
/hOO+ hiib'/ Guess I'll just have to look it up when I'm over there and
have access to my books.
> As for /hod' nam^/ , yes this one is really tricky because it is indeed
> spelled with /hOO+ hiib+/ and is a direct parallel with /rod^/ [sprinkle,
> pour] in Thai. However, here's my two satangs. If you try to pronounce the
> word very carefully both in standard Thai and in kam mUUang, you will that
> they have different tones. **standard Thai /hod'/ is a low tone (and
> definitely has to be spelled with hOO+ hiib+/ **kam mUUang /hod^/ is in fact
> a high tone (and can be spelled with hOO- nok^ huk"/ and a /mai^ tri-/ tone
> mark, although I have always seen it spelled with hOO+ and /dOO- dek') What's
> your take?
I'm going to duck that one until after the coming Songkran water-sports.
I shall have plenty of opportunity then to hear, record, examine and
analyse the word in context :) Bearing in mind the local tone shifts
which you've mentioned above, the whole exercise is probably sterile,
though. The fact is that most of the best (i.e. most natural) speakers
of /kham- mUUang-/ can't read or write anyway, so your warning against my
adopting an over-academic approach is well taken.
>
> Speaking like /khon- taa- bod' klam- chang^/ [the blinds and elephant], we may
> stumble on something big here. :-)
Another idiom for the collection - thanks!
Now I'm going to ask another question which is *not* intended as a
criticism of your (excellent) command of English. Why do (even
well-educated) Thais habitually make the mistake of pluralising
adjectival nouns referring to classes? It's *very* common. You just
referred to "the blinds" - the correct expression is "the blind". The
commonest example of the error in my experience is when Thais refer to
"the poors". I find this very odd indeed. In Thai /khon- jon-/ means
both "a poor person" and "poor people" (="the poor"). Very strange that
you feel the need to pluralise in English when you don't in Thai. Are
you able to indicate the reason for the mistake? And, if you feel like
another, why do Thais often/usually say "I am boring" when they mean "I
am bored"?
Joris Goetschalckx
>...And, if you feel like another, why do Thais often/usually
>say "I am boring" when they mean "I am bored"?
Which reminds me of this sign (at the Kiss restaurant on 2nd Rd
in PTY): "Don't bring your food come to restaurant to eat".
Better still, on the menu in the Vientiane restaurant, also on 2nd Rd:
"We are cooked to your order". :-)
PS: the original was: "phOO khrua ja prung ahaan taam thii".
pkham...@hotmail.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> In article <78bhh9$5up$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>
> puangroi_...@my-dejanews.com writes:
> > I have to emphasize again that my Kham Muang is very basic. Maybe /raad"/
is
> > indeed another word. One thing I'm curious, though, he pronounces it with
> > "r" instead of "h"? Khun Busakorn, you have any better idea?
>
> /rOO- rUUa-/ though it's not a fair indication because he knows he's
> talking to a struggling farang. There is also the fact that we were
> talking specifically about /ii- haa' raad"/ and /ii- haa' haad"/ is
> noticeably harder to say because it requires a glottal stop before the
> "h". Although this fellow is working as a chef in UK right now, I've
> met him also in Mae Sai and heard him talking to his brother there and
> in their conversation the shift from "r" to "h" is the norm.
That could be the case. I noticed that younger generation both in the north
and northeast regrettably lost a lot of their cultural heritage due to
assimilation with the supposedly "standard" Thai culture exerted through
compulsary schooling. Even young people, say, in Chiang Mai would have a
hard time understanding an elder's kham mUUang. Same goes with the Isan
folks too.
Back to the meaning of /raad"/, it could very well be a different expression
in Kam MUUang, /haa' raad"/ aside from the central version, /haa' raak"/.
Something in a sense like, "I wish you wasted by cholera." - (My version of
more literal translation would be - "I wish you got cholera so bad that you
defecade uncontrollably everywhere.") as oppose to "I wish you have severe
bowel disfunction and vomit" in /haa' raak"/.
> BTW are you familiar with the /daa'/ expression /ii- haa" pak' ii- haa"
> kin-/? It's just occurred to me that here the /haa"/ is most definitely
> falling tone. Is it the same "H"-word?
I've never heard of it. But, yes, I think it's the "H" word. I guess you
meant in Thai writing it would be, อีห้าปาก อีห้ากิน, right? /Paak'/ or
/pak'/ ? The second phrase means "May you be consumed by cholera". /Paak'/
in lao means speak. I'm not sure what /pak'/ could mean in Kam MUUang.
> > everywhere. I remember you once asked for the meaning of the word /ga'
hEE^
> > ga' ha^/ or something like that, that you overheard your wife muttered about
>
> You have an excellent memory.
I'm afraid not. It's just something that I've been pondering about a bit and
couldn't be positive about what it means. So it just sticks on the back of
my brain.
> > You're talking about /haa-/ as part of the pronoun pair - /king-/ and /haa-/,
> > aren't you? I understand that they are used only by men, with friends, sort
> > of like the way central Thai guys would use /guu-/, /mUng-/ กู , มึง (Sorry,
> > I can't find my SCT Script sheet.). So, as a lady, I never used it, I swear.
>
> You mean you *don't* swear? :)
Just my attempt at irony. Of course not! The worst thing I'd say would be,
"sh__!", say, when I accidently hammer my thumb or something equally painful
and makes me very mad at myself like that. I always feel I have no need to
cuss at anybody. It's more challenging and satisfying for me to articulate
what I have in mind than succumbing to the primodial urge to cuss at someone
as an easy way out of wringing my brain searching for words. Too easy for me
and for my target.
>
> Oops! I had thought that this was reasonably polite, but archaic - sort
> of on a level with /chan+ thEE-/ between equals. If you're right,
> then I've been misbehaving. One of my stock phrases for refusing to obey
> a wifely command (like to help clean up the house) has been /haa- bO'
> ngiak"/ Are you telling me that this is inappropriate? (The language, I
> mean, not the sense).
From my understanding, it's o.k. for men to use it but absolutely not for
women. I find northern culture too conservative for my taste, translate -
too sexist. I've only spent time with villagers in the North, not city folks
so this is only cover the uneducated people. My apologies to Khun Sanpawat..
While in Isan, the same class of people are far more egalitarian, even more
so than central Thai culture. That's why, I think, northern women are much
more /OOn' waan+/ than women from other parts in general. To make a
humanbeing subservient, you first have to whip the bones out of her! My
apologies if that's was my misconception. Khun Busakorn, would you enlighten
me on that, please.
In your case, John, I don't think it's improper. You set your own standard
in your household and nobody's going to say you use inappropriate pronouns.
Personally, I don't think it's rude. And you're right, it's archaic
pronouns. To stop people from using it, the most effective way is to say
it's uncivilized, impolite. Nothing works like snob appeal and its
counterpart. Growing up in provincial town, I talked with my siblings, and
parents with /guu-/, /mueng-/ also and that was not considered rude. It's
folksie language. After we've been trough school for a while, we, especially
my older sister, felt ashamed of using it, knowing it's considered rude by
"standard" Thai. So she tried to change to use /kaao+/ and /twaa-/ instead.
That probably gave me the insecurity complex til these days. ;-) I never
feel comfortable with any other pronouns again. With my very close friends,
all men, I use กู มึง too. That's because I couldn't find any female friend
who could accept that pronoun pair.
> Excellent! Another one for the book. I do enjoy these language threads!
I really like it too. My hypothesis and interpretation of language is more
related to folksies talk and I usually get very bored when I have any
exchange with scholars in the field, who, unfortunately, lost touch with what
I think the most important link to our language, the country folks.
> I guess my equivalent is the one that I use if I'm hailed by a
> particularly ghastly hooker while walking past a Pattaya beer-bar:
> /diaow+ mao- klap' maa-/ ("I'll come back in a little while, when I'm
> drunk")
Be careful, a comment like that from a man toward woman wouldn't sound as
funny as it came from a female farang. (The way she said /uak"/ was so
cute!) Those women may not find it amusing and might reciprocate you with
the "H" word expressions which by now, I guess you've mastered it all!
> Okay - deal. I'll be visiting Chiang Mai for a few days during March and
> intend to buy every book on /kham- mUUang/ that I can find. I'll e-mail
> you from there and tell you what's available.
> --
> Regards,
>
> John Sharman
I would greatly appreciate that and if you won't mind, please keep your eye
open for the same thing for Lao also. I'll pay you back since I'm rather
greedy when it comes to books. Too greedy to impose on other people because
I want them all!
Regards,
Puangroi
John Sharman
> That could be the case. I noticed that younger generation both in the north
> and northeast regrettably lost a lot of their cultural heritage due to
> assimilation with the supposedly "standard" Thai culture exerted through
> compulsary schooling. Even young people, say, in Chiang Mai would have a
> hard time understanding an elder's kham mUUang. Same goes with the Isan
> folks too.
Yes, I have noticed this. My wife's maternal grandmother, a
sprightly 87, seldom speaks anything except /kham- mUUang-/ to. I have
the impression that until the advent of television she probably did not
know much central Thai at all. My wife seems to understand everything
that her grandmother says but, when actively speaking /kham- mUUang-/
herself, only seems to use about half of the vocabulary. To me, that is
a mark of a dialect in decline.
[..]
> > BTW are you familiar with the /daa'/ expression /ii- haa" pak' ii- haa"
> > kin-/? It's just occurred to me that here the /haa"/ is most definitely
> > falling tone. Is it the same "H"-word?
>
> I've never heard of it. But, yes, I think it's the "H" word. I guess you
> meant in Thai writing it would be, อีห้าปาก อีห้ากิน, right? /Paak'/ or
It sounds like อีห้าปัก อีห้ากิน (maybe with the odd trii- or
jat'ta'waa- thrown in as well - the tones are hard to tell, because it's
spoken quickly and with great emphasis).
> /pak'/ ? The second phrase means "May you be consumed by cholera". /Paak'/
> in lao means speak. I'm not sure what /pak'/ could mean in Kam MUUang.
I think I'll go and ask my lawyer friend in Mae Chan. He seems to be
something of an expert and certaily writes beautiful Lanna. Only trouble
is that he is *very* staid and polite. He may not warm to a discussion
of cuss-words.
> human being subservient, you first have to whip the bones out of her! My
> apologies if that's was my misconception. Khun Busakorn, would you enlighten
> me on that, please.
A lot of this is an illusion. The wife frequently seems to be the
absolute boss in the home (as long as the husband is sober). But outside
the home and the immediate family circle the wife seems to be culturally
obliged to take a minor role. I've mentioned before the incident when I
was severely criticised for asking for her input on the design of our
kitchen when we were in the architect's office. Apparently, a proper
husband should be able to give such orders without consulting the
"little woman".
> In your case, John, I don't think it's improper. You set your own standard
> in your household and nobody's going to say you use inappropriate pronouns.
> Personally, I don't think it's rude. And you're right, it's archaic
> pronouns. To stop people from using it, the most effective way is to say
> it's uncivilized, impolite. Nothing works like snob appeal and its
> counterpart. Growing up in provincial town, I talked with my siblings, and
> parents with /guu-/, /mueng-/ also and that was not considered rude. It's
> folksie language. After we've been trough school for a while, we, especially
> my older sister, felt ashamed of using it, knowing it's considered rude by
> "standard" Thai. So she tried to change to use /kaao+/ and /twaa-/ instead.
> That probably gave me the insecurity complex til these days. ;-) I never
> feel comfortable with any other pronouns again. With my very close friends,
> all men, I use กู มึง too. That's because I couldn't find any female friend
> who could accept that pronoun pair.
I don't feel comfortable using มึง กู either, though I'm not entirely
sure why; it's the same kind of unease that I feel when called upon to
ไหว้ - it just doesn't quite feel right somehow.
> > Excellent! Another one for the book. I do enjoy these language threads!
>
> I really like it too. My hypothesis and interpretation of language is more
> related to folksies talk and I usually get very bored when I have any
> exchange with scholars in the field, who, unfortunately, lost touch with what
> I think the most important link to our language, the country folks.
>
> > I guess my equivalent is the one that I use if I'm hailed by a
> > particularly ghastly hooker while walking past a Pattaya beer-bar:
> > /diaow+ mao- klap' maa-/ ("I'll come back in a little while, when I'm
> > drunk")
>
> Be careful, a comment like that from a man toward woman wouldn't sound as
> funny as it came from a female farang. (The way she said /uak"/ was so
> cute!) Those women may not find it amusing and might reciprocate you with
> the "H" word expressions which by now, I guess you've mastered it all!
I'm not sure, but I guess that you as a "good" Thai woman may find it hard to
comprehend the extreme good nature and jocularity which exists between
Pattaya bargirls and SWMs generally, even when there's no "engagement"
between them. It's big grins all round and they are sincerely meant even
though everybody knows that the girls are there for the money and the
guys for self-gratification in one form or another. When the girls call
out "Come sit down here, sexy man" nobody believes for one second that
they mean it - it's their work. When the men call the girls ที่รัก
sincerity is not suspected nor expected. I can honestly say that my
เดี๋ยวเมากลับมา has never resulted in anything other than howls of
laughter, coupled with that manic rising whoop which Thai girls like to
produce when they're in a group and having fun. There's a particular
nest of bars on Beach Road that I've been using since my very first
visit to the place (nearly 10 years now - only a very few of the
original faces left); the friends that I have made there are genuine. My
wife too is as welcome there now as I am. For all the sleaze, there is a
spark of true magic about the place and a degree of real humanity that
you would never find at Disneyland.
> > Okay - deal. I'll be visiting Chiang Mai for a few days during March and
> > intend to buy every book on /kham- mUUang/ that I can find. I'll e-mail
> > you from there and tell you what's available.
>
> I would greatly appreciate that and if you won't mind, please keep your eye
> open for the same thing for Lao also. I'll pay you back since I'm rather
> greedy when it comes to books. Too greedy to impose on other people because
> I want them all!
But books in Thailand are so inexpensive! Don't worry about it - we'll
sort something out. Don't count on too much Lao stuff, though, but I'll
certainly look.
blue...@my-dejanews.com
Sorry for being a little slow in responding. I've been too busy.
In article <917308...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
> > > BTW are you familiar with the /daa'/ expression /ii- haa" pak' ii- haa"
> > > kin-/? It's just occurred to me that here the /haa"/ is most definitely
> > > falling tone. Is it the same "H"-word?
Yes, I am familiar with it. (My mother uses it.) If you have a Chiang Mai
accent like my mother, /haa"/ here would definitely be a falling tone, but
your accent has not been tampered by a Chiang Mai accent, it would definitely
be a low tone. (I can speak in both Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai accents.)
/ii' haa" pak' ii' haa" kin+/ (note tonal corections = this is for Chiang Mai
accent only) means the same thing; it's a curse for someone (female, for male
replace /ii'/ with /ai'/) to be totally consumed with cholera.
There are other expressions for this curse, such as:
/haa" pan- taay+/ = to die quickly of cholera
/haa" yOOk"/ = to be infected by cholera
/haa" wOOk"/ = to be born as a monkey and die of cholera
/haa" wang-/ = to be infested by cholera.
> > From my understanding, it's o.k. for men to use it but absolutely not for
> > women. I find northern culture too conservative for my taste, translate -
> > too sexist. I've only spent time with villagers in the North, not city
True to a large extent, but there are more than a few exceptions. I see female
villagers curse all the time and many wives are more domineering than their
husbands. Although my mother was not, she was/is a sweet woman. (Now, don't
wonder where I got it from!)
> > so than central Thai culture. That's why, I think, northern women are much
> > more /OOn' waan+/ than women from other parts in general. To make a
Funny, I always feel many women/girls from /phaak" klang-/ (central region)
"too sweet" for my taste. I feel that it is somewhat stereotypical to think
northern Thai women are "sweet" and "subservient." Perhaps the sweet melodic
accent spoken by northerners partly gives a sweeter than real impression.
> A lot of this is an illusion. The wife frequently seems to be the
> absolute boss in the home (as long as the husband is sober). But outside
> the home and the immediate family circle the wife seems to be culturally
> obliged to take a minor role. I've mentioned before the incident when I
> was severely criticised for asking for her input on the design of our
> kitchen when we were in the architect's office. Apparently, a proper
> husband should be able to give such orders without consulting the
> "little woman".
On the other hand, many husbands can say "I have to consult with my wife." in
order to give a final decision on some matter. There are many dimensions to
the culture, and one can't really impose one standard rule on it. But the
bottom line? Women are still considered "lesser" than men, professionally,
politically and legally, in Thailand, in any subcultures.
-busakorn
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~bs388085/frontdoor.htm
Vj
> In article <781dt6$c1o$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
> blue...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
>> In article <916693...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
>> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
>> >
>>
>> As for /ii- haa' raak"/, yes I believe it is spelled like the word "root" but
>> I think it suggests greater intensity in that /raak"/ means "infested" or
>> "consumed." So in a way you can say /ii- haa' raak"/ means "a bitch that is
>> infested/consumed by cholera." Just my two cents.
>>
>
> You might have forgotten something, Khun Busakorn. "R" is pronounced "h" in
> gum mueng. (I had produced a table for tone-shift between central-northern-
> noreasten dialects in the past. One can search Deja News under keyword
> "Central" in the subject field. I can't remember the whole thread name,
> sorry.) So, in this case, it's the same word as /haak"/ in northern &
> northeastern dialect which means "puke" - vomit. It's higher degree of
> severity in cholera symptom, I suppose. In a sense, /... haa'/ could mean a
> curse for so and so to shit one's guts out to death. The /... haa' raak"/
> adds on the puking aspect to it.
I second Khun PK's opinion on this one. Yes, the severe degree of
cholera will cause the patient to "go" both the top and the bottom!
/ii- haa' raak"/ if I may put it to the extreme is actually ...
/ii- haa' raak" sai"/
If I were to add all the missing words, it should be ...
/ii- haa' raak" jon- sai" OOk' maa- gOOng-/ !! .. ahahahaha.. :)))..
Means ... puke til all your intestines came out on the floor! :P..
> Sounds like you folks are having fun. So I can't resist to join in. :-)
Me too! Ain't it so irresistable?!?!? :)))..
Cheers,
Vj :)..
> Regards,
> Puangroi
tch...@my-dejanews.com
How did you guys get from asking what is a polite term to page a waitress in a
restaurant to "puking until all your intestines came out on the floor"???
What restaurant are you guys eating at, anyway?
In article <1999Jan26.114531@ubmail>,
Tchi...@HoTMaiL.com
Johpa
>I see female
>villagers curse all the time and many wives are more domineering than their
>husbands.
As far as local Khon Muang women, absolutely!
Johpa
blue...@my-dejanews.com
jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
>
> Now I'm going to ask another question which is *not* intended as a
> criticism of your (excellent) command of English.
Just got time to answer this one. No criticism taken. :-)
> Why do (even
> well-educated) Thais habitually make the mistake of pluralising
> adjectival nouns referring to classes? It's *very* common. You just
> referred to "the blinds" - the correct expression is "the blind". The
As I said sometime earlier, speaking/writing a second language is still an
effort. Even when you acquire a high level of fluency, sometimes you still
need to make a *conscious* effort to communicate in a grammatically correct
way. In this case I know the rule of "the poor", "the blind", and so on and
so forth, but when you don't pay attention to yourself, you can very easily
make mistakes like that. I correct myself all the time.
Grammatical rules are different in the way in which they are internalized. A
lot of it is cultural. So in a second, third language you have to learn and
get accustomed to new rules, new linguistic paradigm. It can be very
difficult at first (just like when you learn to speak Thai or kam mUUang),
and even after you have somewhat mastered it, there are still loose ends to
wrap up, and the wrapping up process could last forever!
> Very strange that
> you feel the need to pluralise in English when you don't in Thai. Are
That shouldn't be strange because there are no verb or noun conjugation in
Thai. And one of the first things Thais learn about English is that there are
singular and plural forms, while in Thai you just have to attach qualifiers to
the nouns. There are both insufficient and excessive application of the rules
in learning a new language.
> you able to indicate the reason for the mistake? And, if you feel like
> another, why do Thais often/usually say "I am boring" when they mean "I
> am bored"?
Passive mode of expression is not common in Thai language.
John Sharman
> In article <917308...@norvic.demon.co.uk>,
> jay...@norvic.demon.co.uk wrote:
>
> > > > BTW are you familiar with the /daa'/ expression /ii- haa" pak' ii- haa"
> > > > kin-/? It's just occurred to me that here the /haa"/ is most definitely
> > > > falling tone. Is it the same "H"-word?
>
> Yes, I am familiar with it. (My mother uses it.) If you have a Chiang Mai
> accent like my mother, /haa"/ here would definitely be a falling tone, but
> your accent has not been tampered by a Chiang Mai accent, it would definitely
> be a low tone. (I can speak in both Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai accents.)
>
> /ii' haa" pak' ii' haa" kin+/ (note tonal corections = this is for Chiang Mai
> accent only) means the same thing; it's a curse for someone (female, for male
> replace /ii'/ with /ai'/) to be totally consumed with cholera.
It's strange. In my area of northern Chiang Haay, /ii- haa'/ on its own
definitely has the second word as low tone. But in /ii- haa" pak' ii-
haa" kin-/ it's falling without a doubt. I can't explain it.
[..]
> > > so than central Thai culture. That's why, I think, northern women are much
> > > more /OOn' waan+/ than women from other parts in general. To make a
>
> Funny, I always feel many women/girls from /phaak" klang-/ (central region)
> "too sweet" for my taste. I feel that it is somewhat stereotypical to think
> northern Thai women are "sweet" and "subservient." Perhaps the sweet melodic
> accent spoken by northerners partly gives a sweeter than real impression.
I have to agree. In /phaak" klaang-/ it's like saccharine. But when in
the North the /saao+/ are pure honey :)
John Sharman
[..]
> > Very strange that
> > you feel the need to pluralise in English when you don't in Thai. Are
>
> That shouldn't be strange because there are no verb or noun conjugation in
> Thai. And one of the first things Thais learn about English is that there are
> singular and plural forms, while in Thai you just have to attach qualifiers to
> the nouns. There are both insufficient and excessive application of the rules
> in learning a new language.
Aha! I see. This really is the answer. When I first started to learn
Thai I took on board the basic rule that you pluralise a noun by a adding
number indicator plus classifier. It was only later that I realised that
there are many instances in which this "rule" does not apply. Is it
right that a Thai on hearing /khon- jon/ without any further indication
would naturally assume a plural rather than singular meaning? I guess it
must be so.