Getting Around Thai English

About Singapore English or Singlish

Foreigners in Singapore often have a hard time understanding Singaporeans when they use Singlish, or Singapore English, during informal settings, e.g. gatherings with friends and family. This is because, besides being grammatically incorrect, a Singlish sentence is often constructed with words from more than one language (English, Chinese, Hokkien, Malay etc). Here is an example of a Singlish sentence:

Yesterday I was so sian (meaning bored in Hokkien) at home so I went out. But it was so hot outside that I tak boleh tahan (meaning cannot take it or cannot endure in Hokkien). 

Adding to the confusion is the fact that colloquial words and terms are added to the mix as well. As such, it is impossible for a foreigner to understand Singlish without spending a bit of time and effort into studying it.

About Thai English

Thai English poses a similar problem to foreigners. Foreigners to Thailand would have usually have their first encounters with Thai English from Thais in the service industry such as taxi drivers, waiters, street vendors, sales assistants etc. Although many Thais can speak English to some degree, understanding what they say or getting yourself understood is often not easy (this is referring to Thais in general and excludes those who have really studied the language properly or in depth). This is because Thai English is not quite the same as English in the USA or the UK – grammar rules are often not observed and many English words are pronounced in a uniquely Thai way.

For any visitor to Thailand, it will soon become apparent to them that they have to speak English with a Thai accent in order to make everyday Thais understand what they say.

Tones

Thai is a very musical language and some foreigners have likened it to bird-song. Like Chinese, Thai is a tonal language, which means that a word will take on different meanings depending on the tone that is used to pronounce it.

The most famous example is perhaps the Thai phrase mai mai mai mai mai. To many of us, this looks like a meaningless string of five identical words. However, when these words are pronounced using the appropriate Thai tones, they suddenly take on meaning “new wood does not burn, does it?”

Thais speak largely in a monotone when speaking English (though there may be tonal changes in the final syllable of a word sometimes). Considering that tones are so important in Thai (and also the fact that Chinese has four tones while Thai has five), you would suppose that Thais would pronounce words in the same way as native English speakers but this is not so.

Grammar

Grammar rules are often not observed by Thais when speaking English. Examples of sentences they may construct include:

“I no like”.

“He very nice man”.

“She pay already”.

“This bag very nice”.

“You speak Thai very good”.

“You come here how many times?”.

This is primarily because grammar rules in the Thai language is different from those in English and also that English grammar can be hard to master.

Syllable Emphasis

Unlike native English speakers who emphasise certain syllables within a word (the syllable being emphasised is longer in time length than the others), Thais generally pronounce English words with equal emphasis on each syllable (equal time length for all). This is the reason why words like to-MOR-row, IN-for-ma-tion, SHOP-ping, TI-red etc, sound flat when a Thai is pronouncing them. To put it another way, it sounds like the person is speaking in a monotone.

However, Thais do stress syllables (pronouncing a syllable with a different tone) when pronouncing certain words. The stress is often on the final syllable of the word and it is achieved by pronouncing it with a:

• Rising tone (you start from a low tone of voice and then raise it. E.g. tone similar to that when you question someone with the word “Well?”)
• Falling tone (you start from a high tone of voice and then lower it. E.g. tone similar to that when you pronounce the word ‘height’)

However, it is not clear as to when to stress the final syllable a word or not and when to use a rising/falling tone. Out of the few word examples earlier, only tired would be pronounced with no stress on the final syllable. The final syllable of the other words would be stressed, i.e. pronounced with a falling tone. Listen closely to which words Thais stress the final syllable of and what tones they use when they do. You will get the hang of it after a while.

Thai Pronunciation in Use

As I am not an English teacher, I am not qualified nor knowledgeable enough to provide detailed information on Thai spoken English. The section below provides some basic guidelines on how Thais pronounce certain words. By no means exhaustive, this will give you an idea on how to pronounce a word, when you see it, so to make yourself understood in a Thai context.

Note: If the final syllable of a word is to be stressed, it will be indicated with (ris) for rising tone and (fal) for falling tone.

Starting Sounds & Letters

* ‘v’ is often pronounced as ‘w’

• very                 is pronounced as         wely (fal)
• voice                is pronounced as         woice (ris)
• VIP                  is pronounced as         wee-I-P

* ‘r’ is often pronounced as ‘l’

• right                 is pronounced as         light (ris)
• road                 is pronounced as         load (ris)

* For words with two consecutive consonants in the first syllable (e.g. fl, fr, sc, tw, sl, sm, sw, sp, sk, st), an ‘a’ is added to the first letter of the word to create a new syllable in front.  

• flock                is pronounced as         fa-lock (ris)
• friend              is pronounced as         fa-lend
• school              is pronounced as         sa-cool
• twin                 is pronounced as         ta-win
• slow                 is pronounced as         sa-low
• smoke              is pronounced as         sa-moke (ris)
• sweep              is pronounced as         sa-weep (ris)
• speak               is pronounced as         sa-peak (ris)
• skin                  is pronounced as         sa-kin
• straw                is pronounced as         sa-taw

Middle Sounds & Letters

* ‘v’ is often pronounced as ‘w’

• Sukhumvit      is pronounced as         Sukhumwit (ris)
• never             is pronounced as         nair-wer (ris)
• vanilla            is pronounced as         wanilla
• TV                 is pronounced as         tee-wee

* The sound of consonant clusters (i.e. a pair or group of consonants) in the middle of a word is often omitted.

• problem           is pronounced as         por-berm (fal)
• brother            is pronounced as         ba-ter (fal)
• frog                 is pronounced as         fog (ris)
• brake               is pronounced as         bake
• fried                is pronounced as         fide (ris)

  

Ending Sounds & Letters

There is only a limited number of ending sounds for words in the Thai language. English words with ending sounds that do not fall within these are often pronounced without the ending sound or have the ending sound converted to another one.

* The sound of the ending letter or syllable is omitted.

• mend              is pronounced as         man
• pump              is pronounced as         pum (ris)
• red                  is pronounced as         lay-ade (ris)
• with                 is pronounced as         wee-eed (ris)
• cake                 is pronounced as         k-ache (ris)
• cute                 is pronounced as         cue-ood (ris)
• change             is pronounced as         chay-ane (ris)

* ‘-ed’: usually not pronounced.

• cooked             is pronounced as         cook (ris)
• fried                 is pronounced as         fry    

* ‘-el’ and ‘le’: these are pronounced with a ‘earn’ sound.

• Michael            is pronounced as         Mi-kern (fal)
• Russell             is pronounced as         Russ-sern (fal)
• apple               is pronounced as         app-pern (fal)
• bubble             is pronounced as         bub-bern (fal)

* ‘-us’: this is pronounced with a ‘us’ sound.

• lotus                 is pronounced as         low-tuss (ris)
• virus                 is pronounced as         wi-russ (ris)
• chous               is pronounced as         core-russ (ris)

* ‘-tion’: this is pronounced with a ‘shun’ sound.

• station              is pronounced as         stay-shun (fal)
• information       is pronounced as         in-for-may-shun (fal)

* ‘-es’ / ‘-se’ / ‘ss’ / ‘-ce’ etc: the ‘s’ ending sound is replaced by a ‘d’ sound.

• yes                  is pronounced as         yed (ris)
• cheese             is pronounced as         chee-eed (ris)
• lease                is pronounced as         lee-eed (ris)
• lace                 is pronounced as         lay-ed (ris)

* ‘-lon’: this is pronounced with a ‘lawn’ sound.

•  melon              is pronounced as         mare-lawn (fal)
• gallon               is pronounced as         gal-lawn

* ‘-lar’: this is pronounced with a ‘la’ sound.

• similar              is pronounced as         see-mee-la (fal)
• singular            is pronounced as         sin-gew-la (fal)

* ‘-nal’: this is pronounced with a ‘nair-l’ sound.

• international     is pronounced as         in-ter-nair-shun-nair-l
• regional            is pronounced as         ree-ja-nair-l
• professional      is pronounced as         pro-fess-shun-nair-l

Words With Unusual Pronunciations

Here are some words that are not pronounced like they are written but are not numerous enough to form a guideline.

• shopping          is pronounced as         chop-ping (fal)
• album              is pronounced as         ah-la-bum (fal)
• central              is pronounced as         cen-tarn (ris)
• chocolate          is pronounced as         chock-ko-lard (ris)
• major               is pronounced as         may-yer (fal)
• channel            is pronounced as         chan-nair-l (fal)
• Liverpool         is pronounced as         liver-poon
• Arsenal             is pronounced as         are-sir-nern (fal)
• technology        is pronounced as         tech-nor-ler-yee
• Siam                is pronounced as         Sai-yum (ris)
• Paragon            is pronounced as         pah-rah-gone (fal)