ศาลาชุมนุม

[DonSena]

I recall that some on the Forum here have inquired about "pauses," seeming to be unsure, but concerned, where and when there is a pause, as well as how big a pause.

Just how fast we move from one syllable to the next, how loud we pronounce each such syllable and the actual shape of the intonation contour along which we stream our syllables are rarely (if ever) taken into account by the non-native learner of Thai. These often-neglected aspects of the language apply to matters of rhythm, stress (volumetric) and intonation, in that order, and are now compiled into a paper I prepared for Catherine Wentworth of Women Learning Thai, who had earlier indicated an interest in them.

Trivial though they may seem, these features are provably quite meaningful by numerous minimal-pair comparisons. Anyone not already familiar with these things, but genuinely interested in the language, will only enhance his (or her) awareness of Thai in coming to know them.

[Gra-ding]

An interesting and helpful read Don.

I would never have thought จักรยานคันนี้เหรอ คุณถีบไปโรงเรียน could have so many meanings.

If you have a spare minute or two would you mind including audio links to your example phrases.

[DonSena]

An interesting and helpful read Don.

I would never have thought จักรยานคันนี้เหรอ คุณถีบไปโรงเรียน could have so many meanings.

If you have a spare minute or two would you mind including audio links to your example phrases.

Actually, it would have to be someone with access to the website's resources who could supply those audio links.
If MSWord has a way of supplying audio links, its power is beyond what I realized. I wonder if the native speaker who supplies vocalizations of certain Thai words and phrases here on the site would be willing to participate in this endeavor.

In any case, we would need the voice of a native speaker. It would have to be someone who, having read the paper, is able to correlate the points being made with his/her own speaking experience. The difficulty there is that the native speaker is not normally conscientiously aware of these features, as there is no perceived need to teach these aspects of the language in the elementary, middle and high schools of Thailand. The natives internalize these things from birth and don't normally pay direct attention to them.

If a native speaker who is a really good reader of English were to examine the points being made in the paper, s/he might be able to supply some audio-file segments analogous to those already in the Forum dictionary. I myself would like to hear those contrasts as sounded by a native speaker -- I could never do it as well as s/he does routinely.

[pensive]

That document must have been a mammoth undertaking!

Just two things.

I think you mean "closed," as "close" means "near to".

The sentence ผม[เป็นคน]ใส่ใจกับสุขภาพครับ is missing the เป็นคน.

Thanks for putting in the effort.

[DonSena]

That document must have been a mammoth undertaking!

Just two things.

I think you mean "closed," as "close" means "near to".

The sentence ผม[เป็นคน]ใส่ใจกับสุขภาพครับ is missing the เป็นคน.

Thanks for putting in the effort.

It seems as though it should be closed-clause juncture,as compared to open-clause juncture.
But the terminology that has been accepted favors close clause juncture, or more simply,
close juncture.

The reason is that the juncture is not actually closed, but not as wide as open clause juncture.
The duration of open-clause juncture is long -- signified by /,/ and that of open juncture
is extra-long /;/.

Close (relatively "near") -clause juncture has a time gap that by its very nature is not closed up,
but not as long as open juncture.

Thanks for finding the omission of เป็นคน in the paper. I'll doctor it up.

[pensive]

OK. I still don't see that "close" has a place here, but if it is technical jargon then OK.

[Tgeezer]

That document must have been a mammoth undertaking!

Just two things.

I think you mean "closed," as "close" means "near to".

The sentence ผม[เป็นคน]ใส่ใจกับสุขภาพครับ is missing the เป็นคน.

Thanks for putting in the effort.

Does it need เป็นคน ? everyone know that ผม is a person.
It seems to say ' I am the sort of person (who) looks after (my)health.

I wonder if this is a genuine distinction in Thai and why it would be wrong to write ผมใส่ใจสุขภาพครับ .
Does anybody know?

[DonSena]

That document must have been a mammoth undertaking!

Just two things.

I think you mean "closed," as "close" means "near to".

The sentence ผม[เป็นคน]ใส่ใจกับสุขภาพครับ is missing the เป็นคน.

Thanks for putting in the effort.

Does it need เป็นคน ? everyone know that ผม is a person.
It seems to say ' I am the sort of person (who) looks after (my)health.

I wonder if this is a genuine distinction in Thai and why it would be wrong to write ผมใส่ใจสุขภาพครับ .
Does anybody know?

You quite likely could. However, It's the voice of a native speaker that I put in writing for this example. Specifically, นัฐพล วาลิกดิลก introduces some of the many อโรคยา videos on YouTube with an ad for Herbale, a spirulina product. While he says ผมเป็นคนใส่ใจสุขภาพครับ to say he's someone who is attentive to health matters, he does so without the preposition กับ.

I've since modified and corrected the Thai to correspond to what he literally says at the beginning of the videos.

[tod-daniels]

What an incredible compilation of useful information!!

Thanx a LOT Don!!

I'd originally posted about "comma-word"; only because I heard definite pauses in the rhythm the Thais used when speaking.

I think a lot of the "lack of comprehensibility" non-native speakers run into when they speak Thai to Thais is directly related to what your paper addresses. The wrong words are stressed and/or drawn out and the natural rhythm in which a Thai would say things is totally altered. This makes comprehension hard for Thais who are used to hearing things said in a particular "cadence".

I've got a meeting later this week with the group of Thai teachers I routinely get together with. I'll definitely print enough copies to go around. Obviously, some of it will invariably be over their heads (seeing as it's over mine too), but they're a sharp group of teachers. I have no doubt they'll get the "gist" of what you're presenting enough to be able to incorporate it into their lesson plans.

On thing totally OFF TOPIC :
In the meeting we had the teachers were of the consensus that the hardest "tone" for native English speakers to "master" or “hit” consistently in Thai is surprisingly a "mid-tone" when it has a long vowel (whether there's live or dead ending).

Honestly, I would have thought it'd be a different tone, but after some contemplation I think it's because in English we routinely drop (or rise) the intonation of words without a lot of thought when we speak.

Sorry for the off-topic.

Again, thanx a LOT!!!

[DonSena]

What an incredible compilation of useful information!!

Thanx a LOT Don!!

I'd originally posted about "comma-word"; only because I heard definite pauses in the rhythm the Thais used when speaking.

I think a lot of the "lack of comprehensibility" non-native speakers run into when they speak Thai to Thais is directly related to what your paper addresses. The wrong words are stressed and/or drawn out and the natural rhythm in which a Thai would say things is totally altered. This makes comprehension hard for Thais who are used to hearing things said in a particular "cadence".

I've got a meeting later this week with the group of Thai teachers I routinely get together with. I'll definitely print enough copies to go around. Obviously, some of it will invariably be over their heads (seeing as it's over mine too), but they're a sharp group of teachers. I have no doubt they'll get the "gist" of what you're presenting enough to be able to incorporate it into their lesson plans.

On thing totally OFF TOPIC :
In the meeting we had the teachers were of the consensus that the hardest "tone" for native English speakers to "master" or “hit” consistently in Thai is surprisingly a "mid-tone" when it has a long vowel (whether there's live or dead ending).

Honestly, I would have thought it'd be a different tone, but after some contemplation I think it's because in English we routinely drop (or rise) the intonation of words without a lot of thought when we speak.

Sorry for the off-topic.

Again, thanx a LOT!!!

In fact, I've found the long mid tone to be the hardest for the same reason -- keeping it at a mid level.