The vowel ə and əə. (เออ)

In chapter 1 you had special practices on the seven easy short and long vowels of Thai. Of the two remaining pairs of short and long vowels in Thai, the ones written ə and əə are pronouced something like English er, ir, or ur (as in her, sir, fur), but without the final r.

Those of you who come from the eastern part of the country probably pronouce such words as her, sir and fur with out the final r. In that case your vowel in her is quite close to the Thai sound əə. Others of you may come from the midwestern or western part of the country and you will need to take particular care not to pronounce the r when trying to imitate the Thai sound əə. Listen carefully to the examples below and imitate as exactly as you can:

Thai	English equivalents	Aids to listening
เทอม	term (borrowed from English word)	thəəm
เฟิร์น	fern (borrowed form English word)	fəən
เชิญ	to invite, to be invited	chəən
เห่อ	to be proud of something	hə̀ə
เสมอ	always	sàmə̆ə
เยอะ	a whole lot of, a great deal	yə́ʔ
เปรอะ	to be spattered	prə̀ʔ

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  The vowel  ʉ and ʉʉ.  (อือ)

The last pair of short and long vowels in Thai does not have any near equivalent in English. However, if you follow instructions and listen to and imitate the sound guide, you will be able to learn to pronouce it without much difficulty, because it is an easy sound to make. The sound is indicated by the letter  ʉ   if short; if long, the additional letter ʉ is added:  ʉʉ. To produce the sound, follow these step:

(1)  Let your tongue, teeth and lips be in relaxed position, as when you are not talking.

(2)  Note that your tongue is touching the palate and that your teeth are closed.

(3)  Now lower the front of the tongue a fraction so that it just misses the palate, keep the teeth close together, part the lips very slightly, and then vocalize.  Listen to the guide and say the following words:

Thai	English Equivalents	Aids to listening
ยืน	to stand	jʉʉn
มือ	hand	mʉʉ
หรือ	interrogative word	rʉ̆ʉ
ซื้อ	to buy	sʉ́ʉ
หนึ่ง	one	nʉ̀ŋ
สลึง	quarter	sàlʉ̆ŋ
ขึ้น	to rise	khʉˆn

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The Thai sound ph, th, kh, and ch.

Our English sounds written by the letter p, t, and k are really pronouced in two different ways, depending on wheter they come at the beginning of a word or come in the middle or at the end of the word. When these sounds come at the the beginning of the word they are always followed by a puff of breath. If you will hold a small piece of very light-weight paper up to your mouth you will see it flutter slightly as you pronouce the words pat, top, keep. Or if you hold a match-flame up close to your mouth it will become extinguished as you say these words. This puff of breath is an aspiration or breathing-out sound of h as in hat, as you will notice if  you say hat, then pat. In Thai this aspiration is even stronger than in English; it is so strong that it is almost exactly like a p, t, or k-sound followed by h. For this reason these Thai sounds are written, ph, th, and kh.

The Thai ch is very much like English ch ,as in chat but it too has a stronger puff of breath like ph, th and kh. Note particular that whenever you see p, t, k, and c followed by h, you have these aspirated sounds.

Thai	English Equivalents	Aids to listening
แพ	raft	phɛɛ
ผ้า	cloth	phaˆa
เท	to pour	thee
ถ้า	if	thaˆa
คอ	neck	khɔɔ
ฆ่า	to kill	khaˆa
ชา	tea	chaa
แฉะ	to soak	chɛˆɛ
ทน	to endure	thon
คน	person	khon
ชน	to bump into	chon

Be careful not to pronounce Thai th like English th, for Engish th stands for two very difficult sounds ( for example, the sound of thorn and that ). Instead pronounce it like an English t but with a stronger puff of breath. Note also that the word "Thai" itself should be pronounce with the Thai th, not English th; hence it should sound something like the English word "tie".

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The Thai sound p, t, k, and c.

The second way in which our English consonants p, t, and k are pronounced is illustrated by the words sip, sit, sick. If you try the match-flame with these words you will notice that the flame is not blown out as it was when you had these sounds at the beginning of a word. These sounds are called unaspirated p, t, and k, and in Thai they occur at the beginning of words. With practice you will be able to pronounce them at the beginning of words, too.

First, you should try to pronounce the English words pat, top, and keep holding back the puff of breath so that you do not to make the paper flutter or the match flame blow out as you say them. Also be careful that these sounds do not become like b, d, and g. If you have ever heard English spoken by a Frenchman or an Italian and if you can successfully hold back the puff of breath as you pronounce pat, top, and keep, you will notice that you are pronouncing the word as if you had a French or an Italian "accent." If you can do this, you will be getting the unaspirated p, t, and k of Thai.

To distinguish these unaspirated sounds from the aspirated ones they are written without h in the Aids, thus: p, t, k. In addition to these three unaspirated sounds Thai also has an unaspirated ch; this is also written without the h, thus : c. In practicing this sound try to pronpunce English chat without fluttering the paper or blowing out the match-flame. Be very careful not to pronounce this sound like English j, as in jar.

Thai	English Equivalents	Aids to listening
ปี	year	pii
ป้า	elder aunt	paˆa
ตี	to hit, beat	tii
ตา	eye	taa
กิน	to eat	kin
เก้า	nine	kaˆaw
จันทร์	moon	can
จี้	to tickle	ciˆi
เจ็ด	seven	cèd

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The Thai sounds b and d.

The Thai sound b and d are similar to the English sounds written the same way. They must be carefully distinguished from Thai p and t, and Thai p and t must in turn be carefully distinguished from Thai ph and th. If English is the language you learned in childhood, you will need to practice hard on the Thai sounds p, t, and k. But if you learned French, Italian, ot Spanish in childhood you may find that you do not have any trouble with Thai p, t and k, and in that case you may have to work very hard to get in that puff of breath that goes with ph, th, and kh.

Thai	English Equivalents	Aids to listening
ใบ	classifier for fruit	bay
ไป	to go	pay
ภัย	danger	phay
ดี	to be good	dii
ตี	to hit, beat	tii
ที	time, instance	thii
จันทร์	moon	can
ชัน	to be steep	chan
เก้า	nine	kaˆw
เข้า	to enter	khaˆw

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The rest of the Thai consonants.

Most of the reat of Thai consonants are not very difficult to produce. These are shown in the table below. Read through the description of the sounds and then listen to the practice below and imitate.

Aids	Nearest English Equivalent	Example
ʔ	The glottal stop is a cough-like sound. It is not a significant sound in English. It sometimes occurs before the vowel of all in the pharse at all  when ones is trying to keep from running the two words together to become atall.	ʔìik	more, else
f	Like English f in fame.	fay	fire
h	Like English h in home. It is always pronounced where written. Remeber that if it follows p, t, k, c, it is not a separate sound, but a part of ph, th, kh, ch.	hɔ̀ɔ	package
y	Like English y in you.	jùu	to be (of location)
l	Like English l in low. Some speakers use l and r interchangeably.	lŏo	clf. for counting dozens of something
m	Like English m in me.	mii	to have
n	Like English n in near.	niˆi	this
ŋ	Like English ng in song. In Thai this sound occurs at the beginning of the word as well as at the end.	sɔɔŋ	envelope
r	A slightly trilled r, but an English initial r, as in row, is not too bad. Some speakers use r and l interchangeably.	raakhaa	price
s	Like English s in song.	sɔɔŋ	envelope
w	Like English w in west, except that the lips are pursed a little more. It also has a little more friction, like a v, but sound is made by the two lips and not by the teeth against the lips, as in the case of v.	weelaa	time

If you are uncertain about any of the points of pronunciation which have been discussed, listen to the words and phrases with which you are having trouble, and try to improve your pronunciation.

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