Learn some simple tricks to learn grammar
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| Ryan: All About Thai, lesson 3 - Painless Thai Grammar. Hi, everyone and welcome to the grammar portion of ThaiPod101.com’s All About series. |
| Rawinporn: Oh no! No grammar. |
| Ryan: Well, I’m sure some listeners are having that very same reaction right about now. But we’re here to tell you, there’s nothing to worry about. We’ve made Thai grammar so simple that you’ll wonder what the fuss was all about. |
| Rawinporn: You will be surprised to learn that in comparison with English or other foreign languages, some parts of Thai grammar are amazingly easy. |
| Ryan: Easy, you say? How can that be possible? Well, we’re about to show you. |
| Rawinporn: Okay, let’s get started! |
| Ryan: First, what we want to do is take a look at English. English is what we call an S-V-O language. |
| Rawinporn: Khun Ryan, what does S-V-O stand for? |
| Ryan: Subject-Verb-Object. That means that in an English sentence, the subject always comes first, followed by the verb, and then the object. That’s how English sentences are put together. |
| Rawinporn: Can we have an example? |
| Ryan: “I eat bread.” “I” is the subject or the one doing the action. “Eat” is the verb or the action taking place. And lastly, “bread” is the object that receives the action. “I read the newspaper.” “I watch TV.” These are all S-V-O sentences. |
| Rawinporn: Well, this is exactly the same with Thais and tense order. |
| Ryan: For example… |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn gin khà-nǒm-bpang |
| Ryan: phǒm gin khà-nǒm-bpang |
| Rawinporn: It means “I eat bread.” |
| Ryan: Okay. So earlier, we mentioned that there are a lot of areas of Thai grammar that are much simpler than their English counterparts, right? |
| Rawinporn: Now, we’d go through and show you what some of them are. |
| Ryan: What we’ve decided to do is compare Thai examples to English grammar examples, so that you can really see the differences. The next one we’ll talk about is tense. |
| Rawinporn: Tense. Well, first, what is tense? |
| Ryan: Good question! Tense refers to time; past, present, and future! There are tons of tenses in English with scary names like present perfect continuous and stuff like that. |
| Rawinporn: I think you’ll scare a lot of English learners. |
| Ryan: Yeah. And that’s why, you’ll be glad to know that in the Thai language, words are not modified or conjugated for tenses. |
| Rawinporn: That’s right. We simply indicate by the context or with the words “already” or “will.” |
| Ryan: That means there is no difference between past, future, and present tense. But as long as you have words that specify time, you can easily tell when the action is going to take place. Let’s hear some examples. How about a simple sentence? |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn gin saaen-wít. “I eat a sandwich.” dì-chǎn is a personal pronoun that means “I.” gin is a verb that means “eat.” |
| Ryan: So that sentence is in the present tense. How do we change it to the future? “I will eat a sandwich.” |
| Rawinporn: It would be a very similar sentence - dì-chǎn jà gin saaen-wít. |
| Ryan: You only add jà which means “will” in front of the verb and this sentence becomes a future tense sentence. |
| Rawinporn: How easy! |
| Ryan: For the present continuous tense, you only add the word gam-lang in front of the verb. |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn gam-lang gin saaen-wít. |
| Ryan: “I am eating a sandwich.” |
| Rawinporn: For past tense, the sentence would be exactly the same as present tense. In order to make it clearer, you only address the time of the action. |
| Ryan: For example? |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn gin saaen-wít mûuea-waan-níi. |
| Ryan: “I ate a sandwich yesterday.” |
| Rawinporn: Additionally, Thai verbs don’t conjugate according to the subject. |
| Ryan: It doesn’t matter who is doing the action, the verb stays the same. Can we hear some examples? |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn gin saaen-wít. |
| Ryan: “I eat a sandwich.” |
| Rawinporn: Khun Ryan gin saaen-wít. |
| Ryan: “Ryan eats a sandwich.” You heard the exact same gin in both sentences, right? |
| Rawinporn: The word didn’t change. |
| Ryan: That makes grammar a lot easier. That’s for sure. Next, let’s talk about pronouns! What we’re going to do is give you the word one time at natural native speed. Then we’ll give you the English translation. Let’s have a listen. First, we have… |
| Rawinporn: phǒm |
| Ryan: “I” (for males only) |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn |
| Ryan: “I” (for females only) |
| Rawinporn: khun |
| Ryan: “You” |
| Rawinporn: phûuak-rao or rao |
| Ryan: “We” |
| Rawinporn: khǎo |
| Ryan: “He” or “she” |
| Rawinporn: phûuak-khǎo |
| Ryan: “They” |
| Rawinporn: Lastly, man. |
| Ryan: “It” (for animals and things). Now, let’s have a look at the verb “to be.” |
| Rawinporn: In Thai, the word “to be” is bpen. It is always placed after the subject. |
| Ryan: Just like before, what we’re going to do is give you the word one time at natural native speed, then we’ll give you the English translation. Khun Rawinporn, please begin. |
| Rawinporn: phǒm bpen |
| Ryan: “I am.” |
| Rawinporn: phǒm bpen khon-thai. |
| Ryan: “I am Thai.” |
| Rawinporn: dì-chǎn bpen khon-thai. |
| Ryan: “I am Thai.” |
| Rawinporn: khun bpen |
| Ryan: “You are” |
| Rawinporn: For example, khun bpen khun-khruu. |
| Ryan: “You are a teacher.” |
| Rawinporn: phûuak-rao bpen |
| Ryan: “We are” |
| Rawinporn: For example: phûuak-rao bpen khon-dtàang-châat. |
| Ryan: "We are foreigners." |
| Rawinporn: khǎo bpen |
| Ryan: “She is” |
| Rawinporn: For example: khǎo bpen dii-saai-nôoe. |
| Ryan: "She is a designer." |
| Rawinporn: phûuak-khǎo bpen |
| Ryan: "They are" |
| Rawinporn: phûuak-khǎo bpen mǎaw. |
| Ryan: "They are doctors." |
| Rawinporn: Lastly, man bpen. |
| Ryan: "It is" |
| Rawinporn: For example, man bpen yaa-gâae-bpùuat. |
| Ryan: "It is a painkiller." |
| Rawinporn: This is all for this lesson. See you again next time. We are going to practice the pronunciation in the next lesson. |
| Ryan: See you! |
| Rawinporn: sà-wàt-dii khâ. |
Comments
Hide?Hi everyone! How do you feel about Thai Grammar, is not that bad isn't it?
Hi Sean Gates,
Thank you. ร is not silent in ไวยากรณ์ wai-yaa-gaawn ร is a final consonant "n" in "gaawn" ณ is silent as ณ์ gaa-ran. "Terminal silent R" is unheard of. Can you please explain a bit more? Thanks! Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions. I will be glad to help.
สวัสดีค่ะ sà-wàt-dii-khâ
ปริษา Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
*need more coffee. Cannot edit messages. *used should be "confused, frustrated". But no longer. =)
I was getting used by learning Thai, but I'm only there for two weeks, and I'm going to have a great time. Thank you for all your feedback and support.
I looked up the word "grammar", and in Thai, it's ไวยากรณ์ (waai-yaa-gon). R, silent N. It's not critically important, but how do we know it's not a terminal silent R instead? =)
Hello Mel Malinowski,
Thank you. I agree. เรา (rao) we apply to 2 people/ เรา (rao) "I or me", and พวกเรา (puaahk-r-ao) to 3 or more. Likewise using พวก with เขา (khao) "they/them". khàawp-khun khâ, mii kham-thǎam à-rai thǎam chán dâai ná-khá Thank you! Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions. I will be glad to help.
สวัสดีค่ะ sà-wàt-dii-khâ
ปริษา Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
Discussing this with my Thai wife. She says เรา (rao) applies to 2 people, and พวกเรา (puaahk-r-ao) to 3 or more. Likewise using พวก with เขา (khao). Do you agree?
สวัสดี Just Another Person,
Thank you for taking the time to leave us a comment. 😇 We are happy that Thai grammar made you relieved! 😉😉
Wishing you good luck with your Thai,
เลเว็นเต้ (Levente)
Team ThaiPod101.com
No, thank goodness! I am so glad about this because I have a hard time with English grammar.
Hello Sue,
Thank you very much for your comment and question.These is just a really beginning lesson if you keep checking you will find that we put Thai script on every lessons. Hope that will help you. :) Please let me know if you have any future questions. I will be glad to help. We wish you will have a good progress with Thai.
Have a nice day.
Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
Hi!
Thank you for the lessons.
I was wondering if you could put words in Thai as well as the romanization. I am trying to practice writing as well as grammar, but my writing is not nearly good enough, so I keep having to look up Thai writing for the romanization. I would appreciate it very much if you could add Thai words to the romanization. Thanks a lot!
Hello Ronji,
Thank you very much for your comment. For your question, according to Thai language verb do not change form according to tense. "mûa-waan-níi" is a word means "yesterday", put at the beginning or sometime at the end of a sentence. Hope that help.
Have a nice day.
Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
Thank you for explaining it so well! I am wondering about the example for past tense: "mowanii" - she uses it after the verb - I thought the time indicating word went "before" the verb - is it not always the same?
Hello Joe johnston,
Thank you very much for your comment. We really appreciated your suggestion. I will pass your comment to our team for consideration.
Thanks again and hope you have a nice day.
Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
How about the Top 5 things to say to your Thai girlfriend
Hello Patrick and Steve,
Thank you very much for your comment. For Patrick question, “gam-lang” is already means like it have “yuu” at the end so you don't need to always say "gam-lang...yuu" all the time.
For Steve, I feel so glad for you that you have more confident with the tones. Keep practicing and you will get better and better.
Good luck with your Thai.
Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
I was a bit overwhelmed about the learning the different tones, but I feel a bit more confident now after finding out how simple the grammar is! It feels more doable! :thumbsup:
Hello,
when use progressive tense with "gam-lang" do i need the word "yuu" at the end of the sentence or sometimes we not use it?
Thanks
Hello John,
Thank you very much for your comment.
Have a good day.
Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
less talking and more lesson information and charge the theme song on each lession
Hello Ken,
Thank you very much for your comment. I don't know if we can change the music for each series, maybe you can skip past the theme song, but thank you for listening.
Have a nice day. :)
Parisa
Team ThaiPod101.com
Please change the theme music for each group of lesson.
As nice as the intro song is, listening to any song 1000 times can be wearying! :-)
It would be cool if each series had its own theme song. You know?