Earl W. Stevick

“ Thai words sound entirely different from their English equivalents. They not only sound different from English words, they frequently resemble each other in ways that make it difficult for the English speaker to distinguish them. For example, these three words differ only in tone:
These pairs of words are identical except for length of vowel:
These pairs of words differ only in the type of initial consonant (one is aspirated; the other isn't) :
Since these particular types of contrast are not present in English, the student may find it hard to keep them in mind in Thai. ”

“ There already exists at least one reference grammar of Thai, as well as courses which contain detailed grammatical notes. But people learn things when they are ready to learn them. They also need to have the same facts available on more than one scale. Experience with basic courses in other languages suggests that most students need a connected summary of the main points of structure, in addition to and not instead of the notes that are scattered among the lessons. ”

“ Some ability in handling the language normally goes hand in hand with ability in the first area. People react to mistakes in either area, but they are more likely to react verbally to mistake in the verbal area. ”

“ Similarly, English has several verb forms that may function as nouns or as adjectives. For example, driving is a verbal noun in I like driving cars; to drive is a verbal noun (sometimes called an 'infinitive') in I like to drive cars. Compare maintain:maintenance, proceed:procedure, and many others. In barking dogs and frozen food, barking and frozen are verbal adjectives derived from bark and freeze. There are only two noun formatives that are used to form nouns like those above:
36. We have just seen why English speakers may have difficulty keeping track of noun expressions in Thai. ”

“ Since the experience area covered by a particular word in Thai will usually differ from that in English, the student will usually not know the range of meaning of the word in Thai and may extend it into areas where it is not used. ”

“ II. Problems of Sentence Structure
23. In the way they are put together, even the simplest Thai sentences bear little resemblance to their English counterparts. True, the subject does ordinarily come before the predicate, as in English, and the verb does stand before its object, but almost everything else is different. The following are nine of the differences that cause English speakers the most trouble.
24. (a) Every English statement must have a subject, even if the subject is only a personal pronoun (I, etc.)
In Thai, the subject may be omitted if no ambiguity would result:
25. ”

“ Each classifier is normally used with a large number of nouns of very different meanings, and there is frequently no observable connection between the classifier and its noun.
Fortunately, for limited purposes there are about 50 very common classifiers that will take care of most of our needs. ”