Thai Grammar Notes

INTRODUCTION 2

NOUNS 3

VERBS 3

ADJECTIVES 6

PERSONAL PRONOUNS 7

RELATIONSHIPS 8

PREPOSITIONS 8

QUESTIONS 9

CLASSIFIERS 11

NEGATIVE STATEMENTS 13

COMPARISONS 13

SUPERLATIVE COMPARISONS 14

REQUESTS 15

NUMBERS 16

WANT TO LEARN MORE? 17

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Introduction
When compared to other Languages, on a fundamental level the Thai grammar is
actually very simple. Each word normally stays the same; thus, there are no
declinations, no conjugations, no plural forms, no genders and no articles.
Whereas the English word to go might have different forms
like goes, went, going etc., the equivalent Thai word pai always stays the same,
regardless of the context.

However, there are also elements in the Thai language that we do not
have in many Western Languages.

No Blanks between Words

One thing that learners find quite difficult is that there are no
spaces between the words. As this is very tough, especially for Thai
learners, we have put spaces in between the words in these notes.

Tones
One of the most difficult element for the learner of the Thai language is
the correct pronunciation of the five phonemic
tones: middle, low, falling, high and rising because the concept of Tones
is not existing in many European Languages including English.

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Word Order
In Thai, the word order is Subject-Verb-Object. This is the same as the
word order in English (e.g. Tom goes home).

Formal Tone - Krab and Ka

In spoken Thai language, at the end of most sentences, the
particle Krab (ครับ) for a man, and Ka (ค่ะ) for a woman are
added indicating respect. These words can also be used to indicate an
affirmative, but the ค่ะ (falling tone) is changed to a คะ (high tone).

Nouns
Nouns are pretty simple in the Thai language. They do not have articles
nor genders, and there is no distinction between singular or plural. As it
is easy to go without articles and genders, it is important to convey
singular or plural.

Verbs
Now that we already learned how to use nouns, in order to make
complete sentences, we need to know about verbs.

I have some good news here too. Verbs are also pretty straight forward
in Thai! They do not change with person, tense, number and there are

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no particles. Additional information (e.g. tenses, plural etc.) is conveyed

by adding additional words (e.g. tense makers).

Present Tense
In this lesson, we will learn the present tense and we just need to use
the basic form. To emphasize the present tense, the word กําลัง (gam-
lang) is sometimes put in front of the verb.

Example:
ผู ้หญิง กําลัง ยืน อยู่
phû yĭng gam-lang yuen yù
The woman is standing.

Past tense
Past tense is indicated by แล ้ว (láeo - already) which is placed after the
verb.

Example:
ม ้าได ้ กระโดด ไป แล ้ว
má dâi krà-dòt pai láeo
The horse jumped.

There is also an alternative way to make past tense with ได ้ (dâi).

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Have a look at this example:

ผู ้ชาย ได ้ ไป ปี น ภูเขา
phû chai dâi pai bin phu khăo
The man has climbed the mountain.

Since ได ้ (dâi) means can, it implies that something has been achieved
and thus happened in the past.

Future Tense
Future tense is indicated by จะ (chà - will) which is placed in front of the
verb.

Example:
ม ้า กําลัง จะ กระโดด
má gam-lang chà krà-dòt
The horse is going to jump.

There is one interesting case in future tense, that we did not yet look
into.

Have a look at this sentence:

ี ดง กําลัง จะ ชนะ
ทีม สแ
thim sĭ daeng kam-lang chà chá-ná

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The red team is going to win.

Use of กําลัง (kam-lang)

Isn't it strange that we use กําลัง (kam-lang) in this sentence?

The reason is that in the above sentence, the race is already ongoing and
that the red team is already leading (present tense) and we make a
prediction on the outcome (future tense).

Adjectives
If you like to describe certain things, the adjective normally follows the
noun.

Look at this example:

ืE เชต
เสอ ิE สฟ
ี ้ า นัน
E ใหม่
sûea chóet sĭ fá nán mài
The blue shirt is new.

Here we have actually two adjectives following the

ืE เชต
noun shirt (เสอ ิE / sûea chóet):

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ี ้ า / sĭ fá indicates the color blue (note that ส ี / sĭ - color acts as a

1) สฟ
classifier)

2) ใหม่ / mài indicates that the shirt is new

E / nán refers to the place of the shirt (like the English

Please note that นัน
word 'that').

Personal Pronouns

These are common personal pronouns in Thai:

ผม phom I/me - This is used by male speakers

ดิฉัน dì-chăn I/me - This is used by female speakers

เธอ thoe she/her (informal) (also you)

เขา khăo he/him, she/her
ของ เขา / khŏng khăo his
ของ เธอ / khŏng thoe her

ของ ผม / khŏng phŏm my – This is used by male speakers

ของ ฉั น / khŏng chăn my – This is used by female speakers

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Relationships

You will also learn one speciality of the Thai

Language. Relationships are very important in Thailand and so are age
differences. This means that there are special words for older or
younger brothers and sisters.

Have a look at the following words which will be used in this lesson:

น ้องชาย (nóng chai) – younger brother

น ้องสาว (nóng săo) – younger sister
พีช
L าย (phî chai) – older brother
พีส
L าว (phî săo) – older sister

As you can probably guess,

พีL (phî) indicates 'older' and น ้อง (nóng) indicates 'younger'.

Prepositions
Some important prepositions are:
on (บน / bon)
in (ใน / nei)
under (ใต ้ / tâi).

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One important concept in Thai Grammar is the use of the

word อยู่ (yù) to indicate 'place'. So อยู่ (yù) is positioned in front of
prepositions if they indicate a place.

Look at this example:

เด็กทารก อยู่ ใน รถยนต์
dèk tha rók yù nai rót-yon
A baby in a car.

In the above sentence you notice that อยู่ (yù) is placed in front of the
preposition ใน (nai) in order to define where the baby is.

Questions
There are a few different ways to make questions in the Thai language,
let us discuss each of them below.

A) Using the general question words ไหม (măi) or หรือ (rŭe)

These words are question words which are just added at the end of the
sentence. Look at for instance:

คุณ สบาย ดี หรือ ครับ

khun sà-bai di rŭe khráp

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How are you?

Take note that the word ไหม (măi) or หรือ (rŭe) is placed before
the polite particle Krab (ครับ) for a man, and Ka (ค่ะ) for a woman.

B) You can also make questions by using specific question

words like what (อะไร / à-rai), where (ทีไL หน / thî năi), who (ใคร / krai) or
why (ทําไม/ tam-mai).

These question words are positioned after the verb in order to ask for a
specific thing.

However, the question word อะไร (à-rai) can also be placed at the
beginning of the question.

Have a look at this example:

อะไร อยู่ บน รูปภาพ
à-rai yù bon rûp phâp
What's in the picture?

The question word WHAT

ผู ้หญิง กําลัง ทํา อะไร อยู่

phû yĭng gam-lang tam à-rai yù

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What is the woman doing?

Please note that in this example กําลัง (gam-lang) indicates present tense
and that the word อยู่ (yù) is also used since the question asks for a
specific location.

The question word WHERE

Since being able to ask questions is really important, we will continue with
questions and focus on the question word where (ทีไL หน / thî năi) in this lesson.

Have a look at the following example:

เด็กผู ้ชาย อยู่ ทีไL หน

dèk phû chai yù thî năi
Where is the boy?

Just remember that the word อยู่ (yù) is also used since the question asks for a
specific location.

Classifiers
Have a look at the following example:

E ส ี อะไร
รถยนต์ คัน นัน

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rót-yon khan nán sĭ à-rai

What color is the car?

You probably wonder what (คัน นัน

E / khan nán) means.
คัน (khan) is a classifier noun. This is something particular in Thai (which does not
exist in English). Remember when I mentioned that some words in Thai do not
have equivalents in English? Yes, this one is an example.

Classifier nouns are used in questions, and are placed after numbers, or if you
E / nán).
refer to something specific like in this sentence (นัน

The classifier for car is คัน (khan) and that is why it is used in the above example.
Unfortunately, there are many different classifiers.

Common Classifiers:

The following list shows you the most common ones:

an อัน for small objects, things (in general)

chà-bàp ฉบับ for letters, newspapers
baan บาน for windows, doors, picture frames, mirrors
bai ใบ for round hollow objects , leaves
khan คัน for vehicles, umbrellas,cars
khon คน for a person, a child, human beings

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khuû คู่ for pairs of articles, forks and spoons

lam ลํา for boats, ships, aeroplanes
lêm เล่ม for books, candles, scissors
phŏn ผล for fruits
lûk ลูก for balls
tua ตัว for animals, insects, fish, tables and chairs, shirts, pants, coats, other living
creatures

Negative Statements

To give a sentence a negative meaning, just put the word นีใE ม่ (mâi)
or ใม่ไช ่ (mâi-châi) in front of verbs / adjective.

Example:
ั ท์ นีใE ม่ไช ่ สแ
โทรศพ ี ดง มันเป็ น สด
ี ํา
tho-rá-sàp ní mâi-châi sĭ daeng man pen sĭ dam
This telephone is not red, it's black.

Comparisons
How to make comparisons in the Thai language?

When we compare two things in Thai, normally it will come with the form "A +

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adjective + กว่า / kwà B". This means A is more than B.

Please take note of this:

กว่า / kwa always follows the adjectives that it describes.

Have a look at this examples:

ผู ้หญิง สวย กว่า ผู ้ชาย

phû yĭng sŭay kwà phû chai
The woman is more beautiful than the man.

Superlative Comparisons
You have just learned about using กว่า / kwà for comparisons.

กว่า / kwà - more/better etc.

Now will learn how to do superlative comparisons (most).

Just have a look at this example:

้ เป็ น สต
ชาง ั ว์ ทีL ใหญ่ ทีL สุด ใน ภาพ
cháng pen sàt thî yài thî sùt nai phâp
The elephant is the biggest animal in the picture.

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You can see that for 'biggest' in Thai, we use ใหญ่ ทีL สุด / yài thî
sùt whereas ใหญ่ / yài is the adjective (big) and ทีL สุด / thî sùt the suffix to make
it bigGEST.

Requests
How do you ask for something or make a request? This is very common, such as
in restaurants wherein we ask for a plate or a drink.

Look at this example:

กรุณา สง่ ชอนให
้ ้ ดิฉัน หน่อย
kà-rú-na sòng chón hâi dì-chăn nòi
Please pass me the spoon!

To make a polite request, there are two words used in the above example:

กรุณา (kà-rú-na) which starts the sentence and corresponds to the English
'please'. Then you can also add หน่อย (nòi) at the end of the sentence. Directly
translated หน่อย (nòi) means 'a little' and the purpose in questions is to make the
question sound more polite and cute.

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Numbers
Counting in Thai is very simple. After ten, the counting is repeatedly the same.
However what makes counting more tricky is that you use the classifier
system explained previously.

Have a look at this example:

เด็กผู ้ชาย มี ลูกบอล หนึงL ลูก
dèk phû chai mi lûk-bon nùeng lûk
The boy has one ball.

You can see that the number 1 (หนึงL / nùeng) is then followed by
the classifier for ball which is lûk.

In the following table you will see that the building of numbers follows a very
regular pattern (you will continuously learn more numbers in some of the
following lessons):

0 - sŭun - ศูนย์
1 - nùeng - หนึงL
2 - sŏng - สอง
3 - săm - สาม
4 - sì - ส ีL
5 - hâ - ห ้า
6 - hòk - หก

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7 - chèt - เจ็ด
8 - pàet - แปด
9 - kâo - เก ้า
ิ
10 - sìp - สบ
ิ เอ็ด
11 - sìp-èt - สบ
ิ สอง
12 - sìp-sŏng - สบ
ิ สาม
13 - sìp-săm - สบ
ิ ส ีL
14 - sìp-sì - สบ
ิ ห ้า
15 - sìp-hâ - สบ
ิ หก
16 - sìp-hòk - สบ
ิ เจ็ด
17 - sìp-chèt - สบ
ิ แปด
18 - sìp-pàet - สบ
ิ เก ้า
19 - sìp-kâo - สบ
20 - yîi-sìp - ยีส ิ
L บ
21 - yîi-sìp-èt - ยีส ิ เอ็ด
L บ
22 - yîi-sìp-sŏng - ยีส ิ สอง
L บ
ิ เอ็ด
31 - săm -sìp-èt - สามสบ
ีL บ
41 - sì-sìp-èt - สส ิ เอ็ด

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