HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

There are many systems for the romanization of the Thai language, i.e. representing the language in Latin script. These include systems of transliteration, and transcription. The most seen system in public space is
Royal Thai General System of Transcription The Royal Thai General System of Transcription (RTGS) is the official system for rendering Thai words in the Latin alphabet. It was published by the Royal Institute of Thailand. It is used in road signs and government publications and is the clo ...
(RTGS)—the official scheme promulgated by the Royal Thai Institute. It is based on spoken Thai, but disregards tone, vowel length and a few minor sound distinctions. The international standard
ISO 11940 ISO 11940 is an ISO standard for the transliteration of Thai characters, published in 1998 and updated in September 2003 and confirmed in 2008. An extension to this standard named ISO 11940-2 defines a simplified transcription based on it. Cons ...
is a transliteration system, preserving all aspects of written Thai adding diacritics to the Roman letters. Its extension
ISO 11940-2 ISO 11940-2 is an ISO standard for a simplified transcription of the Thai language into Latin characters. The full standard includes pronunciation rules and conversion tables of Thai consonants and vowels. It is a sequel to , describing a way to ...
defines a simplified transcription reflecting the spoken language. It is almost identical to RTGS. Libraries in English-speaking countries use the
ALA-LC Romanization ALA-LC (American Library AssociationLibrary of Congress) is a set of standards for romanization, the representation of text in other writing systems using the Latin script. Applications The system is used to represent bibliographic information by ...
. In practice, often non-standard and inconsistent romanizations are used, especially for proper nouns and personal names. This is reflected, for example, in the name Suvarnabhumi Airport, which is spelled based on direct transliteration of the name's Sanskrit root. Language learning books often use their own proprietary systems, none of which are used in Thai public space.


Transliteration

An international standard,
ISO 11940 ISO 11940 is an ISO standard for the transliteration of Thai characters, published in 1998 and updated in September 2003 and confirmed in 2008. An extension to this standard named ISO 11940-2 defines a simplified transcription based on it. Cons ...
, was devised with transliteration in academic context as one of its main goals. It is based on Thai orthography, and defines a reversible transliteration by means of adding a host of diacritics to the Latin letters. The result bears little resemblance to the pronunciation of the words and is hardly ever seen in public space. Some scholars use the Cœdès system for Thai transliteration defined by Georges Cœdès, in the version published by his student Uraisi Varasarin. In this system, the same transliteration is proposed for Thai and Khmer whenever possible.


Transcription

The Royal Thai System of Transcription, usually referred to as RTGS uses only unadorned Roman letters to reflect spoken Thai. It does not indicate tone and vowel length. Furthermore it merges International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) /o/ and /ɔ/ into and IPA /tɕ/ and /tɕʰ/ into . This system is widely used in Thailand, especially for road signs. The ISO standard ISO 11940-2 defines a set of rules to transform the result of ISO 11940 into a simplified transcription. In the process, it rearranges the letters to correspond to Thai pronunciation, but it discards information about vowel length and syllable tone and the distinction between IPA /o/ and /ɔ/. These are not reversible, as they do not indicate tone and underrepresent vowel quality and quantity. Graphemic distinctions between letters for Indic voiced, voiceless, and breathy-voiced consonants have also been neutralised.


History


American missionary romanization

In 1842, Mission Press in Bangkok published two pamphlets on transliteration: One for transcribing Greek and Hebrew names into Thai, and the other, "A plan for Romanising the Siamese Language". The principle underlying the transcription scheme was phonetic, i.e. it represented pronunciation, rather than etymology, but also maintained some of the features of Thai orthography. Several diacritics were used: The
acute accent The acute accent (), , is a diacritic used in many modern written languages with alphabets based on the Latin, Cyrillic, and Greek scripts. For the most commonly encountered uses of the accent in the Latin and Greek alphabets, precomposed cha ...
was used to indicate
long vowels In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, ...
, where Thai script had two different vowel signs for the vowel sounds: อิ was transliterated as ''i'', while อี was transliterated as ''í''. The exception to this rule was the signs for อึ was transliterated as ''ŭ'', while อื was transliterated as ''ü''. The various signs for were transliterated as ë. The
grave accent The grave accent () ( or ) is a diacritical mark used to varying degrees in French, Dutch, Portuguese, Italian and many other western European languages, as well as for a few unusual uses in English. It is also used in other languages usin ...
was used to indicate other vowels: was transliterated as ''ò'', while became ''è''. ะ was transliterated with a hyphen, so that กะ became ''ka-'', and แกะ became ''kè-''.
Aspirated consonant In phonetics, aspiration is the strong burst of breath that accompanies either the release or, in the case of preaspiration, the closure of some obstruents. In English, aspirated consonants are allophones in complementary distribution with t ...
s were indicated by the use of an
apostrophe The apostrophe ( or ) is a punctuation mark, and sometimes a diacritical mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes: * The marking of the omission of one o ...
: บ ''b'' ป ''p'' and พ ''p’'' ʰ This included separating the affricates จ ''ch'' ͡ɕand ช ''ch’'' ͡ɕʰ


Proposed system by the Siamese society

For many years, the
Siam Society The Siam Society Under Royal Patronage ( th, สยามสมาคมในพระบรมราชูปถัมภ์) was established in 1904 with a mission to promote knowledge of the culture, history, arts, and natural sciences of Thai ...
was discussing a uniform way in which to transliterate Thai using Latin script. Numerous schemes were created by its individual members and published in its journal, including one tentative scheme by King
Rama VI Vajiravudh ( th, วชิราวุธ, , 1 January 188126 November 1925) was the sixth monarch of Siam under the Chakri dynasty as Rama VI. He ruled from 23 October 1910 until his death in 1925. King Vajiravudh is best known for his efforts ...
, published in 1913. The same year, the society published a proposal for "transliterating Siamese words", which had been designed by several of its members working together. The system was dual, in that it separated Sanskrit and
Pali Pali () is a Middle Indo-Aryan liturgical language native to the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pāli Canon'' or '' Tipiṭaka'' as well as the sacred language of ''Theravāda'' Buddhi ...
loans, which were to be transliterated according to the Hunterian system, however, an exception was made for those words which had become so integrated into Thai that their Sanskrit and Pali roots had been forgotten. For proper Thai words, the system is somewhat similar to the present RTGS, for instance with regards to the differentiation of consonants' initial and final sounds. Some of the major differences are: *Aspiration would be marked with '' spiritus asper'' placed ''after'' the consonant, so that ข and ค would both be transliterated as k῾ (whereas RTGS transliterates them as ''kh''). *Long vowels were indicated by adding a macron to the corresponding sign for the short vowel. *The vowels อึ and อื ( and �ː would be transliterated using an umlauted ''u'', respectively ''ü'' and ''ǖ'' (the macron is placed ''above'' the umlaut). *The vowel แอ would be transliterated as ''ë'', whereas RTGS transliterates it as ''ae''. *When ะ indicates a shortened vowel, it would be indicated with the letter ''ḥ'', so that แอะ would be transliterated as ''ëḥ''. *The vowel ออ �ː would be distinguished from โอ with a superscript ''v'': ''ǒ''. Its corresponding short form เอาะ would be transliterated as ''ǒḥ''. *The vowel เออ would be transliterated as ''ö''. As the system was meant to provide an easy reference for the European who was not familiar with the Thai language, the system aimed at only using a single symbol to represent each distinct sound. Similarly, tones were not marked, as it was felt that the "learned speaker" would be so familiar with the Thai script, as to not need a transliteration scheme to find the proper pronunciation. King Vajiravudh, however, was not pleased with the system, contending that when different consonants were used in the final position, it was because they represented different sounds, such that a final -ล would, by an ''educated'' speaker, be pronounced differently from a final -น. He also opposed using a phonetic Thai spelling for ''any'' word of Sanskrit or Pali origin, arguing that these should be transliterated in their Indic forms, so as to preserve their etymology. While most of Vajiravudh's criticisms focused on the needs and abilities of ''learned readers'', he argued against the use of ''spiritus asper'' to indicate aspiration, as it would mean "absolutely nothing to the lay reader".


See also

*
ISO 11940 ISO 11940 is an ISO standard for the transliteration of Thai characters, published in 1998 and updated in September 2003 and confirmed in 2008. An extension to this standard named ISO 11940-2 defines a simplified transcription based on it. Cons ...
*
ISO 11940-2 ISO 11940-2 is an ISO standard for a simplified transcription of the Thai language into Latin characters. The full standard includes pronunciation rules and conversion tables of Thai consonants and vowels. It is a sequel to , describing a way to ...
*
Romanization of Lao Lao romanization systems are transcriptions of the Lao script into the Latin alphabet. Tables Consonants The table below shows the Lao consonant letters and their transcriptions according to IPA ( International Phonetic Alphabet,) BGN/PCG ...
*
Royal Thai General System of Transcription The Royal Thai General System of Transcription (RTGS) is the official system for rendering Thai words in the Latin alphabet. It was published by the Royal Institute of Thailand. It is used in road signs and government publications and is the clo ...


References


Further reading

* * Kanchanawan, N. (2006)
"Romanization, Transliteration, and Transcription for the Globalization of the Thai Language"
''The Journal of the Royal Institute of Thailand, 31''(3), 832-841. * * *


External links


Automatic Thai Romanization generator
(including RTGS, ALA-LC and
IPA IPA commonly refers to: * India pale ale, a style of beer * International Phonetic Alphabet, a system of phonetic notation * Isopropyl alcohol, a chemical compound IPA may also refer to: Organizations International * Insolvency Practitioners A ...
) at thai-language.com {{Romanization