The Five Tones of Thai

Thai is a tonal language: the pitch of a syllable belongs to the word just as much as its consonants and vowels do. Say ขาว (khǎao) with a rising voice and you have said "white"; say ข่าว (khàao) low and level and you have said "news". Standard Thai, the Central Thai of Bangkok, schools and television, has five tones.

Romanisation used here: long vowels are doubled (aa, ii, ɔɔ) and the tone is marked on the first vowel letter - mid unmarked, low à, falling â, high á, rising ǎ; ph, th, kh are aspirated (with a puff of air, as in "pin"), p, t, k are not (as in "spin"), and j stands for จ.

The five tones

Thai children practise tones with tongue-twisters. A favourite is ไม้ใหม่ไม่ไหม้ใช่ไหม? (máai mài mâi mâi châi mǎi): "New wood does not burn, does it?" It packs five different words pronounced mai, plus ใช่ (châi, right), into one breath. Two of the five, ไม่ (not) and ไหม้ (to burn), share the falling tone, and the spelling is what tells them apart; the others are high, low and rising, and ไม้ is said with a long vowel even though it is spelled short.

How the script shows the tone

Thai writing tells you the tone, but not with one symbol per tone. Three things combine: the class of the first consonant (middle, high or low), the tone mark above it if there is one, and whether the syllable is live (it ends in a long vowel or in m, n, ng, w, y) or dead (it ends in a short vowel or in p, t, k).

The last two marks are written almost exclusively on middle-class consonants. A silent ห in front of a low-class ง, ญ, น, ม, ย, ร, ล or ว moves the syllable into the high class: หมา (mǎa, dog) against มา (maa, to come), and ใหม่ (mài, new), low, against ไม่ (mâi, not), falling.

For English speakers

English uses pitch for attitude: a rising "yes?" asks, a falling "yes." settles it, a high "yes!" is delighted. Thai keeps each word's tone whatever your mood, so the job is to stop your English melody from overriding it. The commonest trap is the question: in English your voice climbs at the end, but in Thai the question is carried by a word such as ไหม (mǎi), and that word has its own rising tone. Lift the last syllable of อร่อยไหม? the English way and you blur it. Vowel length matters just as much: ข้าว (khâao) is rice, เข้า (khâo) is to enter. Aspiration is the third contrast English speakers hear late: ไป (pai, to go) has the unaspirated p of "spin", ไพ่ (phâi, playing cards) the breathy p of "pin".

Mistakes English speakers make

• Saying ใกล้ (klâi, near) and ไกล (klai, far) on the same pitch. They differ by tone alone, and a taxi driver will take the one you said.
• Reading the marks as tone names. The mark ่ is called "the first mark", not "low tone": on a low-class consonant it gives a falling tone, as in ไม่ (mâi) and ค่า (khâa).
• Shopping for a shirt and asking for a tiger: เสื้อ (sʉ̂a) is a shirt, เสือ (sʉ̌a) a tiger, เสื่อ (sʉ̀a) a sleeping mat.
• Expecting the dictionary tone in fast speech. Some very common words drift: เขา (khǎo) is usually said kháo, and ไหม often becomes mái. Learn the dictionary tone first; the drift comes with listening.