A Boutique Thai Language School
ALPHABET COMPARISON
SAMPLES
There are many Thai to English transcription/transliteration systems (romanisation). To see the big picture, besides our ThaiToYou Karaoke Code, we selected other 7 systems/sources with various targets, concepts, or methods as follows:
๑.
ThaiToYou Karaoke Code
Integrated the common Thai people’s transcription with the linguistic approach to achieve both pronunciation and written communication. Read more...
๒.
Royal Thai General System of Transcription (RTGS)
The official Thai transcription used in road signs, place names, and other public spaces. Read more...
๓.
Paiboon
Used in all Thai language learning materials published by Paiboon Publishing, popular among foreigners and Thai tutors.
๔.
The Practical Thai Language Proficiency Test
Hosted by Thai Proficiency Test Association in Japan, popular among the Japanese.
๕.
Thai Reference Grammar
“Thai Reference Grammar: The Structure of Spoken Thai” by James Higbie & Snea Tinson (Reprinted 2014 Edition) is a famous Thai language learning book with the transliteration system that uses symbols and marks to “visualise” tones and vowel lengths.
๖.
“Teach Yourself Thai” by David Smyth
The romanisation system in this book was developed from the English pronunciation making it easy for English speakers to read the transcription and pronounce the words naturally.
๗.
Pasa Karaoke in GMM Grammy’s Karaoke music videos
In Thai entertainment industry, Karaoke music videos display lyrics in both Thai alphabet and romanisation for sing-along purpose. This is why Thai people usually call the Thai-to English transcription “Pasa Karaoke”.
๘.
Common Thai people’s Pasa Karaoke
As seen in names, family names, proper nouns, messages and texts on webboards and social media.
ALPHABET COMPARISON TABLE
From the comparison table, you will see that our ThaiToYou Karaoke Code does not look too different from others.
Moreover, besides using it for pronunciation, you can also write these same words of Karaoke Code to communicate with most Thai people in daily life.
For those who are using other systems or read and write Thai script well already, this Karaoke Code is still very useful to you. Just a quick look or skimming through it in our lessons, you will get more familiar with Thai way of transcription. You then can read names and signs as well as chat with Thai people more easily and more integrated with the Thai community and culture.