Thai Language Self-Instruction DVD

The Thai language is a lot like Thai women, beautiful but often overly complex, somewhat tradition-bound, infuriatingly ambiguous and often far too polite to express what really needs to be said. 

The native Thai speaker who wants to learn English can choose from a wealth of self-study aids. The choices available to the English speaker who wants to learn Thai are modest at the beginning level, extremely limited at the intermediate level and nonexistent at an advanced level. The better resources are listed here.

Frustrated with the available materials, I decided to produce my own as a learning experience. The QuickTime movies below present only the Thai dialogue without subtitles. The DVD versions allow the student to select Thai or English language track with  optional subtitles in Thai, English, English transliteration or Thai and English transliteration together. 

With two language tracks and four optional subtitles, the student can tailor the lesson to individual needs.

	Language Track	Subtitles
	Thai	None
	English	English
		Thai
		Thai transliterated into Roman characters
		Thai & Thai transliterated into Roman characters

	Lesson 1   May I have the next dance? ไป เต้นรำ กัน ไหม ครับ Download "Shall we dance?"
Lesson 2 Would you care to have dinner with me? คุณ รังเกียจ ไป ทาน อาหารเย็น กับ ผม ไหม ครับ Download "Would you care to have dinner?"

This allows the student to customize the learning experience to his or her needs and to change the presentation as proficiency develops. A beginning student might display English transliteration subtitles initially, then switch to Thai as greater confidence is developed.

Thai Language resouces

A list of resources I've used and found helpful