THAI LANGUAGE MOD.1

Mandatory course of the B.A. program in Languages, Cultures and Societies of Asia and North Africa with Southeast Asia.

Formative objectives are within the area of language, cultural and humanistic skills learning.

Knowledge and understanding:

- Basics of Thai language, spoken and written
- Cultural notions that are related to the learning of a foreign language

Applying knowledge and understanding:

- Engage in conversations at a basic level
- Comply to cultural norms in conversations at a basic level
- Identify basic grammatical categories and their properties

Basic Level (A1) of the CEFR: “Can understand and use familiar everyday expressions and very basic phrases aimed at the satisfaction of needs of a concrete type. Can introduce themselves and others and can ask and answer questions about personal details such as where they live, people they know and things they have. Can interact in a simple way provided the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.”

Interest in Thai language and culture.

Every week, students will be introduced to new grammatical elements, such as a phonetic system for the transcription of Thai into the Roman alphabet, writing, reading, syntax and tones at a basic level.

Mandatory:

Yuphaphan Hoongchamlong. 2007. Thai Language and Culture for Beginners 1. Distrubuted by University of Hawai’i Press

Further readings:

Smyth, D. 2002. Thai: An Essential Grammar. London and New York: Routledge

or:

Songkran Bunjarat e Sabattini, Mario. 2017. Grammatica essenziale della lingua thai. Venezia: Libreria Editrice Cafoscarina

The course teachers may provide other materials either in person or via Moodle.

There will be two different exams, respectively, for students of Thai as a first language (those enrolled to the Southeast Asia curriculum) and students of Thai as a second language (those enrolled to other curricula).

THAI AS FIRST LANGUAGE

The exam will comprise two tests: written and oral.

Written test: 15 questions (in Thai) and one translation from Thai to Italian. This test will take 60 minutes altogether and will not require a dictionary.

Oral test: conversation for a length of approximately 10 minutes.

The final mark will be the average of the two tests’ scores.

THAI AS SECOND LANGUAGE

Oral exam only, featuring a conversation and a reading comprehension for a length of approximately 15 minutes.

Frontal teaching and exercises.

Italian

written and oral