As I’m sure most of you know by now, pronouns such as ผม /pǒm/ and ฉัน /chǎn/ are used by males and females, respectively, as the word “I”. We also use the pronouns พี่ /pîi/ and น้อง /nɔ́ɔng/ for older and younger sibling and พ่อ /pɔ̂ɔ/ and แม่ /mɛ̂ɛ/ for father and mother. These should not be new to you.

However, quite often in Thai when one person is referring to him or herself, or when referring to someone else, these pronouns (and others) get used differently than the way we are used to in English.

Wanna find out how?

Let’s take, for example, a mother speaking to her young child. Most of the time the mother will not use ฉัน when referring to herself, she will use แม่. This helps the child to learn to say แม่. We do the same thing to an extent in English. Often the mother and father will refer to themselves as พ่อ and แม่ when talking to each other as well.

If a mother is trying to teach her male child to speak, however, she will use the word ผม so the male child understands that he needs to use ผม when he speaks.

When a younger sibling is speaking to an older sibling, she will typically use พี่ instead of the older siblings first name. The reverse is true for an older sibling speaking to a younger one, and often the older sibling will use พี่ instead of the word “I” as well.

Among females, they will often use their female friend’s first name or nickname instead of saying the word คุณ /kun/. It almost sounds like they are speaking to someone in the third person. It’s weird at first, but you get used to it.

Those are just a few quick tips for deciphering some pronoun usage. Hopefully this will help ease the confusion a bit.