Taek-taek took-took: Feeling embarrassed but not showing it on your face. Kathaeng: A brook that's swollen in the monsoon season, but which dries up when the rains stop. Kathai: A bamboo basket used to hold offerings for ancestral spirit
These words form part of the unusual lexicon of the Chong, a small ethnic minority group in southeastern Thailand. Traditionally hunter-gatherers, the tribe has turned to cultivating fruit as newly built roads have made the towns more approachable. But as they bump up against the forces of modernity and the dominant, unifying Thai culture, their language may face a slow death. Should that happen, the Chong's unique world view, local wisdom and rich culture would also get buried.
What the researchers here are doing to stop the Chong language's demise could form a template for Thailand's ethnic minority groups to survive the inexorable march of globalization.