Thailand

III

People and Society of Thailand

Thailand (known until 1939 as Siam) has never been heavily populated. In 1668 an Indian king was reported to have commented somewhat disparagingly to a Siamese visitor that “the King of Golconda is a king of men, while your king is only a king of the forests and the mosquitoes!” By the 1800s Thailand’s population remained low at 2,000,000, and by 1950 it had risen to only 20,041,628. By 2009 the total population had increased to 65,905,410, giving a population density of 129 persons per sq km (334 per sq mi), still one of the lowest in Asia.

Residents of cities are 32 percent of Thailand’s inhabitants. More than 10 percent is concentrated in Bangkok, where serious problems of overcrowding do exist. Since World War II, a significant number of rural Thai have moved from the countryside to cities in search of better economic opportunities. Many Thai people also have migrated abroad either on a permanent basis, mainly to the United States and Canada, or on a temporary one, as migrant laborers, to other Southeast Asian countries (such as Singapore) and to countries of the Middle East.

With an annual rate of population growth of 0.6 percent, Thailand’s population is expected to double in 113 years. However, family size is falling. The Thai have a long tradition of family planning and the use of contraception, which partly reflects the fact that women gain status through their ability to trade rather than through family size. In 2009 the birthrate was 13.4 births per 1,000 people, and the average number of children per woman was 1.6. The proportion of the Thai population that is elderly has grown in recent decades, with 9 percent of the population age 65 or older in 2009. This number is expected to reach 14 percent by 2025.

A

Principal Cities

Bangkok, known in Thai as Krung Thep (“City of Angels”), is Thailand’s capital and largest city, and it dominates the country politically and economically. A seaport located in the southern part of the central plain on the estuary of the Chao Phraya, it became the capital of Siam in 1782, following Thon Buri, which was the capital from 1767 to 1782, and Ayutthaya (1351-1767). Bangkok is a vibrant city, in which the old blends with the new. Within the city, traditional, multicolored temples (wat) and royal palaces are dwarfed by modern skyscrapers. Bangkok suffers from notorious traffic congestion, annual flooding, and severe air pollution. Migration to Bangkok from north and northeast Thailand has swelled the city’s population.

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Other important Thai cities include Nakhon Ratchasima, an industrial city in east Thailand; Nonthaburi, a suburb of Bangkok; Chiang Mai, the largest city in the northern mountains; and Songkhla, a coastal city in the southern peninsula. Chiang Mai and Songkhla are noted for their tourist attractions.

B

Ethnic Groups

Although the majority of Thailand’s people (about 75 percent) are classified as Thai, the country has a complex ethnic composition. The Thai themselves vary considerably, with those of the central plain differing markedly in culture and language from those of the north and northeast, known as the Lao. Many Thai have some Chinese ancestry, and Chinese constitute the largest single minority group in the country (about 14 percent of the total population).

The mountains of northern Thailand are home to a number of different hill peoples, including the Akha, the Hmong (also known as the Meo or Miao), the Karen, and the Lua’. Most of these peoples practice slash-and-burn agriculture. Many produce dry hill (or upland) rice, and some, such as the Hmong, produce opium. Farther south are populations of Mon people as well as groups of Khmer (Cambodian) and Vietnamese refugees. The southern peninsula is home to ethnic Malays.

C

Language

Thailand’s official language is standard Thai, formerly known as Siamese, which is spoken by about 40 percent of the population. Thai is the predominant member of the Tai family of languages, which includes about 60 languages spoken throughout Southeast Asia. The Tai languages are difficult to place linguistically but usually are linked to either the Sino-Tibetan or Austronesian language families. Standard Thai is written in the Thai alphabet, derived from the Indian Devanagari script, and is characterized by the use of five tones. A strong Thai literary tradition goes back to the 13th century.

Another 50 percent of Thailand’s population speak Tai languages other than Thai, such as Lao, spoken in the northeast. Most educated Thai speak English, and Chinese is also widely used. English, Chinese, and Japanese are often the languages of commerce. The Mon-Khmer family of languages is represented both among the hill peoples of the north and in lowland groups of Mon and Khmer peoples. Some Malay is spoken in the south.

D

Religion

Theravada Buddhism is the prevailing religion in Thailand, with about 95 percent of the Thai majority being Theravada Buddhist. Theravada is a school of Buddhist belief that spread to Thailand beginning in the 13th century, primarily via Sri Lanka. Thailand’s most characteristic architectural feature is the wat, the Thai Buddhist temple, of which there are an estimated 18,000. Nearly all Thai men enter a Buddhist monastery for at least a few days or months.

Despite the predominance of Buddhism, Thai religion is highly syncretic, meaning that it combines different systems of religious practice and belief. Many Buddhist ceremonies include elements of animism (worship of objects and phenomena of nature), Hinduism, and even Christianity. Small Muslim groups, comprising about 7 percent of the population, are found throughout the country, especially in the southern peninsula (see Islam). Some hill peoples, including members of the Karen, are Roman Catholic, while missionaries from Europe and North America have converted others to Protestantism. Very few ethnic Thai have converted to Western religions.

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