Question Words In Their Sentence Roles

Level 1

Ask About A Sentence Part
In คุณกินอะไร?, อะไร asks about the object after กิน. In ใครมา?, ใคร is the subject before มา. In ห้องน้ำอยู่ที่ไหน?, ที่ไหน asks about the location. Read the whole pattern rather than moving every question word to one fixed position.

How It Works

Subject And Object
คุณกินอะไร? asks what the listener eats or is eating: อะไร occupies the object position after กิน. ใครมา? asks who comes or is coming: ใคร is the subject before มา. The Thai verbs in these examples do not change their endings to match English tense.

Place, Item And Time
ห้องน้ำอยู่ที่ไหน? asks where the bathroom is. คุณชอบอันไหน? asks which item the listener likes; อันไหน contains the item classifier อัน followed by ไหน. เขาไปเมื่อไหร่? asks when he goes; the situation determines whether English needs a past, present or future interpretation.

Other Positions
Time and reason questions also have other sentence patterns. The placement of เมื่อไหร่ or ทำไม alone does not establish impatience, annoyance or accusation. Read the words and their surrounding situation together.

What Or Anything?
คุณกินอะไร? asks what the listener eats. คุณกินอะไรไหม? can instead ask whether the listener eats or is eating anything. The latter has a different intended question, rather than being an impossible combination of อะไร and ไหม. In the second exercise, choose the version asking what is being eaten.

Read The Written Question
The first exercise practices the ordinary object-question pattern คุณกินอะไร?. The examples teach written word roles. Read the separate Yes-No Questions and Confirmation Questions entries for their own contexts.

Examples (5)

  1. คุณกินอะไร?

    What are you eating?

    Word by Word: you | eat | what

    อะไร is the object of กิน here. The question asks what is being eaten; the natural translation uses a current eating context.

  2. ใครมา?

    Who is coming?

    Word by Word: who | come

    ใคร is the subject before มา. The question asks which person comes; context supplies the time.

  3. ห้องน้ำอยู่ที่ไหน?

    Where is the bathroom?

    Word by Word: bathroom | be located | where

    ที่ไหน asks about the location after อยู่. ห้องน้ำ identifies what is being located.

  4. คุณชอบอันไหน?

    Which one do you like?

    Word by Word: you | like | item | which

    อันไหน asks which item. The phrase follows ชอบ as what the listener likes.

  5. เขาไปเมื่อไหร่?

    When is he going?

    Word by Word: he | go | when

    เมื่อไหร่ asks the time after ไป in this sentence. The natural English uses a planned-going context; the written Thai itself does not mark a specific tense.

Common Mistakes

  • Use The Ordinary Object-Question Pattern

    อะไรคุณกิน?
    คุณกินอะไร?

    For the ordinary question what are you eating in this task, choose คุณกินอะไร?: subject คุณ, verb กิน, object question อะไร. The isolated alternative อะไรคุณกิน? does not present that ordinary pattern. This comparison does not judge every possible context of a fronted question expression.

  • Ask What Is Eaten, Rather Than Whether Anything Is Eaten

    คุณกินอะไรไหม?
    คุณกินอะไร?

    For the intended question what are you eating, choose คุณกินอะไร?. คุณกินอะไรไหม? can mean are you eating anything, a different question. อะไร and ไหม are therefore not universally incompatible.

How It Connects

Tap a pattern to see what it builds on and what it leads to.

Question Words In Their Sentence RolesLevel 1

Learn This First

To understand how Thai question words work, you first need to be comfortable with the basic Subject-Verb-Object sentence structure. Since Thai is a 'wh-in-situ' language, you simply swap the specific information (like the object) for a question word without changing the word order or conjugating the verb.

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Patterns that build on this one.

Words in This Pattern

ใครที่ไหนเมื่อไหร่เมื่อไหร่เมื่อไรทำไมทำไมอย่างไรอย่างไร