บอกว่า

Reporting What Someone Said

Level 3

Report What Was Said
บอก means tell or inform here, and ว่า introduces the reported content. In เขาบอกว่าจะมาพรุ่งนี้, the report concerns coming tomorrow; it does not verify that the person comes.

How It Works

1. Read the Reported Content
In เขาบอกว่าจะมาพรุ่งนี้, บอกว่า introduces the prospective coming, with จะ and พรุ่งนี้ supplying will and tomorrow. The English past-tense said is a selected reading, not a past-tense ending on บอก. ว่า functions as a clause linker here, not the demonstrative that.

2. Identify the Understood Person
The displayed report does not repeat เขา before จะ. Its translation reads that person as the one who will come. Context must supply that reference; the person narrating the report need not be that person. Compare leaving a pronoun out without claiming that repeated pronouns are always less natural.

3. Keep the Clause Meaning
แม่บอกว่าหิวข้าวแล้ว reports hunger already present, while เพื่อนบอกว่าไม่ชอบกินเผ็ด reports not liking spicy food. Adding เขา and แล้ว to a report can change its explicit reference and aspect; these words are not Thai past-tense inflections. Reporting does not require copying every original word or freezing every time reference.

4. Compare the Requested Instruction
The task requesting told me to go uses บอกให้. The displayed บอกว่าไปตลาด instead introduces a report about going to the market, with an understood person and time. That report can be meaningful; ว่า is not forbidden before every report containing an instruction.

5. Read Complete Recipient Constructions
A recipient can be expressed after บอก in a complete report. Read กับ and ให้ in their own full constructions rather than treating one gloss as a universal recipient rule. This entry does not ban every ให้ construction or assign บอกว่า and พูดว่า to mutually exclusive uses.

6. Reports Are Not Verification
พยากรณ์อากาศบอกว่าวันนี้ฝนจะตก attributes a prediction to the weather forecast. It does not establish that rain occurs. Likewise, read the linked thought, question and knowing constructions in context; a grammar label alone is not proof that a reported belief or claimed knowledge is true.

Examples (4)

  1. เขาบอกว่าจะมาพรุ่งนี้

    He said he would come tomorrow.

    Word by Word: he / tell / clause linker / will / come / tomorrow

    No subject is written between ว่า and จะ. This reading takes the person referred to by เขา as the one coming; that reference requires context. จะ and พรุ่งนี้ remain represented, without proving the planned arrival occurs.

  2. แม่บอกว่าหิวข้าวแล้ว

    Mom said she was already hungry.

    Word by Word: Mom / tell / clause linker / hungry (หิวข้าว) / already

    Read หิวข้าว together as hungry in this sentence and แล้ว as already in the reported state. The translation selects Mom as the understood experiencer and a past English report; it does not verify her physical state or the exact words of an earlier utterance.

  3. เพื่อนบอกว่าไม่ชอบกินเผ็ด

    My friend said they did not like eating spicy food.

    Word by Word: friend / tell / clause linker / not / like / eat / spicy

    ไม่ negates ชอบ in the reported preference. The English they refers to the one friend in this reading, without specifying gender; my is contextually supplied. The written report does not establish an original quotation or verify the preference.

  4. พยากรณ์อากาศบอกว่าวันนี้ฝนจะตก

    The weather forecast says it will rain today.

    Word by Word: weather forecast / tell / clause linker / today / rain / will / fall

    The forecast is the information source. วันนี้ supplies today and จะ presents the prospective rain. The sentence reports the prediction rather than verifying its outcome.

Common Mistakes

  • Using a statement report for the requested instruction to go.

    เขาบอกว่าไปตลาด (when meaning 'He told me to go')
    เขาบอกให้ไปตลาด

    For the task meaning he told me to go to the market, use เขาบอกให้ไปตลาด with the instructed person understood. The retained เขาบอกว่าไปตลาด introduces reported content about going instead. It is not universally ungrammatical, and this comparison does not ban ว่า from every report of a directive.

  • Adding an explicit subject and แล้ว when the task requests the bare-hunger report.

    เขาบอกว่าเขาหิวแล้ว (when reporting a past event by adding extra past markers)
    เขาบอกว่าหิว

    For this comparison, the requested report is เขาบอกว่าหิว. The retained alternative เขาบอกว่าเขาหิวแล้ว explicitly adds เขา and แล้ว and can meaningfully report that he is already hungry. Its historical English annotation about adding extra past markers is not endorsed: neither เขา nor แล้ว is a past-tense inflection. This task compares the requested content, not grammatical versus impossible Thai.

  • Leaving out ว่า from the explicitly requested บอกว่า construction.

    เขาบอกเขาจะไป
    เขาบอกว่าจะไป

    For this task, use เขาบอกว่าจะไป, retaining ว่า before จะไป. The retained เขาบอกเขาจะไป omits the requested linker. This exercise does not establish that ว่า is obligatory in every spoken report or that Thai and English clause linkers have identical omission rules.

How It Connects

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

บอกว่าLevel 3Reporting What Someone Said

Learn This First

To understand 'บอกว่า' (said that), you first need to understand how 'ว่า' functions as a linker for clauses. Because this pattern involves reporting what someone else said, you should also be comfortable with basic Thai word order and how pronouns are used, as Thai reported speech typically retains the original pronouns used by the speaker.

Words in This Pattern

บอกว่าบอกว่า