The Thai education system: principles, organisation and school calendar
Twelve years of free basic education, nine years of compulsory schooling, fifteen years of free education if pre-school is included: the figures that…
Understand 11 min read
Period
Contemporary Thailand
- Dates
- 1932 –
Articles
Elephants and mahouts in Thailand: a shared history, from warfare to tourist camps
A man seated on an elephant's neck, guiding it with his voice and his knee: the scene seems timeless. Yet it sums up at least seven centuries of…
Understand 14 min read
The Thai Sangha: the history and organisation of a monastic community
More than forty-four thousand registered temples, and several hundred thousand monks and novices depending on the period: the Thai Sangha is an…
Understand 14 min read
Thailand's mangroves: a forest between land and sea, from collapse to recovery
Neither wholly terrestrial nor wholly marine, the mangrove fringes the estuaries and muddy shores of Thailand, from the upper reaches of the Gulf to…
Understand 14 min read
'Thainess': the history of a national identity constructed, imposed and contested
In official speeches, at school and in public debate, *khwam pen thai*, 'Thainess', literally 'the fact of being Thai', is taken as self-evident. Yet…
Understand 14 min read
Behind the Masks of Phi Ta Khon: What Dan Sai Really Celebrates
Every year, at the end of June or the beginning of July, Dan Sai, a small town in Loei province in north-eastern Thailand, fills with round-eyed…
Understand 13 min read
Patpong, between spy legends, the Vietnam War and nightlife: what do we really know?
In 1946, a family of Hainanese origin bought an outlying plot of land between Silom and Surawong. Within a few decades, Patpong had become Bangkok's…
Understand 9 min read