Thai/Lao Language and the Term "Yuan"
Excerpted from the history book:"Thailand and the Southeast Asian networks of the Vietnamese revolution, 1885-1954", Christopher E. Goscha, parts of page 18.
...Catholics were not the only religious immigrants in Siam. Vietnamese Buddhists settled in Nang Loen village or 'Xom Kinh' (Vietnamese village). Located along the Kut Mai canal, not far from the Siamese royal grounds today. Nang Loen boasted hundreds of Vietnamese adherents at the turn of century, many of whom were married to Siamese or were the offspring of mixed marriages themselves. Of the 12 governing monks, two were expatriates from Indochina.
After World War II, this temple (and its senior Vietnamese monk) would serves as the headquarters for the Viet Minh's arms trade in Southeast Asia (see Chapter 5).
By the turn of the century, this coastal Vietnamese immigration moved in wards along the Chao Praya River. A few kilometres north of Samsen, for example, immigrants established a larger village at Ban Pho. By 1916, it reportedly had more than 1,000 dinizens. Further north, not far from the royal palace of Bang Pa In, Vietnamese Catholics formed a mission of 400 on the island of Koh Yai, while 700 to 800 others moved into neighboring Bang Pli Na, and yet another 300 went further to stake a claim in the village of Chao Chet.
Following the Chao Phraya's canals, another 300 Vietnamese built homes where their predecessors had resided in 17th century: Ayuthia. These waterways eventually carried them to the major commercial entrepôt of Paknampho, where Catholic fishmen built homes on an island at the confluence of the Mac Ping and Yom Rivers, which the Siamese called 'Koh Yuan' or the Vietnamese Island'.
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See related topic:
Language Vitality and the Ethnic Tourism Development of the Lao ...
...Apart from the Lao Yuan, all of these Lao ethnic groups migrated from Laos as prisoners of war more than 200 years ago....
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Northern Thai language - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Speakers of this language generally consider the name Yuan to be pejorative. They generally call themselves kon mueang (กนเมือง, [kon˧ mɯːəŋ˧]), Lannathai, or Northern Thai
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The term Yuan is still used for the distinctive Tai Tham script that Northern Thai uses, which is closely related to the old Tai Lue Script and the Lao religious alphabets.
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? They (Thai-Yuan) did not give reasons why the term "Yuan" is all of the sudden "pejorative".