The Language and Thainess of Thai Food Products on an E-Commerce Platform

Abstract

The term ‘food products from Thailand’ was searched on the biggest e-commerce platform, Amazon. 140 Thai food products from Thailand were presented and fell into four categories: rice products (2), canned and instant food (19), snacks and candies (35), and food ingredients and seasonings (84); and 29 Thai food products from other countries were also found in three categories: rice products (6), canned and instant food (6), and food ingredients and seasonings (17). Thai brand names were the most found (53.52%) followed by English brand names (29.58%). In terms of language patterns, English dominance showed in the use of Thai-English (50.01%) together with the use of English only (23.26%) and English-Chinese (1.16%). Thainess was mostly presented with pictures of Thai food dish along with fresh vegetables, herbs, and spices (86.73%). Notably, certain food products with clear and transparent plastic packaging were presented without any pictures, but the products themselves. Although rice is one of the major food exports from Thailand, only 2 brand names of rice products from Thailand were found compared to 6 brands of rice products from other countries. Notably, a name of Thai place was found in a food product exported from other country.