Interesting (translated) Literature on Thai Philosophers and Thai Philosophy?

[u/Key-Opening7133]

I’m looking for literature about Thai philosophers and philosophical thought in Thailand, both contemporary and historical are welcome.

[u/AquaTheAdmiral]

Hey, happy to help, but just to clarify: are you interested in more ‘modern’ Thai philosophy as a subject (i.e. Thai thinkers engaging with Western analytical/continental philosophy) or more ‘traditional’ religious (Buddhist or otherwise) schools of thought? For the former, I’d take a look at the translated works of Sulak Sivaraksa, who’s probably the most influential figure engaging Thai thought with modern philosophy to start off with. For the latter, it’s a bit tougher as I’m not sure how interested you would be in reading the scripture itself (speaking from experience, it is a bit dry). Unfortunately there isn’t a lot of stuff out there in English yet. In the academic world, I think there’s starting to be a movement towards conceptualising Thai thought on its own terms (for most of the past one hundred years, it’s been subject to the conventional idea of a clean transmission from India/China —> Thailand, but a lot of global historians have started to subtly challenge this), but we’ve still got a while to go.