On Fri, 18 Jun 2004 13:50:53 -0400, Peter T. Daniels
<grammatim@...> wrote:

> There really was a reason, long ago, why "dictionary pronunciations"
> assigned the labels "long" and "short" to the vowels the way they did,
> but those uses for quality-of-vowel aren't used in linguistics; "long"
> and "short" to us really do refer to the durations of segments.

Just the sort of information I have been hoping to encounter for many
years; it's much appreciated.

I do hope that dilettante queries aren't straining the graces of the
experts! My linguistic posts are becoming a serious distraction; I'll be
considering joining CONLANG-L, but I lost the message; will ask for a
repeat-send off-list.

> In Finnish (ObQalam) they make it easy for you by actually writing two
> vowels or two consonants when they want you to pronounce them long.

ObQalam? You really pique my curiosity!

I assume double consonants in Finnish are repeated, as in Italian?

Many thanks, Peter.

--
Nicholas Bodley /*|*\ Waltham, Mass.
who recently discovered that there are several homophone checkers
available, at least one actually affordable on a low budget.
Opera 7.5 (Build 3778), using M2