SS/PS question

[Geoff Bannister]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "Carol" <justcarol67 at ...> wrote:

Carol:  
> I'm wondering whether the terms long vowel and short vowel are used
> differently in Britain than they are in the U.S.
> 
> I'll do a table to see whether we agree:
> 
>     Long     Short
> 
> A   ate      at
> E   Pete     pet
> I   I        it
> O   hoe      hot
> U   huge     hug
> 
> Does that match the British conception? And to show that a long vowel
> doesn't necessairly indicate stress, wouldn't you pronounce "identity"
> as "i DEHN tuh tee," with a long "i" (pronounced "eye") but the stress
> on the second syllable, in which the vowel is short (pronounced
> exactly like the word "den"?

Geoff:
This is a difficult area to indicate what we mean. In general, I would 
tend to agree with your list with the following provisos.

There is also 'a' as in 'hay'. Your choice of 'ate' is not a good one as 
it is often pronounced 'et' - with a short 'e' sound in many UK areas.

For 'i' there is also the sound as in 'machine'.

Going back to 'Alice' and "Alicia', the point I am trying to make is that 
the 'Alic-'' stem is said the same way. I have not heard the form 
'Alee-sicia' in UK pronunciation. Mark you, it; not a common name 
here. My first reaction to the name is usually to think of the pianist 
Alicia de la Rocha and her name is pronounced Spanish style!

In the words of the old song -'You say 'tomayto' and I say 'tomahto'; 
let's call the whole thing off.
:-)