barrier'. Pronounced "mock", the Mach number is the ratio of the speed of a fluid, or of This would appear to be a case where pronunciation spelling doesn't do the job. I'm going to avoid ... British pronunciation of

Did you people *never* learn short and long vowel sounds? "Tin" is short "I"; "teen" is long "I". The way it's usually taught in school is that "tin" is short "i" and "teen"

I don't know from linguistics and phonetics (we're sending Young Aaron to grad school for that), but I think the ... context where there's a closely linked following word beginning with a vowel, however, it turns into a flap sound (*)

"In final position (t) is aspirated and shortens the vowel before it, whilst (d) is particularly weak and makes only ... do you pronounce the "t" sound when it's in the final position of the word, like "cent",

This is news to me. I've heard a strong "ko" ... and they have "k@". Kuh-LIN-ee-er, kuh-LATE. Almost klinear and klate. I'm puzzled. When you say "Merriam-Webster", what dictionary are you referring to? Both

"collate", ('koU,leIt). From the usual pattern for such Latin-derived verbs ... people pronounce "collinear" (,koU'lIni@r), and some even spell it "co-linear". This is news to me. I've heard a strong

Really? I recognize it, and I went to school here. Of course, I'm different ... Could it be that the distinction is recognized in Latvian? That would explain a lot. Different ballgame altogether, but in general, each vowel or a particular

To what extent is this influenced by the initial consonants ... for these vowels, both issuing from the same lip shape. Having looked in a mirror, I agree with Matti: whatever internal movement of the tongue produces the two distinct RP ... of

I'm forwarding this posting, which was originally posted to alt.english.usage, to alt.usage.english because it has remarks in it that I hope will be of interest to readers of that newsgroup. I've suppressed the identification of the AEU

(I am posting these Intros for Donna Richoux while she is away. Maria.) Last Revised 2003-02-27 (27 Feb 2003) ~~ Mini-FAQ on Spelling ~~ There are longer answers, with more examples, for most of these items in the full AUE FAQ (see end). Many of