# vowel lengthening



## Qcumber

Hi. 
In his Tagalog manual, Bowen says the last vowel of a word like *hindî* "no" is lengthened when it is followed by another word, e.g. *Hindî totoó.* "It’s not true."
(The way he puts it is more linguistic.)
I can’t hear this lengthening. For me the vowel is still short.
What is a native speaker’s impression?


----------



## sean de lier

Er, there's a slight difference between the pronunciation of *hindi* by itself and if it is followed by a word that starts with a consonant. I hope I can describe it correctly here.

The second I in *hindi* has a glottal sound ( I can't seem to think of an example in English...). If it precedes a word that starts with a consonant, the glottalization of the second I is removed; it becomes an "open" vowel (Fr. English's dictionary also has a explanation... perhaps it does not becomes "long", it simply becomes "open", or stressed at most.)


----------



## Qcumber

sean de lier said:


> The second I in *hindi* has a glottal sound ( I can't seem to think of an example in English...). If it precedes a word that starts with a consonant, the glottalization of the second I is removed; it becomes an "open" vowel (Fr. English's dictionary also has a explanation... perhaps it does not becomes "long", it simply becomes "open", or stressed at most.)


I agree with you. The glottal stop at the end of _hindî_in isolation is erased when it is followed by a word like _totoó:_* [hIn'dI?] > [hIn'dI].*
Bowen contends a compensatory lengthening of the final vowel takes place when the glottal stop is dropped: *> [hIn'di:*].
I don't hear such lengthening. For me the syllable only becomes open, as you say.

Of course his rule is for all words whose last syllable is closed by the glottal stop. Try as I may with other words (lostening to recorded texts), I can't hear any particular lengthening.

P.S. English has no such thing as a final glottal stop. The only non-Austronesian language I have studied in which it also exists is Arabic.


----------

