Now we will start a lesson on Persian long vowels.
There are three long vowels in Persian: "Aah, oo, ee." So let's start with "aah." Why
did I write two forms? So, these forms are initial forms.
Whenever we have long vowels, it should
be written like this, if it's initial. Or "او" like this, and "ee" like this. So we
have the word "آب".
It means water. So because "aah," the long vowel, is in its initial place,
so it should be written always with this. You can call it, like, a hat, on
top of "الف". So it's "آب". But if it's not initial, it should be written
like this. Like this example:
"بابا" means dad. So you have two long vowels "aah," but
without this on top: بابا Or for example, this one: کار
As you can
see, here we have a long vowel "aah," which is in the middle, and it doesn't have
this. Remember, whenever you write "aah" in the beginning, you need to put on
the top, this hat. The second long vowel: "oo."
So like the previous one, whenever "oo" is in initial form, you need to use "الف" in
order to show that this is "او". Like the word "او"
means he or she. So this is "oo" but if it's not initial, you need just "و"
itself, like,
بو
or
بودا
Here we have two long vowels, "oo" and "aah": بودا
Another one:
کوبا
Two long vowels: "ooh" and "aah."
"کوبا" the the country, Cuba.
The third one "ee", like,
"ایران" the country, Iran.
So because "ee" is initial form, we use "الف" to show that
the "ی" is a long vowel: "ee." Then we have the second long vowel,
"aah." Iran. Now, if it's not initial, like, we have س, ی, and ب.
سیب
So here, "ی" is a long vowel. It's not initial, so we don't need "الف". So it's
called, it's pronounced "seeb." Or it can be at the end, which is written differently:
سینی
So here we have two long vowels "ee," first "سی", then "نی".
سینی
ایران، سیب، سینی
Again, we can pronounce it together:
آب، بابا، کار
Many English
speakers confused "aah" with "ah," the short vowel. So for example, we have the word
مادر
It means mother. So many people, they pronounce it "madar". In
Persian, it's "aah" and then "ah." We have the long vowel aah," the short
vowel, "ah." It's different. So the second long vowel "او":
بو، بودا، کوبا
The short vowel "oh" is different, so it's "oo" and "oh." They are totally different.
And the third one:
ایران، ای، سیب، سینی.
The short travel is "eh," so "eh" and "ee." So "aah," "ooh," and "ee."