12. The method according to claim 9 wherein: said sample acoustic units are syllables; and the step of determining at least one acoustic unit boundary or duration comprises the steps of: extracting boundaries or durations of at least two phones from said path; and combining portions of at least two phones to obtain a boundary or duration of a syllable acoustic unit.
12. The method according to claim 9 wherein: said sample acoustic units are syllables; and the step of determining at least one acoustic unit boundary or duration comprises the steps of: extracting boundaries or durations of at least two phones from said path; and combining portions of at least two phones to obtain a boundary or duration of a syllable acoustic unit. 13. The method according to claim 12 wherein the step of combining portions of at least two phones comprises measuring the time difference between centers of vowel phones from among said phones to obtain a duration of a syllable acoustic unit.