Question

As-salaamu alaykum,
I have a question concerning madd. Many of the Arabs tend to shorten long vowels to short vowels when the long vowel occurs at the end of the word in speaking .
To give an example I read the male youth, "al-fataa." My Egyptian friend told me I had read the female youth, "al-fataah" and told me to say "al-fata" instead, in reality reading fathah instead of alif.

Also, Many Arabs have also developed vowel quality distinctions to differentiate long and short vowels. Is this correct?

I do not have a trained teacher so how can I know the correct madd?
jazakumullah

Answer

Wa alaikum assalaam wa rahmatu Allahi wa barkatuh.

May Allah increase you in knowledge and reward you greatly for your efforts to learn the Arabic language. 

Spoken colloquial Arabic cannot be measured in the way we measure vowel counts and mudood (plural of medd) in tajweed.  This unfortunate situation is because spoken Arabic has been corrupted away from the Arabic spoken at the time of the Prophet, , to what is today many dialects based on hearing and copying, not by a set of rules.  The only time you would be able to measure in the same way would be when talking to someone with an excellent background in classical Arabic who can speak classical Arabic easily with the correct vowelings. 

The common Arabic colloquial pronunciation for the word  does have a lengthening for the alif a little longer than a fat-h, but shorter than the natural correct lengthening of two vowel counts.  The word  is pronounced (when stopping on this word) with a longer lengthening because if we go back to our tajweed rules, we know that this is a different medd than the natural two count lengthening of .  The word  has a medd letter following by one letter, and when we stop on it, we stop with a  saakinah; making a presented sukoon lengthening, , which has a  lengthening 2, 4, or 6 vowel counts.  Although those speaking colloquial Arabic will not lengthen the alif in the word  a full four vowel counts, they do prolong it to two vowel counts. 

The vowel lengthenings in colloquial Arabic then are quite subtle, but there is a difference between a medd and a vowel count, just not the correct classical Arabic difference. 

We understand your confusion but urge you to continue your study of the Arabic language.  The best advice we can offer is to separate colloquial Arabic from classical Arabic and practice classical Arabic with those proficient in speaking it.  To apply your study of the mudood, we suggest you listen to Qur'an recitation by some known expert reciters, such as Sheikh Al-Husray or Sheikh Basfar. 

Wa iyyakum wa-l-muslimeen.