1. A system for processing speech, said speech including a succession of utterances spoken in any of continuous and discrete form, comprising: A. means for storing a plurality of word models; B. means for identifying a succession of temporal segments of said utterances spoken in any of continuous and discrete form; C. means selectively operable on ones of said segments for identifying a subset of said plurality of word models meeting predetermined criteria, said subset defining a list of candidate words; D. control means for determining arbitrarily selected frame start times t during said utterances spoken in any of continuous and discrete form, said frame start times being independent of identification of an initial anchor; and E. means for generating a signal representative of said list of candidate words for selected ones of said frame start times t determined in step D.