The term schwa , which is the transcription of a Hebrew word ( שווא , according to the modern orthography) meaning “vain” (like “in vain”, “vacuity”), is employed in linguistics to indicate the neutral vowel, power station, noted in International Phonetic Alphabet.

This vowel existed formerly in French, but was transformed as of the traditional time into “E null and void” (or “E dumb”) which either approaches (but certain phonetists note it nevertheless, cf will infra ), or does not decide at all. One frequently finds it in dull position in other Romance languages, like the Portuguese of Lisbon, the Rumanian , certain dialects Italic exchange-Southerners (Campanie, the Abruzzi, etc)

One also finds it in English (the majority of the not accentuated vowels are carried out there thus), in the majority of the dialects Breton S and in much of other languages.

It is often considered that there exist alternatives of schwa; these alternatives are in particular due to the " coloration" brought by the adjacent consonants: one speaks then about " scwha" anteriorized or posteriorized (the Russian phonetists note them respectively and); the modern misadventure of the French schwa mentioned above can also be described like a " schwa arrondi" (labialized).

The character ə (and Ə in capital) is also used in the writing of the Azeri in the Latin alphabet adopted shortly after the independence of the Azerbaïdjan (Azərbaycan) in the last decade of the XXe century. Given as intermediary between the has and the E French this ə Azeri would correspond to] the ] of the phonetic alphabet and not to phonetic alphabet.

References