Mid central vowel
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Legend: unrounded • rounded |
The mid central vowel is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. A reduced mid central vowel is known as a schwa. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents either sound is ⟨ə⟩, a rotated lowercase letter e.
While the Handbook of the International Phonetic Association does not define the roundedness of [ə], a schwa is more often unrounded than rounded. The phonetician Jane Setter describes the pronunciation of the unrounded variant as follows: "a sound which can be produced by basically relaxing the articulators in the oral cavity and vocalising." To produce the rounded variant, all that needs to be done in addition to that is to round the lips.
Afrikaans contrasts unrounded and rounded mid central vowels; the latter is usually transcribed with ⟨œ⟩. The contrast is not very stable, and many speakers use an unrounded vowel in both cases.
Danish and Luxembourgish have a mid central vowel that is variably rounded. In other languages, the change in rounding is accompanied with the change in height or backness. For instance, in Dutch, the unrounded allophone of /ə/ is mid central unrounded [ə], but its word-final rounded allophone is close-mid front rounded [ø̜], close to the main allophone of /ʏ/.
"Mid central vowel" and "schwa" do not always mean the same thing, and the symbol ⟨ə⟩ is often used for any obscure vowel, regardless of its precise quality. For instance, the unstressed English vowel transcribed ⟨ə⟩ and called "schwa" is a central unrounded vowel that can be close-mid [ɘ], mid [ə] or open-mid [ɜ], depending on the environment. The French vowel transcribed that way is closer to [ø].
If a mid-central vowel of a language is not a reduced vowel, or if it may be stressed, it may be more unambiguous to transcribe it with one of the other mid-central vowel letters: ⟨ɘ ɜ⟩ for an unrounded vowel or ⟨ɵ ɞ⟩ for a rounded vowel.
Mid central unrounded vowel
The mid central unrounded vowel is frequently written with the symbol ⟨ə⟩. If greater precision is desired, the symbol for the close-mid central unrounded vowel may be used with a lowering diacritic, ⟨ɘ̞⟩, or for the open-mid central unrounded vowel with a raising diacritic, ⟨ɜ̝⟩.
Features
- Its vowel height is mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a close vowel and an open vowel.
- Its vowel backness is central, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel.
- It is unrounded, which means that the lips are not rounded.
Occurrence
Mid central rounded vowel
Languages may have a mid central rounded vowel (a rounded [ə]), distinct from both the close-mid and open-mid vowels. However, since no language is known to distinguish all three, there is no separate IPA symbol for the mid vowel, and the symbol ⟨ɵ⟩ for the close-mid central rounded vowel is generally used instead. If precision is desired, the lowering diacritic can be used, ⟨ɵ̞⟩, or the more rounded diacritic with the schwa symbol, ⟨ə̹⟩, or the raising diacritic with the open-mid central rounded vowel symbol, ⟨ɞ̝⟩, although it is rare to use such precision.
Features
- Its vowel height is mid, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a close vowel and an open vowel.
- Its vowel backness is central, which means the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel.
- It is rounded, which means that the lips are rounded rather than spread or relaxed.