Schwa

For a note on how AWE organizes its group of articles on vowels, basically by aspects of sound and of writing, see category:vowels.

This is the name given by linguists to the commonest vowel sound in English - the unstressed weak vowel heard in the usual native pronunciation of 'the', in natural; speech. If you want to hear it, say 'The President of the United States' as naturally as you can. You should hear a schwa in the middle of this - in both 'the's.

The symbol for a schwa in the IPA is /É™/. (The word schwa is of course also the name of this symbol - a 'turned e', É™.)

schwa is pronounced very like 'shah' with a '-w-' inserted, IPA: /ʃwɑː/.