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Schwa (Cyrillic)

Schwa (majuscule:Ә, minuscule:ә) is a letter of the Cyrillic alphabet. It is currently used in Abkhaz, Bashkir, Dungan, Kalmyk, Kazakh, Kurdish, and Tatar. It was also used in Azeri, and Turkmen, before those languages switched to the Latin alphabet.

Phonetic value

In Azeri (formerly), Bashkir, Kazakh, and Tatar it represents the a in English cat (IPA: /æ/). It is often transliterated as ä.

In Dungan, it represents the close-mid back unrounded vowel, /ɤ/.

In Kalmyk and Kurdish, it represents schwa /ə/.

In Abkhaz it represents labialization of the preceding consonant (IPA: /ʷ/). Digraphs with ә are treated as letters in Abkhaz, and given separate positions in the Abkhaz alphabet. It is transliterated into Latin as a high ring (˚).

See also

• Ə (Latin letter)
• Schwa
• Schwa with diaeresis

References

Ager, Simon. Omniglot. Retrieved on 2006.