Ə
| Schwa | |
|---|---|
| Ə ə | |
| Usage | |
| Writing system | Latin script |
| Type | alphabetic |
| Sound values | [æ] [ə] [ɨ] |
| In Unicode | U+018F, U+0259 |
| History | |
| Development | |
| Time period | ~1922 to 1939, 1992 to present |
| Descendants | • Ә |
| Other | |
| Writing direction | Left-to-right |
Ə, or ə, is an additional letter of the Latin alphabet. It is also called schwa, from another name for the mid central vowel, the sound represented by minuscule ə in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
It was invented by Johann Andreas Schmeller for the reduced vowel at the end of some German words and first used in his 1820s works on the Bavarian dialects.