Peoples with linguistic knowledge!

That is indeed the upside down e sound, if I'm hearing it right. It's called a schwa.

Hey, if my evenings of brain bashing to memorize the international phonetic alphabet accomplished anything, that's good

ETA: If you want to describe it rather than name it, and the link isn't useful, let me know what the character knows and I can try and figure out what she'd say.

Ah, but a schwa is used in unstressed syllables. If your word is a one-syllable word, then you necessarily put stress on the vowel. The symbol you want here is a caret (^). To be precise (since you asked!), it's an open-mid back unrounded vowel.

Open-mid: This refers to the height of your tongue: basically open, mid, and closed. Closed vowels are ones where your tongue is high in your mouth (the vowel sound in "tea"), closing off the passage of air. Open is the opposite, where your tongue is low and mouth is open (the vowel sound in "spa"). So, open-mid is somewhere where the tongue is pretty low in the mouth, but not quite what we would call open.

Back: This refers to tongue positioning: front, central and back. The sound you are looking for is a back vowel, because your tongue is far back in your mouth when you make it. This is compared to a vowel sound like the one in "bed".

Unrounded: Some vowels are given a different sound by you rounding your lips (like the vowel sounds in "boot" and "coat"). Try saying the ^ sound that you are using and then slowly round your lips as you say it. The sound changes, so that you go from saying the word "cut" to the word "caught".

Maybe that was far more information than you needed, but hope it helps!

Really depends on whether the word itself is stressed, Past Midnight -- even monosyllabic words get the schwa in -- well, in most sentence contexts.

Well, if you are transcribing a sentence, that's one thing. You're right, you could use a schwa for unstressed syllables in a whole sentence, even if as part of a monosyllabic word. Jo was asking about a single word in isolation, in which case I wouldn't use a schwa. When looking at the word in isolation, a person unfamiliar with the language has no way of knowing if it is usually stressed or unstressed in a sentence.

Huh. So you'd use the caret for citation form?
I'd use a schwa, unless it was very clearly not the neutral vowel of that language, or unless i was doing a very close transcription.

...Actually, Jo, is this an alien character? If so, the vocal qualities might be so different this makes no sense, because vowel qualities have to do with formants, which have to do with the shape of the human mouth and nose and such.

Yeah, I'd use a caret for an isolated, monosyllablic word, but I think you're right, I'd use a schwa for transcribing the same word within a context.

I must say, I've been enjoying the discussion, Shweta!

Shweta said:

...Actually, Jo, is this an alien character? If so, the vocal qualities might be so different this makes no sense, because vowel qualities have to do with formants, which have to do with the shape of the human mouth and nose and such.

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Interesting point, but still, if it sounds like a schwa...

I'd use the schwa for stressed, unstressed AND aliens. I mean, life is tough enough already, you know?

But seriously: I never taught my students to transcribe using the caret. There are no other vowels where you use a different symbol for stressed and unstressed versions, so why do it for this one?

I don't know how it would be transcribed, but I am leaning toward the softer pronunciation most associated with the schwa.

Then again, I pronounce Missouri as Missourah, so what do I know.

PastMidnight said:

Yeah, I'd use a caret for an isolated, monosyllablic word, but I think you're right, I'd use a schwa for transcribing the same word within a context.

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So then it might depend on whether the character heard the sound in a sentence context or in citation form. Which is kinda cool

I must say, I've been enjoying the discussion, Shweta!

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Me too!

wombat said:

Interesting point, but still, if it sounds like a schwa...

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My point was more that it might not.

The sound of a vowel has to do with the pitch of several 'formants' (standing wave harmonics) and a differently shaped apparatus for producing sounds would get you different formants patterning together.

Of course, Jo might want to gloss right over that, and I wouldn't blame her

But seriously: I never taught my students to transcribe using the caret. There are no other vowels where you use a different symbol for stressed and unstressed versions, so why do it for this one?

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Depends on your context. If you're a beginning student, it's just about getting in the right ballpark to understand the idea behind transcription, right? But if you're a professional field linguist, you don't want to be making assumptions, because the simplifications you make in transcription turn into theory.

So if you're doing a loose-transcription for the purpose of sort of figuring out how the language goes, I'd guess that a schwa would work best. But if you're trying to record the language accurately, you want to write down whatever's closest to the sound you heard -- and that is true for all vowel sounds.

Or you could go with "hu"

I think if the character commented on it, I could read "hu" as you want it to be read.

Do you know whether the funny character would count as offputting? I've been told they are. Not that I play with sound systems or anything!

There's also the possibility that the language is derived from english/french/spanish but borrowed a chinese word anyway. English does that allll the time.

Shweta said:

Depends on your context. If you're a beginning student, it's just about getting in the right ballpark to understand the idea behind transcription, right? But if you're a professional field linguist, you don't want to be making assumptions, because the simplifications you make in transcription turn into theory.

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Sure. But if what you're hearing is just like schwa except stressed, why not transcribe it as schwa with a stress mark, like you'd do for any other vowel? I think this is just a historical accident, not a real issue of precision.

But that's not the important issue here, it's the spelling. Yeah, I think actually using schwa in normal text is offputting - and also wouldn't a publisher give you a hard time if you asked for it? I'd go with 'uh'.

wombat said:

Sure. But if what you're hearing is just like schwa except stressed, why not transcribe it as schwa with a stress mark, like you'd do for any other vowel? I think this is just a historical accident, not a real issue of precision.

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Um, seems I was unclear. What I was trying to say is that stress does change vowel quality, so if I was doing a tight transcription, I wouldn't just add a stress mark to any vowel.

But that is, as you said, not the important point

But that's not the important issue here, it's the spelling. Yeah, I think actually using schwa in normal text is offputting - and also wouldn't a publisher give you a hard time if you asked for it? I'd go with 'uh'.

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But that would give you a word spelled "huh", which might be confusing to readers.

It's a toughie.

Shweta said:

Um, seems I was unclear. What I was trying to say is that stress does change vowel quality, so if I was doing a tight transcription, I wouldn't just add a stress mark to any vowel.

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Agreed, especially since we have symbols already to represent stressed vowels that could be used here. Stress does indeed change vowel quality and, to me, a schwa (even with a stress mark) and a caret, are two different sounds. Although I question the idea of just adding a stress mark to an unstressed vowel.

Jo, I don't have a good suggestion here as to how to represent your word without using phonetic symbols (which I agree are probably not appropriate to use everywhere your pronoun appears in your novel, as it's probably a pretty common sound in your characters' language). Maybe something like h-uh or h'uh. Not a linguistic representation, but might be easier for your readers.

My what a great collection of cunning linguists we have here.

So...I was totally lost by the majority of this conversation. Assuming that your "off-putting" is not a linguistic reference and you are talking about reader feed back (seriously...that's how confused I was) then it all depends on the billing. If you label this sci-fi/fantasy then as a sci-fi/fantasy reader I am ok with alien sounding/looking words. I mean, a whole generation learned Klingon, lol. One or two advanced linguistic usages that add depth to the understanding of a race of people should be alright.

WittyandorIronic said:

If you label this sci-fi/fantasy then as a sci-fi/fantasy reader I am ok with alien sounding/looking words. I mean, a whole generation learned Klingon, lol. One or two advanced linguistic usages that add depth to the understanding of a race of people should be alright.

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That's an interesting point, but it just confirms my feeling that it's better to figure out a way to spell it without using the schwa symbol. Because the unfamiliar symbol makes the vowel seem exotic and alien when in fact it's really common and normal, you know?

I agree that linguistic symbols might be a little off-putting to readers, not to mention a bit of a pain for a publisher when they print it.

What I would do probably is use some variation of hu', huh', or h'uh like PastMidnight suggested, and briefly point out the u is pronounced like a schwa or carret and the ' is a glottal stop that often becomes unnoticeable in everyday language.

In my tribe's language, Zuni, the word for "I" is ho', with the ' being a glottal stop, and is pronounced in everyday language somewhat like your pronoun except with an "o" sound instead of "uh". The IPA symbol for glottal stop would be more like a ?, but in writing, I think most languages just stick with '. Not quite a perfect solution, but I think it would work okay--and you would probably be the first modern sci-fi/fantasy writer to us an apostrophe in your language for a real reason.