Communicating schwa is impossible in written English

Let’s say you are trying to communicate

/k/क

sound in English.

You can use k, c, or, if it is guttural, even q to communicate it.

But what if you are trying to communicate the most neutral vowel

sound known to mankind, the schwa sound

/ə/अ?

It is impossible to pick the right Latin letter to communicate this. There are 5 vowel letters in English. And each of them can be used to communicate the schwa sound in different words!

- The ain about

- The ein taken

- The iin cousin

- The oin button

- The uin upon

So, what if a foreign name has a schwa sound?

In some contexts, it is impossible to communicate that in written English.

Schwa as the last vowel in a word

Consider the first name of the Microsoft CEO,

Satya Nadella.

The first name should be pronounced as /sətjə/सत्य/ with a schwa ending.

But if you try to write it in English, you will have to write it as Satya.

Which makes it Sətja/सत्या.

What if you remove the a from the end?

Then it becomes Saty, which makes it Sæti/सैती़.

Schwa as the first vowel in a word

A similar problem happens with schwa as the first vowel in a word.

The general pronunciation rules of English demand that the first syllable be stressed.

So, a name like Anu, which should be pronounced as /ənu/अनु/ will be pronounced as either

- AA-nu /ɑːnu/आनु/or

- AiN-u /eɪnu/ऐनु/

Schwa in a middle syllable of a word that requires stressing

What about Google’s CEO,

Sundar Pichai?

The first name should be pronounced as /sʊndər/सुंदर/ with a schwa ending.

But it gets pronounced as either /sʌndɑːr/सॅन्दार/ or /sʊndɑːr/सुन्दार/ in English.

What if he instead wrote Sundr?

Well, then it would be pronounced as /sʌndr/सॅन्द्र/ in English.

This makes all Indic-origin schwa-starting or schwa-ending names impossible to write in modern English.

Different cultures struggle with this and come up with their own solutions. None that can be considered perfect.

- Indians for example use ato communicate the schwa sound in their names. Also,ais used for the/ɑː/आsound in their names. Creating ambiguity.

- Sri Lankans, for example, use eto communicate the schwa sound in their names, for example, Wickremesinghe

- Japanese, for example, use uto communicate the schwa sound in their names. Also,uis used for/uː/ऊsound in their names. Creating ambiguity.