The vowel you’re talking about is “ə”, also known as “schwa”. It’s probably the most common vowel sound in all varieties of English - in defiance of spelling - but it occurs in lots of languages. (German often uses it as the sound for final e, and French still retains it in some words and dialects for the same thing too.)
As to how common it is in English:
“Thə vowəl yo~ə’re talking əbout is “ə” also known as “schwa”. It’s probəbly thə most commən vowəl sound in all variəties of English.”
In some varieties ə moves closer to ʌ, a similar sound that’s a little further back in the mouth. Links go to Wikipedia where there are sound files to listen to.
It’s actually a syllabic L, which is often spelled out as a schwa in pronunciation dictionaries.
If you speak German, an equivalent would be the -en on most unconjugated verbs. Haben is pronounced with a syllabic n (or m, depending on your accent), for example.
The difference is basically in length. A syllabic consonant is shorter than even a short vowel sound, and which vowel it uses depends on the language. It’s a schwa in English because that’s basically our default vowel, as you pointed out, but not every language uses a schwa as the syllabic consonant carrier: Serbo-Croatian uses [u].
I don’t think it’s really a schwa, at least not the way I say it
A schwa kind of comes from the back of your mouth like you’re saying “uhh…”
When I say possible, that last sound feels more like it’s the little burst of air from the b sort of fading into the l sound
Then again I’m no linguist so I could be out of my depth trying to really describe the noises I’m making, and I’m not very well-equipped to separate how I talk from more general American English (I’m from Philly, and we have more than our share of little linguistic quirks, after all, we pronounce “water” as “wooder”)
The vowel you’re talking about is “ə”, also known as “schwa”. It’s probably the most common vowel sound in all varieties of English - in defiance of spelling - but it occurs in lots of languages. (German often uses it as the sound for final e, and French still retains it in some words and dialects for the same thing too.)
As to how common it is in English:
“Thə vowəl yo~ə’re talking əbout is “ə” also known as “schwa”. It’s probəbly thə most commən vowəl sound in all variəties of English.”
In some varieties ə moves closer to ʌ, a similar sound that’s a little further back in the mouth. Links go to Wikipedia where there are sound files to listen to.
It’s actually a syllabic L, which is often spelled out as a schwa in pronunciation dictionaries.
If you speak German, an equivalent would be the -en on most unconjugated verbs. Haben is pronounced with a syllabic n (or m, depending on your accent), for example.
The difference is basically in length. A syllabic consonant is shorter than even a short vowel sound, and which vowel it uses depends on the language. It’s a schwa in English because that’s basically our default vowel, as you pointed out, but not every language uses a schwa as the syllabic consonant carrier: Serbo-Croatian uses [u].
I don’t think it’s really a schwa, at least not the way I say it
A schwa kind of comes from the back of your mouth like you’re saying “uhh…”
When I say possible, that last sound feels more like it’s the little burst of air from the b sort of fading into the l sound
Then again I’m no linguist so I could be out of my depth trying to really describe the noises I’m making, and I’m not very well-equipped to separate how I talk from more general American English (I’m from Philly, and we have more than our share of little linguistic quirks, after all, we pronounce “water” as “wooder”)