[ə]→[o]Certainty: 5/5Commonality: 5/5

Re-stressing Restoration Germanic Slavic

Mid central vowel to Close-mid back rounded vowel

The shift from the neutral schwa [ə] to the mid-back rounded vowel [o] is a form of re-stressing or vowel restoration. In languages with heavy vowel reduction, the schwa functions as a placeholder for various underlying full vowels; when the stress shifts back to the syllable, the original quality (often a back-rounded one) is restored.

Phonetic Effects

Re-stressing, Restoration, Akanye

Language Examples

English (Morphological) Germanic

photography [fə-]→photograph [foʊ-]— Vowel restoration: the schwa re-opens to a full back vowel when the stress shifts to the first syllable.

protest (verb) [ə]→protest (noun) [oʊ]

Russian Slavic

voda [ɐ/ə] (water)→vodu [o]— Akanje restoration: the reduced pre-tonic vowel returns to its full [o] quality when the stress shifts onto it in the accusative case.

Related Transformations

Reverse

More Germanic Shifts

[a] → [ã] — Assimilatory Nasalization [a] → [∅] — Elision [a] → [ʔ] — Glottalization [a] → [ə] — Vowel Reduction [æ] → [ɛ] — Vowel Raising

Sources & References

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