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erikdkennedy / figtree

A friendly, simple geometric sans serif font
SIL Open Font License 1.1
537 stars 20 forks source link

Adding schwa "ə" glyph #38

Open pietrogregorini opened 3 months ago

pietrogregorini commented 3 months ago

Hey there! I was noticing that the font (at least from Google Fonts) is missing this glyph "ə" called "schwa" that nowadays is used in Italian language for gender neutral words: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C6%8F

Would be a nice add :)

lazarljubenovic commented 3 months ago

"Used in Italian language" is a bit of stretch. Would be nice to see the glyph but the motivation is dubious in your own link. The most common usage would be for IPA in e.g. dictionaries.

This niche usage is controversial—as well as mainly limited to written language, as there is no real consensus on how the -ə suffix should be pronounced—and has been criticized by the Accademia della Crusca. The president of the Accademia opposed its use,[3] and the Accademia replied unfavorably to an initiative by the Equal Opportunities Committee of the Supreme Court of Cassation for the introduction of the schwa in juridical language, stating that "juridical language is not the place to experiment with minority-led innovations that would lead to irregularity and idiolects".[4]

pietrogregorini commented 3 months ago

@lazarljubenovic Though the use of glyph itself is not a rule in the Italian language, nor in legal texts or spoken language, there is a quite unanimous consensus in the late years to be used in written texts wherever is necessary to have sensibility towards gender-neutral messages and microcopy – since the language has a really strong masculine/feminine structure in itself.

That link refers only about the glyph itself, that's why I attached it. If you want, there are many essays about linguists like Vera Gheno, writers like Michela Murgia and others about the subject – though all in Italian.