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(Maybe Martha, with her background in Spanish, could answer this.)
In the United States, from what I've heard, the common pronunciation is Bar-bAY-dos and Gre-nAY-da.
But if these are derived from Spanish, I would expect to hear Bar-bAH-dos and Gre-nAH-da instead.
How did this come about?
(Similarly for Colorado - short a, or AH?)
I've always heard /bar 'be dos/ (approximately "bar-BAY-dosse") for the one. For "Grenada" I hear both /gr@ 'na d@/ and /gr@ 'ne d@/ ("greh-NAH-dah" and "greh-NAY-duh").
I've observed that roughly speaking, repeat roughly, Brits convert a foreign word's pronunciation to whatever the word looks like to them, while Americans make a stab at the native pronunciation: Thus Brits say "men-AG-you-a, nicker-AG-you-a" and the Yanks stick to "men-AHG-wa, nicker-AHG-wa". But any US place name that starts as a foreign word is pretty soon coöpted into the local dialect; in North Carolina there's a Benaja Road (pronounced /bEn 'e dZ@/ (ben-AY-dja), and Medina county in Ohio is pronounced meh-DINE-ah. In Arizona and southern California maybe the tendency to Americanize Spanish words is reduced somewhat, but I wouldn't place any bets on it.
Bob's observation about the Brits might also explain their classic Jaguar automobile, which I grew up pronouncing as (two syllables) "JAG' GWAR." But of late, a new 3-syllable pronunciation as "JAG' YOU ARE" seems to be catching on. I've even heard it pronounced that way by sportscasters referring to the NFL team from Jacksonville.
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
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