Westoids have suddenly started saying /kiv/, which alone makes me want to say /kiːɛv/, like my parents always said.

Neither is even the endonym, which is more like /kɪjiu̯/

  • Erika3sis [she/her, xe/xem]
    ·
    2 months ago

    If you want to anglicize /kɪjiu̯/ then that ends up rhyming with "pee-ew", at least it does for me, which is maybe not ideal. If you're going by the Russian pronunciation, it's /ˈkʲi(j)ɪf/ which should anglicize to /kijɪf/ or /kif/ ("KEY-yiff" or "keef").

    Which is to say that next to nobody pronounces the name particularly close to either its Russian or Ukrainian names. But ultimately the pronunciation doesn't really matter much anyways. I've heard people say the name as /kiv/ since before the war, particularly in Norwegian, possibly by analogy with the city of Kiel in the German part of Jutland — a city which many Norwegians like to travel to by boat, "kielferga".

    So basically, say it kinda however makes sense or sounds right to you, is my advice.