Glasgow

The name of Glasgow, the largest city in Scotland, is pronounced in RP as 'GLAHZ-go' (IPA: /ˈglɑːz gəʊ/). The general tendency of Scots accents to realise an RP 'ah' (IPA: /ɑː/) as IPA: /æ/ or IPA: /ɛ¦/ makes the name of the city sometimes sound more like (IPA: /ˈglæz gəʊ/). Informally, the pronunciation in the city itself is often represented as 'Glesga', 'Glesgae' or 'Gleska'. The majority pronunciation in the USA has a more extreme first vowel sound, rhyming with 'as', often with the second rhyming with 'how': the syllables are more evenly stressed IPA: /glæz gaʊ/, or even /ˌglæz ˈgaʊ/). This is regarded as wrong in Scotland. In any case, you are advised to pronounce the '-s-' as a voiced consonant, '-z-'.

The noun for a resident of Glasgow, and the adjective to describe 'of or from Glasgow' is Glaswegian, glaswegiensis in Latin.

The name derives from the British glas- + cau, meaning 'Green hollow'. (Mills, A. D., A Dictionary of British Place-Names, OUP, 2003. Oxford Reference Online. Hull University. 10 April 2008 <http://www.oxfordreference.com/views/ENTRY.html?subview=Main&entry=t40.e5927>.)