While here in England it's pronounced very much like Zed.
I personally prefer the American pronunciation, which is more like Zee.
it just makes more sense to me, because when you sing the alphabet Zee flows better than Zed.
Try it: T, U, V, W, X, Y, Zee
While: T, U, V, W, X, Y, Zed!
To my ears it's like ending the rhyme with a loud THUNK!
Even a word like Zebra, makes more phonetic sense when you use the American Z.
Phonetically in England it would be pronounced Zed,bra. There is a whole letter e going unused.
While in America Zee,Bra at least sounds like it' making use of the e.
Yet most people seem to find it annoying when I say Zee instead of Zed.
in terms of spelling an pronunciation it's one of the few things I think the American's have got right.
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I never thought the British pronounced letters definitely. I'm American so I only know it as "zee". Well, until now. It sounds more like I'm saying a word instead of a letter when I say "zed".
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I say Zed, I'm personally not terribly keen on American pronunciations and things, simply because I'm not American so it doesn't really make sense to me for me to use American phrases or pronunciation. But they're just my thoughts :)
I think zed sounds better in a rhyme. There was a song on this tape we used to have in the car when i was really young that sang the alphabet, and ended with x, y, zed diddly-did. Sounded just right, and for years i used to sing that end bit in my head when saying the alphabet, well, actually at one point i thought the twiddly bit at the end WAS a letter. Also thought that lmnop was one letter cos of how they sang that bit :)
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I'm Irish and I use both. I would always use Zee at the end of the alphabet 'cause I think it sounds better too. I'm trying to actually remember what I say day-to-day (I actually use the letter a lot in uni for equations). Like the zee/zed transform, but both sound fine to me. I think I just use whichever.
