I know someone who pronounces
Nina with a long "i" sound. She's Native American, but I don't know if that has anything to do with how she pronounces it.
Nina with a long "i" reminds me of a town in British Columbia, Nanaimo("nah-NIE-mo"), which always had a haunting sound for me.
All things considered, I think it would be too much of a headache to try to get people to pronounce it with a long "i" sound. The more common way, "NEE-nuh" is so pretty anyway.
This message was edited 7/27/2009, 11:03 AM