From what I learned in high school (from teachers):
Saint AUH-guh-STEEN, Florida.
Saint uh-GUHS-tihn who wrote “Confessions”.
In an academic team meeting I got into an agument about this with a girl who got so mad at me she left with her boyfriend.
Not to say he’s perfect, but the man on whose authority I have this is a priest. I figure he’d know about a saint.
Anyone disagree?
Interesting that you bring this up. I do the pest control for a St. Augustine’s school and rectory. I’ve heard the women in the rectory answer the phone, so I know they pronounce it aw-GUS-tin. If I get a chance, I’ll ask one of da Faddahs what the distinction is.
Thanks very much, Dave. I got my pronunciation from a priest at the Benedictine boarding school I attended for high school. I’ve also pronounced the name several times in front of my father, who is a monk and knows about as much about Church history as anyone I’ve ever come across.
I worked at Villanova University, which is an aw-guh-STIN-i-an school, for several years. When talking about the saint, uh-GUS-tin is right. (The first syllable is usually pronounced slightly differently in Augustine and Augustinian.) I’ve heard people say AW-guh-steen, and that may be the way the city in pronounced. I wonder if that comes from the way we say August, which is, of course, different from how we say august. We English speakers sure are a crazy bunch of people.
Dictionaries, wonderful things.
According to Merriam-Webster, the name of the city is properly accented on the last syllable, that is, stEn (where ‘E’ represents long ‘e’ orthographically). The saint who wrote the Confessions and was bishop of Hippo from 396 to 430 can have his name pronounced either by accenting the last syllable (same as the city), or by accenting the middle syllable, that is, o - g&s - t&n or & - g&s - t&n, where & represents the unstressed syllable sound (I guess they don’t like using schwa any more, maybe because it isn’t always in a font or something, dunno).
Now for the kicker: There was ALSO a St. Augustine who was the first archbishop of Canterbury (601 - 604). This poor man’s name is at times shortened to Austin, as in the capital of the state of Texas. How would YOU like to lose a whole syllable of your name? 
Any given pronunciation of that name is probably seriously influenced by the language from which a specific English use was borrowed.
aw-gus-TEEN is a reasonably close American pronunciation of the Spanish version of the name–and is associated with the Spanish-settled city.
uh-GUS-tin is probably the Brit version and is found throughout mainstream U.S. (reinforced by the pronunciation od Augustus).
OW-gus-teen (not mentioned, yet, but I’ve encountered it), is taken from the German. Ach, du lieber…
There ain’t no “real” way. Follow local custom to avoid comment.
The Latin for Augustine is Augustinus. For Latin names ending in -inus or -anus, the penultimate syllable is virtually always long.
Augustinus
Aemillianus
Octavianus
Atratinus
It is more appropriate in English to stress whatever syllable would be long in the Latin. Hence augusTInus becomes augusTINE. This is, of course, not a general rule that applies to all Latin words, but it usually does hold for nomenclature.
I think the auGUStine confusion is caused by the pronounciation of Augustus, about which there is little controversy to my knowledge. If you pronounce it auGUStus, then logically you would pronounce Augustine with a stressed antipenultimate syllable. If you don’t know Latin, of course.
Hope this helps.
MR
**DSYoungEsq wrote:
OK, I didn’t get to talk to any of the padres at the rectory, but I did see a small portrait of Gus on the wall. It has the word (or name) Hippo on it, so I guess the above quote would definitely apply. The place is no doubt named for the same dude. And, as I mentioned in my earlier post, I’ve heard the ladies refer to the church as St. “uh-GUS-stin’s.” Works for me.
Personally, I attend Grace Baptist. Hard to mispronounce that.
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JeffB, what did you do at 'Nova, and were you there from 1995-1999? I did my undergraduate work there.
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Of course in the same vein as Augustine, we also have St. Louis the person (Loo-ee), and St. Louis the city (Loo-wis).