I wonder if this was the reason her name was never mentioned out loud in AC or in KH1&2. Always referring to her as you, she, her, and even mother. It was kind of annoying since my brother always pronounced it like "Iris" and I wanted to see for sure.
Then when the first videos of Crisis Core were leaked on the internet (in Japanese) for the first time I heard her name spoken aloud when she introduced herself. Of course with Japanese pronunciation the "r" is slightly rolled, the "i" sounds like (ee), but since the "th" as mentioned before does not exist in Japanese, it was pronounced like an "s" which is most likely why the "error" happened. So saying that, "Aerith" isn't an English word, its not even a word to my knowledge.
So when I first heard her name out loud, I figured that it was the same way I had been pronouncing it all these year (except for the Japanese accent) so why change it based on the English?
So maybe the "th" was meant to be taken literal in English translations, and like I said I always thought that they changed her name in the North American version to avoid reading her name wrong or something. So although her name in English might be pronounced with the "th" sound, I will remain to say it with an "s" because that is the way I felt it was meant to sound coming to NA.
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