Maltralian (also known as Australian Maltese; in Maltese: Il-Maltraljan) is the variety of the Maltese language spoken by Maltese Australians. It is considered an ethnolect of Maltese that has developed in the Australian linguistic and cultural environment.
History
The first official group of Maltese immigrants arrived in Australia in 1882. Larger-scale emigration began after 1911, with approximately 6,000 Maltese emigrating to Australia between 1911 and 1939, followed by 8,000 between 1940 and 1949, and over 61,000 in the two decades after 1949. The earliest evidence of linguistic divergence from Standard Maltese is found in the writings of Charles Parnis, the first Maltese journalist in Australia, published in 1929. These writings contained expressions and vocabulary not found in Standard Maltese, suggesting the dialect's origins predate 1929.
Linguistic Characteristics
Maltralian diverges from Standard Maltese in several notable ways:
- Lexical borrowings from Australian English: Words such as blaġa ("bludger") and soker ("soccer") are used instead of their Standard Maltese equivalents.
- Phonological and morphological changes: For example, iddmanda ("to demand") appears instead of Standard Maltese tiddomanda; the plural of dar ("home") may appear as djars, darsijiet, or djarsijiet rather than the standard djar.
- Reduced Italian influence: Maltralian tends to avoid Italian-derived expressions common in Standard Maltese. For instance, ċaw ("bye") is replaced by saħħa, and awguri ("congratulations") is replaced by nifraħlek or nixtieqlek ir-risq.
- Unique vocabulary: Words such as kejn/kejna (instead of kannamieli for "sugarcane"), mislef (instead of bank for "bank"), and rifed (instead of appoġġja or għen for "help") are used.
Classification
Maltralian belongs to the Afro-Asiatic language family, within the Semitic branch (Central Semitic, Arabic, Maghrebi Arabic, Pre-Hilalian, Sicilian Arabic, Maltese). It is written using the Maltese alphabet. The IETF language tag for Australian Maltese is mt-AU.
Academic Recognition
The variety has been the subject of scholarly study, most notably in Roderick Bovingdon's work Maltralian: The Maltese Ethnolect of Australia (2019), published by Lincom Grammar Surveys.
