Language Contact and Loan Vocabulary in Maltese Language from Arabic and English

Introduction

The Maltese language is a Semitic language spoken by the natives of the island of Malta, a European nation. The Mediterranean island experienced various periods of political dominance throughout its history by foreign nations (Ravishankara, Tyersb, & Gattc, 2017). These nations ended up contributing heavily to the Maltese language. Maltese morphology is dominated by Arabic, Italian, and English influences because these nations once had a significant political dominance in Malta (Ravishankara et al., 2017) Scholars, therefore, regard Maltese as a hybrid language (Sciriha, 2002). Currently, Maltese is one of the two official languages of Malta together with English. The indigenous language that was once scoffed at by educated citizens is now used in official settings such as courtroom proceedings and in the media, both print and live (Sciriha, 2002). The Maltese language is now an important part of the identity of the natives. To put it into perspective, about 9% of the Maltese people use English as the primary language in their homes (Krug & Sonning, 2017). This means that more than 90% of the population primarily use the Maltese language in their quotidian conversations.

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Sankoff (2001) claims that language contact is an aggregation of social factors throughout history. The major social components that affect language contact are synonymous with social imbalances such as colonialism, migrations, and wars. According to Sankoff (2001), migrations and conquests are the main contributors. Urbanization and trade affect the linguistic outcomes of language contact on a small scale. The author, however, notes that language contact can last for a short while and that the duration of the contact is also a significant factor in the determination of language contact (Sankoff, 2001).

The short description above implies that Malta's native language is greatly influenced by language contact and loaning of vocabularies from foreign languages. This literature review aims to show the influence of language contact on the Maltese language, especially from Arabic and English. It will also discuss how the Maltese language loaned vocabularies from both English and Arabic languages. The borrowing is reflected in the language's morphology, grammar and syntax.

English Loaned Morphology, Grammar, and Syntax

Verb Morphology

The Maltese language allows two methods for forming new verbs: the root and pattern strategy, or addition of a suffix (Bauer, 2004). The first strategy, root and pattern, involves extraction of nouns in their intermediate forms from the source language (Twist, 2010). Sometimes adjectives are extracted, though rarely so. After the root extraction, the next step involves the formation of denominal verbs using accepted verbal patterns (Twist, 2010). This two-step process informs how the strategy was named the "root and pattern strategy". The borrowing strategy outlined is commonly applied in most languages of Semitic origin (Mifsud, 1995). The following table illustrates the root-extraction strategy in the Hebrew language which is exactly the same as in Maltese:

Table 1. Denominal verb formation in Modern Hebrew (Evelyn, 2006)

The Maltese language, however, incorporates a second strategy known as suffixation. This approach involves adding a suffix (-ja) to the borrowed verbs followed by inflection of the words to align them to standard verbal patterns of the Semitic language (Twist, 2010). Suffixation is thus considered to adopt a concatenative morphology approach while root and pattern utilize the non-concatenative morphology plan (Hoberman & Aronoff, 2003). According to Twist (2010), both strategies are used in the Maltese language, but suffixation is currently the most popular approach. In fact, other scholars assert that the root and pattern strategy is not needed in producing the verb morphology of the Maltese language (Hoberman et al., 2003). The preference for suffixation is attributed not only to the conventional factors such as phonological segments and prosodics, but also other environmental considerations such as social contexts or semantic structures (Twist, 2010). The following are examples of loaned verbs in the Maltese language from English according to Twist (2010).

• Spid - speed
• Drill - drill
• (ip)parkja - park

The majority of the suffixation in the Maltese language when loaning verbs involves the -a and -ja NSM (Non-Semitic Maltese) verb endings. For instance, assess-ja (to assess) and var-ja (to diversify) (Evelyn, 2006).

According to Evelyn (2006), the rise of suffixation in verb morphology of the Maltese language coincided with the increased English political influence in the country during the 1800s and the 1900s. This period succeeded the Italian linguistic effect on the Maltese language known as Romance, due to the island's closeness to Italy (Evelyn, 2006). Mifsud (1995) arranged loan verbs into four distinct groups according to the period of borrowing. The table below shows that English loan verbs were the most recent and mainly involved suffixation. The general trend also shows that initially, the non-concatenative approach of root and pattern strategy was used to loan verbs before recently shifting to the concatenative suffixation method.

Table 2. Loan verb types (Mifsud, 1995)

Apart from suffixation, loan verbs in Maltese are formed via initial gemination (Evelyn, 2006). This approach is used when two conditions are satisfied. One is that the verbs must begin as with a consonant, and two is that the gemination will yield phonotactically appropriate verbs (Hoberman et al., 2003).

Table 3. Initial consonant gemination in verbs borrowed from English (Evelyn, 2006)

Initial gemination is illustrated in Maltese by doubling the initial consonant when it is either a single consonant as in iffilmja or either a consonant-sonorant cluster as in iddrillja. The two verbs in (c) and (d) do not portray initial gemination because the consonants are either in sibilant-initial clusters or complex clusters respectively (Evelyn, 2006). A curious thing about initial gemination in the Maltese language is how it has been extended to loaning verbs from source languages that do not exhibit gemination, such as English (Evelyn, 2006). More examples of initial gemination originating from English verbs according to Evelyn (2006) include irriskja (to risk), iggassja (to gas), and igglejzja (to glaze).

Noun Morphology

Assimilation

The main method of loaning nouns from English to the Maltese language is via assimilation (Camilleri, 1991). Assimilation involves incorporation of elements from the source language to the recipient language either wholly or partially (Camilleri, 1991). Some instances of assimilation according to Camilleri (1991) include kuker (cooker), kejk (cake), and Amerka (America). These examples further show the use of a non-concatenative approach in loaning words from English. Assimilation primarily follows the phonemics of the recipient language. The author also cites inflectional morphology as another source of loaned nouns in Maltese.

Noun Plurals

Maltese nouns form their plurals by either suffixation or through the use of 'broken plural' templates (Hoberman, 2007). It is, however, difficult to accurately predict the plurals of Maltese nouns because of the two methods described. Even if one arrives at which strategy to use, the variety of suffixes and templates available further complicate the process (Hoberman, 2007). The author notes that it is possible to concentrate on few possibilities by considering factors such as suffixes, meanings, and prosodic shapes. A general rule exists that the plurals of Maltese nouns sourced from English are always achieved by suffixation method in contrast to those sourced from Romance languages which adopt both strategies (Hoberman, 2007). Examples of pluralization of Maltese nouns derived from English include:

• Bulldogg - bulldoggjiet (bulldogs)
• Bulldowzer - bulldowzrijiet (bulldozers)
• Brigadier - brigadieri (brigadiers)
• Bankier - bankieri (bankers)

In the examples above, it is clear that plurals are derived from singular nouns by either adding the suffix -jiet or -i. This pattern is apparently true for most Maltese nouns derived from English. Other nouns derive their plurals by adding different suffixes such as the traditional -s suffix used mainly in English.

• Suvenir - suvenirs
• Skor - skors
• Cermen - cermens

What is worth noting, however, is that the plurals of some nouns are derived via the 'broken plural' template method (Hoberman, 2007).

Adjective Morphology

The Maltese language has sourced few English adjectives to derive Maltese comparatives, according to Hoberman (2007) such as:

• Idjer - dear
• Ikwet - quiet
• Iplet - polite
• Ismart - smart
• Isnek - sneaky

The assimilation technique is heavily used in this case like in loaning the nouns.

Syntax

The basic word order of English is subject, verb, and object (SVO) (Spagnol, 2011). The Maltese language is based on Semitic principles, thus, its word order should be VSO as in Arabic (El-Yasin, 1985). This is further from the truth because of the hybrid nature of the Maltese language. It was able to borrow the word order of both English and Romance languages to add to its Semitic base (Comrie, 2009). As a result, the Maltese language exhibits various word arrangements for both declaration and question statements (Camilleri, 2013). English mainly adopts the SVO order for declarative statements and VSO for questions.

Arabic Loaned Morphology, Grammar, and Syntax

Morphology

According to Borg and Gatt (2017), Maltese language basically has Semitic foundations. The statement agrees with the claim that the language is mainly Arabic garnished with Romance and English influences (Hoberman, 2007). Hoberman (2007) notes that the morphology of the Maltese language shows a great deal of Arabic influence. Borg and Gatt (2017), however, claim that the morphology is majorly composed of non-Semitic components. The language form traditionally followed the non-concatenative approach typical of all Semitic languages. This was a root-and-pattern strategy in which root consonants define a certain fixed lexical meaning (Spagnol, 2011). Vowel phonologies and verbal patterns are then combined with the roots to derive various types of words. Borg and Gatt (2017) give an e...