Attitudes and perceptions of European English accents in the Maltese Isles

Abstract

This paper examines the attitudes of the Maltese population towards select European English accents. The participants listened to five short voice recordings of speakers from Spain, Italy, Germany, Sweden and Malta reading ten short sentences. Through an online questionnaire, this study revealed how the Maltese population views these European accents according to how accented, clear, aesthetically pleasing, friendly, trustworthy, and prestigious the accents were considered to be. This data is further broken down according to the age, sex, education, English competence, and whether English is the L1 or L2 of the participants which provides a deeper understanding of how the accents are rated depending on these categories. Through this data, this research provides a new insight into how the Maltese population perceive their own and other European accents.