The Gibraltar-Malta nexus : two European Mediterranean identities in onetime fortress ports

Abstract

This paper is a work in progress exercise, delivered at the Euromed's La Navigation du Savoir encounter at St James Cavalier, (Valletta in 2004) which may be extended and revised in due coursel. An upgraded version would comprise more specific comparative references to Malta and Gibraltar both in the context of British naval policies and assessments, especially working and living conditions prevailing during the inter-war period relating to dockyard employment and otherwise , as well as the earlier Maltese migratory movement and settlement before and especially after the building of the Suez Canal, including aspects of cultural clash, ethnicity, crime and possible scapegoating, all of which have continued to some extent to reverberate in a collective memory, in spite of the gradual assimilation. Actually this is a follow-up to a still unpublished keynote address which I had delivered at a conference which I had co-organized in Gibraltar, under the auspices of the Gibraltar Museum in September 2002, on the subject: "Gibraltar-Malta: History, Heritage and Identity in a Mediterranean Setting". My knowledge and understanding of the Gibraltarian situation was much enhanced by that delightful sociohistorical experience, so I shall briefly refer here to an additional intended input to this tour d'horizon, inviting more specialised and detailed attention to various sinews in the thread, some of which I certainly hope to engage in myself more fully in the coming months. They complement my long-standing interest not only in migrant settlement but in imperial strategy, and the impact of these on islands and enclaves, particularly in the Mediterranean region.