Professor J. Aquilina and Maltese linguistics

Abstract

The thesis begins with an introductory essay on the views of Professor Aquilina on language, and, in particular, on the Maltese language. My method has been to base myself on Professor Aquilina' s work, but in the interests of scientific objectivity I have also considered the views of other scholars when they are at variance with those of Aquilina. Part One deals with Phonology, and is divided into two sections, Synchronic and Diachronic Phonology. Here I refer constantly to Aquilina' s "The Structure of Maltese", his article in "Papers in Maltese Linguistics" entitled "Some Historical Phonetic Changes of Maltese" and D. Cohen's article "Le Systeme' Phonologique du Maltais: Aspects Synchroniques et Diachroniques". In the chapter entitled "Other Phonemes" (Section I, Chapter 3) an attempt is made to point out the continuity between Professor Aquilina's studies and the advances in Linguistics in the field of Phonology. In the Section on Diachronic Phonology the sources of the Maltese consonants and vowels are discussed. Commenting on Aquilina's method in a review of "The Structure of Maltese", D.Cohen says: "La structure du maltais selon une premiere orthodoxie firthienne est ... decrite exclusivement en termes de distribution, sans preoccupation du systeme meme de la langue". It has thus not been an easy task to bring together the studies of two scholars with two different approaches: on the one hand Aquilina's distributional approach, and on the other, Cohen's concern in considering the system of Maltese Phonology. In the Structure of Maltese, Aquilina is not only concerned with the study of consonants and vowels in isolation, but also takes into account nominal and verbal patterns. The latter part of Section II hints briefly at the nature of Aquilina'a work on this subject.