Giving compliments in Maltese

Abstract

A compliment is a speech act which explicitly or implicitly attributes credit to someone other than the speaker, usually the person addressed, for some good possession, characteristic, skill etc, which is positively valued by the speaker and the hearer (Holmes 1988). Compliments are almost always accompanied by a response, often verbal, and hence the speech act is normally considered as consisting of a compliment and a response (CR). An initial analysis of CR types in Maltese was carried out in 1996 (Camilleri 1996) as part of a wider European survey and some interesting comparisons already emerged. Zammit (2006) carried out a full-blown ethnographic project on CR types in Maltese which can be said to have confirmed the results of Camilleri (1996), and also to have added further dimensions. This chapter puts together a selection of the findings to date on CR types in Maltese, and introduces some novel analyses largely based on my new database (Camilleri Grima 2009).