So now it is official. Bilingualism is almost dead, if not officially, in terms of usage in our day-to-day lives. In a country where, considering our almost unbelievable illiteracy rates, a primary school education has been compulsory since 1946 and where bilingualism is one of the primary objectives of the curriculum, why oh why are we burying our heads in the sand and pretending it is not happening? That bilingualism is dying, that good English is in freefall, and that a form of Maltese is widespread, but which is the Maltese of “thank you hafna!”

A study by Lydia Scriha and Mario Vassallo, as reviewed by Prof. Joe Brincat, confirmed what we have all known for a while. That while in our parents’ and our generation good English was encouraged and was relatively alive and well, its decline, which probably started and accelerated in the Mintoff years due to heady but understandably immature nationalism, has relegated English, in the eyes of the masses at least, as being the language of the so termed tal pepe and foreigners. And the masses count. They determine not only who gets elected, but also far more importantly, the priorities of those who do.

And sadly, in this country, the voices of the hunters, the voices of immature nationalism and over zealous religious sentiment, speak far louder volumes than the voices of the far far quieter English speaking Maltese, the more liberal Maltese, the environmentalists, those who believe our education system is failing our children, and the good though not necessarily religious with all the formalities and blind acceptance even of nonsense from the Church, such as not turning those accused of paedophilia over to the police immediately, filling us with fear about divorce but annulling marriages with children, filling us all with more fear about limbo, which has now been phased out, and ridiculous demands on the non sexuality of priests and nuns. These are in fact the currently disenfranchised Maltese, not sure who to turn to at voting time, not sure of this lesser of two evils thing which is being bandied about, wondering if they can get away with not voting.

Is it the only way to get the message across that we do not want Malta to remain a backwater, a village of people some of whom are IT literate and smart of course but with a village siege mentality all the same, locked into church groups or www.gov.mt?

Try saying to most Maltese people that English is an official language of Malta as much as Maltese is, and you will be met with blank stares or firm denial. That the first is the language of those who colonised us more recently and the second the language of the Arabs who colonised us centuries ago. That neither are ours in terms of being totally homegrown. They were both imported, and people and generations have modified and adapted them. So most Maltese today speak a very adulterated form of a language that came here centuries ago; and many of those who speak English also speak a different English to that spoken by the British sailors who landed here and liberated us from the French; and the distinct possibility that today we could be worrying about Franglais in Malta as much as we are worried about the current growth of Minglish.

This interesting study by Scriha and Vassallo points to many things but not least the inconsistencies between what we say and what we do. The same huge gulf which showed itself in a survey of our attitude to religion where 90 per cent plus professed themselves to be Catholic with only a third following the Church’s teaching on sex (i.e. no sex before marriage, no contraception, sex is only to have children and so on) is also apparent in what we say about the use of the Maltese language. While for example the records of a top bank show that English is the preferred language that is used by 68 per cent at ATMs, people rarely dare admit using English, as if it is a badge of shame or anti nationalism to admit using English.

Again figures for use of the media are also baffling. Do we all really watch only Becky, Xarabank and Tista Tkun Int? Most imported TV programmes are actually in English, yet if you believe what people say, few are watching these English programmes. It is really sad that all the propaganda and brainwashing about Maltese over the years, coupled with the fact that our leaders choose not to promote English as the language of Malta and the Maltese, has led to this disastrous decline in English. Successive governments have let the massa decide and the massa has decided on lousy Maltese and non-existent real English beyond of course thank you hafna!

Twas not always this bad. Surveys as recent as 1993 and 1996 showed that more parents used English far more than they do now. Now it is just the preserve of certain social classes and those who aspire to be members of those social groups. The massa use Maltese and the most professional use some English some of the time, but in actual fact English is only used widely by five per cent of us, more than there are hunters mind you, but we seem to be a forgotten and an ignored voice by all three political parties at this stage at least.

So will we have the guts to stop this decline? Will we have the nerve to start promoting English as a language of Malta on a par with Maltese? Will we start to put bilingualism into action? Until we do are we going to be far more tolerant of English speaking Maltese families and their children who can’t get into university without Maltese while foreigners can? We are in such a mess on this language issue we need short term policies to cope with the current crisis and ensure English speaking Maltese can access higher education, medium term policies until things start to improve and longer term policies (within 25 years) when we reach the goal of bilingualism. We can only get there if we really really want to. I wonder if this time we will show that some of us at least do want to get there. There are more of us than there are hunters. We do not take to the streets or threaten to, but if we continue to let ourselves be ignored we will become extinct. And I guess that is just what some of them want! To that we are not going to say “Thank you hafna” or “No grazzi”. Or are we?

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