https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/62991 Sat, 18 Apr 2026 22:46:48 GMT 2026-04-18T22:46:48Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/106955 Title: Il-lessiku : differenzi djalettali fil-qasam ta' l-armar tal-festi Abstract: L-għan ta' dan l-istudju hu li jiġu analizzati varjanti ta'kliem li jintużaw għall-oġġetti ta' l-armar tal-festi parrokjali f'żewġ lokalitajiet jew aħjar f'żewġ lokalitajiet jew aħjar f'żewġ parroċċi : il-paroċċa tal Kunċizzjoni f'Bormla, u l-parroċċa ta' San Ġorġ fil-Belt Victoria f'Għawdex. [...] Description: B.A.(HONS)LINGUISTICS Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/106955 2008-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101792 Title: II-ġens grammatikali fil-Malti Abstract: Wieħed mis-suġġetti ta' natura lingwistika li kien u għadu joħloq kontroversja bejn l-istudjużi huwa dak li jiffoka fuq ir-relazzjoni li teżisti bejn il-lingwa u d-dinja ekstralingwistika. F' dan il-kuntest, id-differenza bejn sess u ieħor titqies bħala fattur li jinfluwenza ħafna l-perċezzjoni li għandna dwar id-dinja. Bosta drabi din ir-relazzjoni tkun assoċjata mal-kategoriji semantiċi raġel/mara u mal-kategoriji grammatikali maskil/femminil, distinzjoni li tistrieħ fuq is-sistema tal-ġens f'bosta lingwi, inkluż il-Malti. Madankollu, in-natura ta' din ir-relazzjoni għadha kontroversjali u għalhekk il-ġens ta' spiss jitqies, kif jgħid Corbett (1991:1), bħala: " ... the most puzzling of the grammatical categories. It is a topic which interests non-linguists as well as linguists and it becomes more fascinating the more it is investigated. In some languages gender is central and pervasive, while in others it is totally absent. One of its attractions for linguists is that there are interesting aspects of the study of gender in each of the core areas of linguistics." Dan ix-xogħol jinvestiga sewwasew kif tiffunzjona din il-kategorija grammatikali fil-Malti, u kif il-kelliema tal-Malti jikklassifikaw in-nomi billi jassoċjaw magħhom ġens jew ieħor. Dan kollu jinvolvi bosta proċessi mentali, proċessi ta' assoċjazzjonijiet u analizi kontinwi, proċessi li ħafna drabi l-kelliem innifsu ma jkunx konxju tagħhom. Għaldaqstant, dan l-istudju, għalkemm jiffoka fuq il-Malti, jitqiegħed fid-dawl ta' studji ohra psikolingwistiċi biex ċerti kunċetti diskussi fih ikunu jistgħu jinftiehmu aħjar. Kien meħtieġ ukoll li fil-bidu ssir diskussjoni dwar x'mekkaniżmi grammatikali jużaw il-lingwi biex jikkategoriżżaw in-nomi fihom. Dan sar biex dak li jintqal fuq il-Malti jkun jista' jinftiehem f'perspettiva usa' u jkun jista' jitqabbel ma' dak li jiġri f'lingwi oħra. [...] Description: PH.D.LINGUISTICS Fri, 01 Jan 2010 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101792 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101254 Title: La variation stylistique en maltais : étude des usages concrets de la langue appuyée sur une approche contrastive des phénomènes variationnels en maltais et en français Abstract: Intraspeaker variation takes place according to relevant situational conditions of language use, such as the spoken/written order, the framework and degree of formality of the situation, topic, tone, participants' aims and identity issues, and context, which is co-constructed and reconstructed throughout the interaction. A distinction is made between institutional or protocol formality, practised by public speech professionals in serious, public, sometimes mediatic situations, and individual speakers' formality, practised by all, normally within transactional frameworks. The type of bilingualism which characterises the Maltese language situation is described as relatively diglossic, from a social rather than an institutional point of view. This characterisation is based on the functional distribution of Maltese and English, and on the prestige associated with English, considered by the community and the private sector as the H variety, whilst Maltese is the H variety chosen by government institutions for protocol situations. A questionnaire delves into language use and attitudes on a societal level. Ambivalent attitudes emerge regarding regional dialects, as well as veneration of Semitic Maltese, and conflicting attitudes regarding the use of English. These results allow a better understanding of the sociolinguistic value of data obtained from a Maltese corpus. The spoken corpus is obtained thanks to eight key speakers (among which three public speech professionals), recorded in a variety of situations ranging from the formal to the informal. The written corpus is divided into informal (emails, chat) and formal (articles, literary prose, administration texts) sections. The corpus shows that variation takes place in Malta through register shifts and codeswitching, thus covering variation patterns associated with both monolingual and bilingual situations. A study of adverb and conjunction distribution in Maltese confirms their susceptibility to formality, channel and genre. Clause junction and dislocation also vary according to style. Code-switching appears motivated by a will to teach children English and, for adults, by the prestige and the connotations of education associated with this language. The language situation in France is known for the significant difference between standard and non-standard forms; its causes are mentioned. In the Maltese context, variation inherent to Maltese and the possibility to resort to code-switching also provide a wide margin of variation possibilities. The standardisation process in the two situations diverges on several levels; language attitudes converge through an idea of language purity. Language areas susceptible to variation are analyzed, and it is proposed that variation is mostly tolerated in Maltese at the syntactic level. Stylistic variation dominates the non-diglossic French context; a hypothesis is proposed that social variation dominates the Maltese context. Description: PH.D.LINGUISTICS Tue, 01 Jan 2013 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101254 2013-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101066 Title: The relative clause in Arabic : a surface oriented study Abstract: The objective of this study is to provide a descriptive analysis of relative constructions in Arabic. Relative constructions are subsumed by the term 'conjunctive constructions' in classical and contemporary Arabic literature. The term 'conjunctive constructions' for Arab grammarians means 'subordination', of which the relative construction is an instance. The conjunctive construction is decomposed into its two basic constituents, namely, the conjunctive pronoun and the conjunctive sentence. Notions central to the conjunctive sentence, such as the governing principles and the resumptive pronoun, are discussed in terms of function and distribution. The universal hypothesis, 'Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy' proposed in the literature for the typology of relative clauses is adopted to attest relativization in Arabic. Under the resumptive pronoun strategy, Arabic is shown to relativize all grammatical functions specified on the hierarchy. Arabic has two, syntactically independent and semantically related relative clause systems. A brief overview of the theoretical framework assumed in this work, namely, the Principles and Parameters theory of syntax is presented .. A modified version of Rizzi's (1990) Complementizer typology is proposed to account for the complementizer system in Arabic. Relative operator movement is assumed to account for relativization and agreement facts in a unified manner. Resumptive pronouns are discussed in detail and analyzed as pronominal phi-features base-generated in the Agr projection of a complex DP in any of the complement positions. Finally, the gap, which is virtually restricted to the (D)irect (O)bject position and specific to classical Arabic, is extensively discussed in relation to the co-occurrence of the resumptive pronoun in various contexts. Description: PH.D.LINGUISTICS Sat, 01 Jan 2000 00:00:00 GMT https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/101066 2000-01-01T00:00:00Z