A Casa del Fascio for Malta

Abstract

In the 1930s, the so-called ‘Language question’ dominated the political scene in Malta. Mussolini’s frequent references to the Mediterranean Sea as Italy’s mare nostrum and Malta as an integral part of Italia Irredenta, coupled with the rise of belligerent Fascism in Italy, made the British colonial authorities particularly sensitive to the infiltration of Italian influence in Malta. The conflict between Italian and English as Malta’s official languages was a highly contentious and divisive political issue in the 1930s, both amongst the Maltese people and also, on a higher political level, between Britain and Italy. For many years before the Second World War, not only Maltese but also English were opposed by the local intelligentsia, especially the clergy and the legal class, who resisted any attempt to reduce the official status of Italian. The British had promulgated provisions in favour of the English language in the 1921 constitution whereby both Italian and English were to be the official languages of Malta and its administration.