Maltese ‘self-stereotype’ themselves negatively

A study has found that the Maltese living in Australia are far more comfortable with their self-identity than their Maltese counterparts, since the latter attribute far more negative traits to their fellow Maltese, and even rate themselves more negatively than their European counterparts. 

This emerges from a study by Gordon Sammut, lecturer at the University of Malta’s Psychology Department. In collaboration with Prof. Marco Giannini and two of his students from the University of Florence, Sammut penned the paper ‘Self-stereotypes, Maltese identities and intercultural relations: A comparison of Maltese in Malta and the Australian Diaspora’, which explores this curious contrast between the Maltese who are settled in Australia and those who are based in Malta. 

According to the study, the Maltese living in Malta view themselves in a predominantly negative light, when compared to their Australian counterparts. While both the native Maltese and the Maltese-Australians attribute a more or less equal amount of both positive and negative traits to each other, Sammut found that the Maltese would then ‘rate’ their negative traits very high. Asked to list some of these traits, they put down storbjużi (loud/noisy), nervuzi (short-tempered), sindikajri (nosy/gossipers), għażżenin (lazy), hamalli (chavvy/trash), arroganti (arrogant), razzisti (racist/xenophobic), and moħħhom magħluq (close-minded).

Employing the seven-point Likert scale, Sammut found that ‘for the Maltese in Malta, every trait presented except for laziness received a higher rating than the neutral midpoint in the scale. This means that all traits presented were deemed representative of the Maltese except for laziness,’ Sammut writes, adding that relative to Europeans, the Maltese rate themselves more positively on every positive trait, and more negatively on every negative trait. 

‘In general, the Maltese in Malta thus hold themselves to be better than the Europeans in various respects, and worse than the Europeans in various other respects.’

Sammut found that this was not the case with the Maltese based in Australia who on the contrary, listed more positive traits than negative ones. They described the Maltese as being family orientated, hardworking, friendly, helpful, proud, responsible, religious and respectful, while listing indulgent, competitive, jealous, stubborn, blasphemous, impatient, shifty and gossipy as negative traits. 

Identity and integration

We shouldn’t overlook the importance of this ‘self-stereotyping’, because according to Sammut, “A positive social identity is associated with positive self-esteem, social and psychological wellbeing, as well as positive intra-community relations.”

Noting that while the Australian-Maltese also listed negative traits, Sammut pointed out that this is part of any national identity, and that it’s worth pointing out how “they hold the negative features as less salient than positive ones”.  

Speaking to MaltaToday, Sammut suggests that the key differences between the two communities boil down to favouring full assimilation with the European mainstream in the case of native Maltese, and a more balanced integration in the case of Maltese-Australians. This means that, since the native Maltese are highly critical of their national identity, while finding the European mainstream attractive, the tendency among this group is to ‘erase’ any traces of ‘Malteseness’ when, say, moving to a different country. 

On the other hand, in the case of the Australian-Maltese, integration rather than assimilation takes precedence, with the Maltese migrants to Australia being given ample room to practise their customs and cultural habits. Sammut believes that this is enabled, in part, by virtue of the fact that Australia has adopted “some strong integrationist policies over the years”.

“It has been very strict with regard to allowing migrants to come in but when they do, successive Australian governments have sought to actively integrate migrant communities through various policies,” Sammut said, adding that – significantly enough – Canada, another country boasting a high number of Maltese expats, is also similar in this regard. 

Sammut suggests that the native Maltese tendency to revere the European model can backfire in many ways, chief of them being the fact that, unlike their antipodean counterparts who found a welcoming space in which to enact their local habits, “in relations with Europeans, even locally, the Maltese are at risk of confining themselves to the underdog position for the simple fact that they look up to Europeans”. 

But the negative effect could even spread outwards, with the Maltese adopting a “selective xenophobia” to foreign communities that they don’t deem “European enough”. 

“And this then leads to efforts on the parts of these communities, who end up on the receiving end of discrimination, to gain recognition and fair treatment through challenge and strife. With the caveat that the more they challenge, the more they’re stereotyped, and the situation may, if left unattended, degenerate into a spiral of conflict over time. It will be very difficult to reverse this spiral once it kicks in,” Sammut added.