Minglish
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Minglish refers to the phenomenon of code switching between Maltese and English.
While English is an official language of the Maltese Islands (along with the Maltese language - Malti - the native tongue), it is, for many Maltese, considered a second language. As a result, many Maltese either switch back and forth or mix syntactic and lexical aspects of Malti onto English) while engaging in conversation or writing.
In the past, this phenomenon used to be associated with the town of Sliema in Malta and with Maltese persons who serviced the British colonialists. Of late, however, Minglish has spread out throughout the islands of Malta and Gozo.
There are several reasons for its widespread use, but the main one may be the fact that the Minglish speaker, attempts to speak English without possessing the necessary vocabulary and/or grammatical knowledge to do so. This is true for speakers who wish to appear sophisticated, but also for those who need to communicate in English for whatever reason.
An example of a Minglish phrase is "How much I didn't see you", meaning: "I haven't seen you for such a long time!". Although this is grammatically incorrect in Standard English, it is correct in Maltese. Another common syntactic difference between Standard English and Minglish is the removal of certain articles as in "I haven't seen you for such long time!"
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