Jaħli has been crowned word of the year for 2022 but gayyaġni – which started off as an insult and was turned into a meme by the LGBT community – also made a colourful comeback last year.

Michael Spagnol, who heads the University of Malta’s Department of Maltese and is behind Kelma Kelma, gave us the top five words that made it into the Maltese lexicon in 2022.

Jaħli: Abundantly used on all social media platforms through 2022, jaħli (literal meaning ‘he wastes’) has left several unsure about what it really means.

For some, it is the Maltese version of ‘attaboy’, for others the more contemporary alternative to ‘ara l-wajer’ (mind the wire). Still, some use it at the end of a phrase to mean ‘let’s go’ or ‘hooray’.

But the origins of the catchphrase seem to date to the 1970s, with some recalling using it to compliment a woman walking down the street.

By time, it took on a wider meaning, to refer to something as being cool – used even to compliment Duminku Mintoff – and made a comeback in the 1990s.

In 2022, it was revived through traditional – sometimes vulgar – kwartini (quatrains popular in the past especially among women) on Tiktok posted by people of all ages.

Gayyaġni, gayaġni… or gejjaġni? As politically incorrect as they come, the word made headlines when a priest – later cleared of hate speech by a court – said that gayyaġni (‘gayness’) was worse than being possessed by the devil.

But the LGBT community turned the homophobic slur on its head, reclaimed it and wore it proudly. Fashion designer Marco Parascandolo and illustrator Johann Agius even launch a limited special edition of fashion wear featuring the word.

Linguistically, despite disagreement over its written form, the word follows the pattern of words such as żiblaġni, guffaġni, ksuħaġni, where Maltese speakers coined a word to fill a gap in their own lexicon.

In this case, the English word ‘gay’ was coined with the ‘-aġni’ suffix of Italian roots to make up a word that sounds less vulgar than an existing word with a similar meaning.

Femiċidju: Tragically, the year 2022 started with the horrific murder of a woman: Paulina Dembska.

The following 12 months saw the murder of another two women: Rita Ellul and Bernice Cassar, whose former partners were charged with their killing.

The murders sparked protests, with women rights’ groups ramping up the pressure to introduce femicide as a crime separate to homicide.

The government introduced the concept of femicide into Maltese law in June.

Although the concept of femicide is not new – and is referenced as far back as the 1800s – never as in 2022 has the word femiċidju been uttered so frequently in public spaces, news bulletins, social media, law courts and political fora.

Initially, some opted for feminiċidju but by the end of the year, most had settled for femiċidju.

Abort: Similarly, abort is not a new word, however, locally it had definitely not been used as much as it was used throughout the second half of the year. In the case of abort, the word was even uttered – sometimes screamed – in hospital corridors, theatre circles and parliamentary sittings.

Inti gamer? The audience-participatory joke cycle, which over recent years developed into a meme to taunt people on social media, rose to new popularity levels in 2022 when, during the electoral campaign, PN leader Bernard  Grech amassed over 2,000 likes for his comeback to a question on the group Malta Pastizziposting Ir-Raba’ (now Benna Milkyposting).

Grech’s “Ijja bro”, accompanied by a photo of himself with a game controller in hand and another photo of him in action, earned him a seal of approval from one of the Facebook page’s administrators and followers.

Kelma Kelma turns 10

Kelma Kelma started out in January of 2013 as a Facebook page featuring curiosities about the Maltese language, kicking off a social media movement that proved the development of the language was not just up to academics.

Launched by Spagnol – then a PhD graduate and lecturer – Kelma Kelma had filled a local gap on a platform that until then mostly featured political, customer service and satirical pages in Maltese.

Spagnol would upload a word of the day, like bużillis and sinifiteti and explain new words making their way into the Maltese language like tiffrejpja, tikklikkja and tillajkja.

Since then, other pages were launched by others, bringing together social media users with an interest in the language.

Kelma Kelma, however, remained a reference point for many.

“I think Kelma Kelma and other Maltese language pages have proved that the language is not just what we read in dictionaries or grammar books. The Maltese language is especially kept alive through the spoken language,” Spagnol said.

“The page tried to suggest words such as stessu (selfie) and borrinu (snowman) that show the flexibility of the language.

“However, it is up to the people who speak the language every day, rather than academics, whether such words enter the Maltese lexicon.”