ABSTRACT
The colonial administrative centres established in Melanesia in the late nineteenth century were small groups of European-style houses, stores and offices. They were referred to as ‘towns’, but it was some decades before they had grown large enough to materially justify that term. Certainly, it was not until the late twentieth century that any of them had developed in size and density to the point where they could be regarded as ‘urban’ – a term derived from the Latin urbs and nowadays connoting the ambience of a city. From the same Latin root, we derive ‘urbanity’ and the adverb ‘urbane’, the latter originally meaning ‘of the city’ and coming to connote particular deportments and mannerisms symbolic of an educated worldliness. Melanesian towns, however, typically have very small central business districts and little industry and their rapid growth in size and density since nationhood can be largely attributed to migrants, who developed ethno-linguistic enclaves in relatively informal housing, and who still identify themselves strongly with a rural or island place of origin.
