ABSTRACT
The islands and seas of Oceania, from the vast thinly populated island of New Guinea to the tiny atolls of Micronesia and Polynesia, cover more than a third of the globe but have a population of just 7 million, of which rather more than half is in Papua New Guinea (Table 1.1). Despite the sparseness of its settlement, Oceania is exceptionally varied in language, culture and ethnicity with isolated islands and impenetrable mountain ranges emphasising difference and enhancing diversity. A quarter of the world’s languages are spoken in the region reflecting extreme geographical and cultural variation, especially in Papua New Guinea (PNG), which alone has over 800 languages, and Vanuatu – with over a hundred – has more per capita than any other country. Despite its recency, colonial contact has had a powerful and wide-ranging impact, resulting in the initial decline of indigenous populations in some areas, the imposition of new languages, political and legal institutions and economic systems. Christian missionaries transformed belief systems, created new and often deep divisions – important in very small states – and emphasised old differences. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries substantial new migration movements, such as that of Indian labour into Fiji and Filipino workers into Micronesia and beyond, have transformed demographic structures, accompanying crucial shifts in economic structures. Rural-urban migration and international migration (resulting in declining or stable populations in parts of Polynesia) have influenced identity, nationality and sovereignty. Urbanisation has transformed the once idyllic, but inaccurate, images of an unspoiled Pacific island paradise into something more mundane.
