South Malaita Island 3 main dialects! - Sa'a dialect- widely spoken by 75% of the population of South Malaita. - Tolo (mix areare) dialect- is spoken by 20% of the population. - Lau dialect- is spoken by 5% of the people. South Malaita Island, also known as Small Malaita and Maramasike for Areare speakers and Malamweimwei known to more than 80% of the islanders, is the island at the southern tip of the larger island of Malaita in the eastern part of the Solomon Islands. It is called "small" to distinguish it from the much larger mainland. It is now part of Malaita
Malaita Auki, on the northwest coast and is on the northern shore of the Langa Langa Lagoon. The people of the Langa Langa Lagoon and the Lau Lagoon on the northeast coast of Malaita call themselves "wane i asi" ‘salt-water people’ as distinct from "wane i tolo" ‘bush people’ who live in the interior of the island. Most local names for the island are Mala, or its dialect variants Mara or Mwala. The name Malaita or Malayta appears in the logbook of the Spanish explorers who in the 16th century visited the islands, and claimed that to be the actual name.