Asia is the largest continent, occupying approximately 17,000,000 square miles (44,030,000 square kilometers), or about 30 percent of the world's land area. It is roughly rectangular in shape and bounded on three sides by oceans (and their various seas): the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Pacific Ocean on the east, and the Indian Ocean on the south. On the west, Asia's traditional boundaries are the mountains and bodies of water separating it from Europe. The Suez Canal divides Asia from Africa on the southwest, and the narrow Bering Strait, which links the Arctic and Pacific Oceans, separates Asia from North America. Asia is a continent of enormous extremes including the world's highest peak: Mount Everest.
Culturally, Asia is divided into the following regions; Southwest Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, North Asia, and Central Asia. Asia was the birthplace of the world's earliest civilizations and its major religions. Three of the world's great religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, were originated in Southwest Asia and with Hinduism and Buddhism, Islam remains one of the major religions of Asia.
Asia's population was estimated as 3,968,000,000 in 2006 containing about 60 percent of the global population and is growing rapidly with annual growth of 1.2 percent.
Its major language group is Sino-Tibetan, which includes languages spoken in China and throughout Southeast Asia. Indo-European languages comprise the second-largest group of languages spoken in Asia.
Web Sites
- Open Directory Project
- countryreports.org
- nationsonline.org
- timeanddate.com
- University of Texas Libraries
- The Library of Congress
- worldatlas.com
Maps:
Catalog
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Databases
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