Professor fails US student over Australia being a Country

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You are far from alone in that EzraS. But at least you know that New Zealand is a different country, some distance away from our cousins on the other side of the Tasman Sea. A surprising number of Americans don't know this.

When staying in a rich gated community in East Texas as a guest, (and generous hosts who were very kind), I was asked to give a talk to a luncheon group of about 50 residents there. I spent 15 minutes talking about New Zealand, how it is a volcanic country with many distinct species, including the astonishing tuatara, the oldest living species in the world, in terms of survival from the far distant past, and how different New Zealand is from Australia, our links to the USA, and the many marriages that occurred in the wake of the second world war between NZ women and USA servicemen, hosted here during breaks from fighting with us in the Pacific as allies. (I managed to restrain myself from pointing out that we are better rugby players, CyberDad!! !)

At the end of this, I welcomed questions and they were:

"What is it like living in the outback?"
"Do you see kangaroos from your kitchen window?"
"How long was your flight from Australia to the USA?"

I did my best to be gracious and said that I had only visited the outback once, on the periphery, though I had flown over it and the colours are beautiful, that we had nothing like that in New Zealand, that the two countries are very very different in landscape and topography. (My introduction to diplomacy! Who says that aspies can't adapt to how others think and take their viewpoint into consideration!!)

The most beautiful Australian island I have been privileged to visit was Hamilton Island. I hope I will see more in future visits.

Sorry! you are right...Mein gott!
The upshot is that PNG's history involved occupation from everyone, the Dutch, Germans, Indonesians and Japanese before the eastern portion got independence in 1975. Australia's role as a protectorate hasn't quite finished as we oversee their elections and basically run their economy (Australian Mining company BHP are their main source of income) but we also play a similar role in Fiji, Solomon islands and other little nations

Nope! just one country?

East Timor, Papua New Guinea, and Australia are separate independent, sovereign nations.

East Timor is on the eastern part of an island. West Timor is a state of Indonesia which is on the western portion of the island. Papua New Guinea is the non-Malaysian portion of the island of New Guinea.

East Timor and Papua New Guinea are not on the Australian continent. They are considered part of the region known as Oceania (as far as I know). I would guess they would be considered part of the Australian "region."

Last edited by kraftiekortie on 10 Feb 2018, 5:15 pm, edited 3 times in total.

G'day from across the ditch
I myself prefer the "All blacks" to the Australian rugby team so agreed


I enjoy listening to my fellow Australians trying to explain our "wide brown land" to foreigners when I am overseas. I myself have lived in the outback and it's a pretty landscape but a little monotonous (like driving through Nevada or Arizona) full of flies that get into your lungs and hot as heck! (the tourist brochures neglect those bits). I do have kangaroos on my street in a nearby park but need to take a 2min stroll from my house to see them...



A little overated unless you like lying around beaches...I think the Indonesian island of Bali is prettier which is why more Aussies visit Bali than other tourist destination within Australia

Yeah although Oceania is a little outdated and arbitary like saying Asia is everything east of Constantinople

A more accurate definition is based on the Australian continental plate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Plate
The geological pate includes Australia, PNG and New Zealand and once even included southern India

Are you responding to the wiki page of geographic scholars that say that the Australian continent has 4 countries?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia_(continent)

Oceania has 19 countries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceania

This is from National Geographic ...

From a purely geological standpoint, since the above countries lie within the Australian Plate, they should be said to be within the Australian continent.

Last edited by kraftiekortie on 10 Feb 2018, 6:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

According to modern geologic theory the planet is covered with rock "plates" that move around, and some carry landmasses, and the plates rub against each other, and bash into each other, etc.

And there is an "Australian" plate (like there is a North American plate).

That plate extends far out from the continent of Australia to include other landmasses (new guinea, timor, some (but not all) of New Zealand.

So if you use the tectonic plate as the defining thing then, yes, you could say that "Australia has two whole countries, and parts of two more" because that's what lies upon the Australian tectonic plate.

But not only is that a very strange an unorthodox usage of the term "Australia" it has problems.

One of the problems: by that logic you would have to say that Los Angelos, San Diego, and San Francisco, not to mention Tijuana, and all of Baja are all NOT part of North America!

One of the boundries of the North America Plate is the San Andreas Fault that runs through the state of California. All of California west of the San Andreas fault is on the Pacific Plate, and not on the North American Plate. And the includes big Cali cities like Frisco and L.A..

Now...I would never refer to Papua New Guinea and East Timor as "Australia." Ever.

Because they are not Australia. They are their own nations.

I probably wouldn't even refer to both of them as being part of the "Australian Continent."

Though a case could be made for it based on purely geological considerations.

It's true, of course, about the San Andreas Fault.

Dare I say that some citizens of the USA use the term "America" and Americans as if there were no other peoples or countries in the American landmasses. This has always puzzled me.

Y'all do still stand on your heads down there, though, right? I mean, you'd have to since everything is upside down. That part of what I learned in my American colledge is still true, isn't it?

Replace stand with scratch, Darmok. We are constantly astonished by the trends in the USA currently.

And what's wrong with seeing the world through an perspective...huh...huh..

I think this illustrates how subjective national boundaries brainwash the perception of the actual physical structures and flora/fauna

For example on another thread the silly idea that the Bald eagle is a US bird and the Canadian geese are Canadian...obviously the animals couldn't give a toss as migratory birds have been flying over national boundaries since before humans set foot in the Americas

The idea of continents predates the discovery of plate tectonics by a few millennia, so the criteria for what is and isn't a continent tends to be a bit loose, but generally comes down to a contiguous area of land where you can travel from any part to any other part without crossing the sea, separated from other contiguous areas of land by large bodies of water. So it's more to do with coastlines than with plates.

This means that, depending on how you apply the criteria and convention, there are four, five, six, or seven continents.

Four continents — Africa-Asia-Europe, North-and-South-America, Antarctica, Australia
The is probably the strictest by definition, but not widely used.

Five continents — Africa, Asia-Europe, North-and-South-America, Antarctica, Australia
Africa is traditionally spit off as a separate continent because the idea of continents was created by Europeans and, for them, Africa was clearly separated from Europe by the Mediterranean Sea. Also the link between Africa and Asia is only a small isthmus.

Six continents — Africa, Asia-Europe, North America, South America, Antarctica, Australia
The Americas get split in two, following the same logic as separating Africa; the link between the two is only an small isthmus. This tends to be the continent model taught in Eastern Europe, Russia, and Japan.

A different Six continents — Africa, Asia, Europe, North-and-South-America, Antarctica, Australia
Europe is separated from Asia along the line of the Ural mountains. This doesn't make any sense according to any definition, but reflects the fact Europe was long considered a separate continent from Asia. This is the model taught in France (and former colonies), Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania, Greece, and Latin America.

Seven continents — Africa, Asia, Europe, North America, South America, Antarctica, Australia
This is the model taught in English-speaking countries, including the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom, as well as China, India, Pakistan, and the Philippines.

A continent is also supposed to be large, with Australia being the classic border case, being either the world's largest island or the world's smallest continent, depending on the whims of the geographer. These days it's usually considered as the smallest continent.

By this definition, the country of Australia covers the entirety of the continent of Australia, and most Aussies tend to treat the two as synonymous. It's often taught here in Australia, that Australia is the only country in the world to have a continent to itself.

Last edited by Amaltheia on 10 Feb 2018, 9:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.