• Rothe@piefed.social
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    11 days ago

    The entire concept of continents is entirely cultural. The number of continents taught in schools varies greatly from country to country (specifically because the Americas can be 1-3 continents in different systems).

    So yeah, there is no objective correct about continents, it really depends on which cultural tradition you were brought up in.

    • Ostfriesentee@feddit.org
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      11 days ago

      I mean, couldn’t you just work with the tectonic plates? They roughly align with the traditional “continents”.

      • SapphironZA@sh.itjust.works
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        11 days ago

        Americans are going to love having to learn the name of the continent that split their west coast cities.

        They will wish it would drop into the sea or something. 😂

      • SmoothLiquidation@lemmy.world
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        10 days ago

        It’s a good idea but it opens a whole other can of worms, like by the tectonic plate definition, India is its own continent.

    • Melchior@feddit.org
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      11 days ago

      specifically because the Americas can be 1-3 continents in different systems

      I know North and South America and it being a single continent, but three? Or are you talking about Afro-Eurasia?

        • Melchior@feddit.org
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          11 days ago

          Really? Who considers Central America a continent? Not a region, but a continent. I always understood it as something similar to say North Africa.

          • inari@piefed.zip
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            11 days ago

            In Brazil I was taught in terms of North, Central, and South America. I suspect it may be similar in other Latin American countries.

            • igmelonh@feddit.online
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              11 days ago

              Most LatAm I’ve spoken to online (including Brazilians) insisted that it’s one continent and that North, Central, and South America are subcontinents. Several of them have ranted at me about how it’s immoral for the US to monopolize “American” because of it.

              fwiw in the US I was taught that North and South America are two continents and that Central America and the Caribbean are subcontinents of NA; the Panama-Colombia border demarcates the continents.

              Only other one that really ever gets brought up is Australia vs Oceania as a continent. Don’t think I ever heard of Oceania until after graduating.