Talk:Australia (continent)/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3

Suggested change of article name

The scope of this article is good but I think there are better names for it. There is much debate above about the Australia-only vs Australia-New Guinea basis for the continent. Good points have been raised by JackofOz and others and while I think they are ultimately red herrings, they have been dismissed with arguments that don’t stand up.

There are several different meanings of the words continent and continental. One is a continuous landmass or mainland, a second is all the lands and islands on a continental shelf and a third includes associated oceanic islands not on the shelf. Taking Europe for example, the “Continent” or “continental Europe” is only the mainland, the 2nd definition includes islands on the shelf like the British Isles and the 3rd includes oceanic islands like Iceland.

In the case of Australia, the first and most common meaning is the Australian mainland. To dismiss this as pedagogic simplification is (ironically) an oversimplification, if not actually wrong. Sometimes continent appears to be a synecdoche for the whole of the country of Aust., as in the title of the book by historian David Day, “Claiming a continent: a history of Australia” (1996). And sometimes it means Aust and NG. To dismiss the term “island continent” as an informal term for marketing is incorrect. Sir Grenfell Price, a leading Australian geographer, titled his 1972 book about Aust, "Island Continent". Arthur Scholes, in the foreword to his book about Aust, "The Sixth Continent" (1958), said “[this] is the story of an island continent”. A much more recent publication, "Australia: the complete encyclopedia" (2001) says, “Today the island continent of Australia extends from about 10 S to 45 S”.

Writers, from scholars to journalists, usually mean the Aust mainland. Marcus Clarke titled an 1877 book “History of the continent of Australia and the island of Tasmania”. Geographer Ronald Heathcote made a similar distinction, “around Tasmania and the southeastern coasts of the continent” (‘’Australia’’ 1994, 12), while also recognising the broader definition: “If the boundaries of the continent are extended to the 100 fathom line to include the offshore continental shelf, a … component forming a link with the island of New Guinea could be distinguished. However … attention here will be limited to the main continental area” (p15). Flannery and Schouten said, “Australia, which comprises the bulk of Meganesia, is indeed the smallest continent” (in Natural History 102 (6) 40-45, 1993). I searched the SMH [1] for “continent” and all the references in the Australian context seemed to refer to the mainland. And as JackofOz points out above, many Wikipedia articles refer to the mainland as the continent. This is not wrong – it is just different from the concept that this article is based on.

I think the best solution is to rename this article. Note that Johnson (2004, 12) (cited by Snottygobble/Hesperian) said “the continent extends to the edge of the continental shelf”. He did not say, “Australia extends to the edge of the continental shelf”. In fact, on the same page he has an image of Australia that does not include NG, and elsewhere he refers to “the Australian continent” with no indication he means to include NG (eg, p 106). Much of the earlier debates above are about the ambiguous terms “the continent Australia”, “the Australian continent” or “the continent of Australia”. The objections raised are unlikely to be raised if we were instead discussing the continent of “Australia-New Guinea”, “Sahul”, “Meganesia” etc.

An article name, to distill down Wikipedia’s article naming convention, should be well-known (easily recognised and readily thought of when making links) and reasonably unambiguous. Unlike article content, common usage is more important than recent scholarship – see WP:COMMONNAME. By these criteria, the merits of the candidates are:

  • Australia (continent). Very ambiguous as it commonly refers to the mainland. Has a country bias similar to Greater Australia (see following).
  • Greater Australia. Could be ambiguous (Mainland & Tas; Aust & NG; Aust & territories). Rejected by scholars, along with Greater New Guinea[1]
  • Australia-New Guinea. Unambiguous. Easily recognisable. No reason that link-makers should not think of it.
  • Sahul. Unambiguous; differentiated from Sahul Shelf. Used more than the following names but not as easily recognised as Australia-New Guinea.
  • Meganesia. Ambiguous – also used to mean Aust & NZ (Theroux, 1992) and Aust, NZ & Hawaii (according to Wareham, 2002).
  • Australinea. Unambiguous. Invented by Dawkins (2004) and little used. Excludes smaller islands like the Aru Islands, according to a review by Tim Flannery.

Looking at it objectively I think Australia-New Guinea is the leading contender, although I have a personal liking for Sahul. Nurg 10:30, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Clearly this debate is in good hands. I support Nurg's proposal for a rename, and I'll trust his judgement on the new name. Hesperian 11:57, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
I understand the points made by Nurg, but the point of this article (and I queried its intention early on) was to talk about the continent and not the island. In the first instance the lead should define what we are talking about and I think does so. If we want to move away from Australia (continent) as an article title, then I favour either Sahul or Australinea, but I suspect both those terms come with their own baggage and are not quite as general and I would prefeer redirects from those to the simpler Australia (continent). I do not favour Australia-New Guinea as that seems too tied up with political boundaries.
Nurg makes the point about continental Europe excluding say the British Isles. I feel that is because it is an Anglocentric term and the Continent is somewhere you travel too. The English of a certain generation and class would use it in the same breath as talking about the "Near East" and the "Far East" ... fine terms for the English of a certain period but we are talking continent small c and lining up with articles such as that on North America, different discussion to English travelling in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Often for many people North America is synonomous with the United States but they can quickly disentangle themselves from that as Canada is so large. Note that North America as a continent does not equal North American Plate. If you ask somebody to list continents they do not go Africa, Asia, North and South America, Antarctica, Sahul ... or Australinea or Australia-New Guinea - the last in that list is Australia. We need to make it clear in the name that we are not talking the political entity. We need to make it clear in the lead how we have defined our terms. The term continent, as per the English travelling classes to name just one group, can be used in different ways. Wikipedia has an article on Continent and there it has listed the subject of this article as Australia, another name would not match the list in that article in my opinion - but we should certainly discuss it there too if changing the article name.
If any editor thinks that the term "island continent" does not derive from pedagogic simplification ... I have no difficulty with a rewrite of that section and an expansion to acknowledge popular usage, for example as per Nurg's search of the Sydney Morning Herald and reference to various scholars (normally in the arts though). My write up on that point was in response to a couple of comments on the article such as can be seen above, for example those by DXRAW, on this talk page, which were asserting "every single student in Australia is taught that Australia is a continent of its own" plus "In Australia we are taught that the continent of Australia is only our country and that New Guinea and other country :P are part of Asia. This is what the Australian education system says." from Rkeys.
As one point of reference of what Australian school children are taught, the NSW HSC curriculum at [2] states "The Australian continent lies entirely within the Australia-India plate, and so it does not experience plate boundary processes." At [3] doesn't help with a definition but for example discusses the "Interaction between the converging Australian and Pacific plates has produced the current New Guinea mobile belt." They also refer to continent probably as in island continent at [4] and [5] [6] etc - it isn't clear. They never refer in their curriculum to "Sahul" or "Australianea" (at least not found by Google): Google HSC curriculum on continent compared with a similar search for Sahul or Australinea
Not sure where that leaves us, other than the importance of a lead clearly defining terms and robust referencing. I would really rather not go for the alternate article names as above, they are not simple and don't match the continent series, but of course won't object if concensus goes another way.--Golden Wattle talk 21:14, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Amen to what Nurg said. —Nightstallion (?) 15:30, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
Responding to some of Golden Wattle's points. Re Australia-New Guinea seems too tied up with political boundaries: Not sure what you mean. The New Guinea part doesn't correspond to political boundaries. Australia is a political entity, but that could be used more as an argument against the present article name, than against the proposed one.
It is totally correct that the term continent is used in different ways. The different usages are now explained better on the continent page. It is also correct that when people list the continents they say Australia. But exactly what they mean by Australia varies. Often it will be the mainland of Australia only; relatively few people will be thinking of New Guinea as well. Most dictionaries include "continuous" land in their definitions of "continent" (see references in continent); only some extend it to the shelf as an additional definition. When Wp articles refer to the mainland of Australia as a continent (either explicitly or implicitly), or use continent as a synecdoche for the whole of the country of Aust., they should link to Australia; when they refer to the continental-shelf continent, they should link to Australia (continent)/Australia-New Guinea. The continent article links to both as appropriate - and also to Oceania and Australasia, to cover all usages! Granted there is ambiguity between Australia the mainland and Australia the country. But the ambiguity is reality and we have to accept it (and explain it where necessary). And that ambiguity will not be resolved by whatever we call this article - it could be resolved by creating an additional article for the mainland alone (but I'm not suggesting that be done - I can live with the ambiguity). Nurg 05:59, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
I'm sure that Matthew Flinders and Lachlan Macquarie were not thinking of New Guinea when they proposed "Australia" as the name for the country (although it wasn't a country back then, just a collection of British colonies, which did not even cover the entire big island). The issue seems to be that geographers, in their wisdom(?), have only relatively recently given the name "Australia" to a continent, when the name already applied to a country that was a part of that continent. (God only knows what they were thinking of. They would never have named Africa "Nigeria", for example, because of the obvious scope for confusion.) I wonder if we can find out when this continent-naming occurred, and why they chose that particular name. If "Australia" is indeed the accepted formal technical geographical term for the continent, I don't think that Wikipedia has any brief - consensus or not - to go around renaming it to anything else, as this would breach our no original research policy. Besides, nobody but us few would know of the existence of this new name, and we'd have an article that few people would ever read. But on the other hand, "Sahul" also exists. So are geographers unanimous in what they call the continent? If not, why not, and do they intend to get together to agree on what the continent will be known as? Can we do anything to influence that decision to ensure it is NOT called "Australia". In the meantime, I still firmly believe that readers of the article about the country Australia need to be informed that the same name also refers to a larger entity, and that the continent and the country are not coterminous, but overlap. Another issue that's just dropped into my mind is that some years ago Australia the big island lost its claim as the world's largest island, on the basis that it is more correctly described as a continental land mass, and the honour now goes to Greenland. I can accept that. However, if the big island is no longer viewed as a continent but only part of a continent, doesn't that mean that it's an island after all and should be restored to its place as the world's largest. If it's not a continent in its own right, and it's not an island, what is it? JackofOz 23:08, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
I don't believe geographers have named the continental-shelf continent "Australia". Nurg 05:59, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
JackofOz wrote: "God only knows what they were thinking of. They would never have named Africa "Nigeria", for example, because of the obvious scope for confusion." Your faith is misplaced: "Africa" is in origin the name of the Roman province around modern Tunis, and whoever first used it for the entire continent did the equivalent of your "Nigeria" - we're just lucky that the more restricted usage has become obsolete. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Orcoteuthis (talk • contribs) 18:10, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I do think it is important that we define what we are talking about. To that end, I have placed the words "In geology," at the beginning of the article. Just so people know we are not talking about political, historical, biological or any other definition. If we are talking about the geological continent, then we should use the name geologists use, and just make that clear. Other than that I really don't have an opinion. --Michael Johnson 23:30, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

December 2006 discussion on name change (continued)

I proposed a name change, suggesting "Australia-New Guinea". With Hesperian and Nightstallion, that's 3 in favour, Michael Johnson is neutral and Golden Wattle is opposed. JackofOz's comments were perhaps based on a bit of a misapprehension (apologies in advance if that's not right). So that's a majority in favour, but I have also responded to what I think are Golden Wattle's main points. I think there is a mandate for the change, but will wait a bit in case there are further comments. Nurg 05:59, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Given that Australia (country) and Oceania (political) already have articles and this is a primarily geological article, this should be under Australia-New Guinea if it is to be moved from its present location.Orderinchaos78 12:35, 17 December 2006 (UTC)
I think its very important to qualify that International Maritime Law and the International law issues that arose from the Australia-East Timor negotations do not relate to this article SatuSuro 13:04, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Disagree that a name change is needed, none of these options are likely to be search terms. Lankiveil 13:26, 17 December 2006 (UTC).

Lankiveil, what do you think are the most likely search terms? Say, the top 3. Nurg 09:23, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
The current article title, for one =). My objections are basically the same as Golden Wattle's comments below. Lankiveil 12:40, 22 December 2006 (UTC).

Disagree (still) --Golden Wattle talk 21:34, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi Golden Wattle. I responded to some of your earlier comments. What are your main reasons for still disagreeing? Nurg 09:23, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
I think disambiguation by (continent) is appropriate and adequate to distinguish from the other uses of the word Australia. That to date the article on continent refers to it as Australia is a good indication that the most common term to think about the subject of this article is Australia and not some other term. I think other terms including Australia-New Guinea, Sahul, Meganesia, Greater Australia and Australinea should all be redirects (as they are in fact are with the exception of Greater Australia) and thus they will work as search terms. The word synecdoche is absolutely perfect for describing the quandary but I don't think the answer is to rename with another term. The answer is I believe to have a good lead to the article defining what we mean and proper references to support our assertion.
I note that Australia-New Guinea has been used quite frequently in other articles, particularly zoology articles (see Special:Whatlinkshere/Australia-New_Guinea) and the next most commonly linked term is Sahul - refer Special:Whatlinkshere/Sahul
My disagreement is not strong, merely my two cents and I am happy to go with concensus.--Golden Wattle talk 19:50, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

I can appreciate the reasoning behind this proposed move, but the problem is that there is really no alternative. None of the alternatives proposed are commonly known. In fact, I'd say they're only known to the geologist community, and the chances of them needing to research on Wikipedia seems slim. The current title seems like the least worst alternative, to me.

My other problem is that including New Guinea seems frightfully arbitrary, while there is some legitimate scientific opinion holding that they're the same 'continent', it doesn't seem to be dominant. To me, putting the two together just because they're on the same continental shelf seems like moving Europe to Europe-Britain, or North America to North America-Newfoundland.

Based on this, I'm going to have to object to this change, sorry. MichelleG 13:13, 22 December 2006 (UTC).

"Australia-New Guinea" may not be commonly known but surely when people come across it, they quickly deduce what it means with considerable accuracy. On the other hand, "Australia (continent)" is highly ambiguous as it commonly refers to the Australian mainland only. Can you explain what you mean when you say including New Guinea seems arbitrary? It seems to me a fairly precise name. The analogy with "Europe-Britain" and "North America-Newfoundland" is not quite apt as neither Europe nor North America are individual countries. Likewise we do not have articles called Europe (continent) or North America (continent), but it would also be inapt to use that fact as an argument in favour of my proposed change, so I merely slip the fact in. I don't think scholars in Britain or Newfoundland would object as much to being told they are part of Europe or North America, as scholars in Papuan Indonesia or Papua New Guinea would object to being told they are in Australia, the continent. Nurg 11:09, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Hello - two cents worth from North America -- Speaking as a geologist, I know that Australia and New Guinea and a few other items like Timor are more or less on the same tectonic plate (although it could be argued that NE New Guinea is a zone caught up between the Australian and Pacific Plates) and as you all know, they share the same continental shelf. But if you say to me "the continent of Australia," I would hear that in the geographic, not geologic context, and would think of Australia per se, plus Tasmania, perhaps. If you look up the area of Australia in any atlas or almanac, it includes neither the continental shelf nor New Guinea. It seems to me that this is mostly a matter of semantics, but since the lead paragraph of the article starts with "In geology...", then as long as you are clear what you mean (as it seems to me you all are), then just go with it. There might be a reason for a link on New Guinea pages to this one. Cheers, Geologyguy 15:49, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Ah, Geologyguy, I have been deferring doing anything about the "In geology..." bit which Michael Johnson added. I think it is inappropriate. The majority of the content is about geography (including biogeography) and biology. There is a little about geology and brief reference (which could be expanded) to archaeology. Of the 5 categories, 2 are explicitly geography, 2 more I consider also geography and the 5th is natural history (which can include geology but is also much broader). A geology article of relevance is actually Australian Plate, although it's not called that (not sure why it doesn't have its own article). I don't think it is necessary to have "In ..." anything at the start, but if we do, I think "In geography" is more appropriate. The concept of continent is primarily geographic, is it not? Geology deals more with plates and cratons than continents, does it not? Geologists and Michael Johnson (biologist) - your thoughts?
I understood the article was to be about geology, which is why I added the (admittedly clumsy) "in geology". Clearly the definition of the area covered is not a bioligical, historical, cultural, political or geological definition. If it has no validity in geology, then what reason is there for it? --Michael Johnson 01:19, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
Now, if we accept even that the topic is a combination of geography, geology, botany and archaeology, Geologyguy may swing in favour of a name change, based on his 2nd and 3rd sentences. Is that right, Geologyguy?
Anyway, what reputable geology sources say that "Australia" is the name of the continent which embraces Australia and New Guinea? If scholars won't even call it "Greater Australia"[1], I'd be very surprised if they called it "Australia". Nurg 11:09, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I agree (as I tried to say in my roundabout way above!) that the concept of continent is basically geographic. And indeed, the geologic concept is "Australian Plate" or, as redirected, "Indo-Australian Plate" - there is not a separate page because the Indian Ocean plate and Australia are more or less moving together as one. Just as you say, to me as a geologist, "Australia" does not mean the plate, it means either the country, or the continent which would be more or less one and the same (depending mostly on how you count Tasmania). The Australian (or Indo-Australian) plate has little to do with the continent (though it does include it), or even the continent+continental shelf, inasmuch as the plate includes vast areas of oceanic crust. I'm not familiar with a usage of the word 'continent' that automatically includes the continental shelf - without specification, shelfal areas are not counted in areas, nor (I think - I am not a lawyer) in determinations of international boundaries etc.
So, even though I sort of applauded the intro "In geology..." above, I was actually still uncomfortable with "Australia (continent)" because in geology, the word continent alone would, I think, usually imply the geographic context. We would go on to talk about continental shelves, continental crust, continental rocks, none of which would necessarily be coincident with the geographic continent. I would definitely make a distinction between any 'continent' and 'continental areas' - I would say that is general among geologists, though obviously I can't speak for the entire profession. Thus, the sentence in paragraph 3, "Geologically the continent extends to the edge of the continental shelf, so the now-separate lands can still be considered a continent" would for me need to be re-phrased as "Geologically continental rocks extend to the edge of the continental shelf, so the now-separate lands would all be considered part of the same continental mass." To me, below-sea-level areas are in no way "continents" (geographically) even though they may indeed be continental in nature (geologically). "Continental" and "continent" have significantly different technical meanings, which seems to me to be the source of much of the disagreement (most amicable disagreements, might I note!) here.
No, I'm not aware of sources that equate "Australia" the continent with Australia+New Guinea, unless in something where it was defined for convenience. Likewise, there might exist refs that called "Greater Australia" some who-knows-what entity that might include Indonesia (or parts of it) and even New Zealand, for some specific purpose. To me such writing is confusing, though if the rationale and definition for convenient reference are made clear, I guess it is OK - but not in general and not for an encyclopedia (except in disambiguation, I guess).
I don't know if this helps or complicates more, but I guess I pretty much agree with everything Nurg says. You all are more familiar with how this article has evolved, so I have no plans to do any editing here but just wanted to share what I hope is a general geologist's view (others out there who disagree should jump in!) Cheers Geologyguy 14:12, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

On 16 December I raised (but did not promote) the possibility of creating an additional article for the mainland alone. I am now firming up this suggestion as it may resolve some of the issues in some people's minds. I have created a draft which I have tentatively called "Australia (mainland)". So I now propose either:

  1. Rename the present article "Australia-New Guinea" (as already discussed) and create the new article called either "Australia (mainland)" or "Australia (continent)".
  2. Just rename the present article "Australia-New Guinea" (as already discussed).

What does everyone prefer? I am happy with either and if a new article is created, I am happy with either name for it. If we go with the first option, we would need to think carefully about the mechanics in order to minimise the amount of link-changing required - but for now we just need to decide in principle. Feel free to edit the draft in my namespace. Nurg 09:36, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

OK it seems "Australia (Continent)" does not correctly apply to the defined area. It seems Australian Plate might - so how about renaming it thus, or else how about just deleting the entire article? --Michael Johnson 01:19, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
I too like the idea of renaming to "Australian Plate", or, if necessary, "Australian Plate (geology)". Lankiveil 03:54, 28 December 2006 (UTC).
Just so you all understand, the geological Australian Plate - which can be taken as a subdivision of the Indo-Australian Plate, will also include the part of New Zealand west of the Alpine Fault (that is most of western South Island and a good bit of western North Island, as well as all the oceanic areas around Australia. Cheers! Geologyguy 04:26, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
Renaming to "Australian Plate" wouldn't be correct for the reasons given by Geologyguy. Nurg 10:16, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
I would be happy for Nurg's draft article to be called Australia (continent), and for the current article to be moved as a separate concept. I agree that the proposed use of Australian Plate is incorrect.--cj | talk 00:57, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Nurg's article is good as far as it goes, and why not just put it up? As for Australia (continent) what is to be done? I don't know what it is, I just know what it isn't! Geologists, please tell us, is what is being described from a geological point of view a valid concept, and if it is what is it called????? --Michael Johnson 04:11, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Support the move back to Australia-New Guinea, which is where this article used to live. Australia (continent) is unhelpful, as the geological and geographic senses of "continent" are not entirely synonymous. Sahul and Meganesia aren't bad choices either, but Australia-New Guinea is probably most widely used and understood. Tom Radulovich 07:33, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Support fot the move away from Australia (continent), assuming the article continues to be about a wider area than the Australian mainland. See discussion in subsequent sections, in which Nurg has pointed out that Australia (continent) is unverifiable for this. I also reject Australia (continent) for an article about the mainland only, despite frequent reference to the mainland as a "continent" (as opposed to an "island"), because of its incorrect implication about New Guinea. Incidentally, imo we should clearly support the concept of the continent in question covering the whole of the island of New Guinea, which is both physically and culturally correct; if Turkey and Russia can be in two continents then so can Indonesia. Viewfinder 09:42, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Despite the claims about what Australians are taught in schools, I have yet to find a reliable authority that includes a map which places the eastern part of New Guinea within Asia, although there is some (imo wrong, see above para) variation re the western part. Viewfinder 09:55, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeesh

My $0.02.;

  1. Australia (continent) is fine. Or you could go with "Continental Australia". Either way, I think such a long and pointless discussion about changing an article such as this merely demonstrates the pedantry of those concerned, and though I hestitate to claim dfference from such a despiccable and embarassing state by prostrating myself to the level of you all in order to carry forth this discussion, I feel I must in order tom via one last act of pedantry, dissolve such a concentration of ridiculous pedants that it hurts my brain.
  1. In a geologic context, Australia (continent) is technically bunkum anyway; it's the Indo-Australian Plate. It is composed of several distinct fragments of continental crust in a mire of oceanic crustal material, a few remnant ocean island plateaux and failed rifts. However, I agree with everyone who disagrees with a geological basis for naming this article, not because they are more right or less pedantic than the rest of you (and you guys are WAY pedantic, even by Wiki standards!), but because even if the current article lacks coherent geological information it is only a matter of time to put this in with some creative copy editing and a cut and paste, but because it makes no sense to do this because the majority of humans are NOT geologists and consider only continents as being land masses above mean sea level.
  1. All the other terms, especially Australia-New Guinea and the like, are obscure terms far from the common usage of most people interested in "Australia, the only nation which owns an entire continent", etcetera. Sahul, meganesia are both rarely used, if not completely obscure terms. Meganesia is to my mind just a flippant anthropological foil to "micronesia"; the anthropological grouping of the Australian aborigine with the micronesian and polynesian peoples. Which is bullshit anyway, as the two groups are completely culturally and historically seperate. So micronesia is out. Sahul? I haven't even heard of it before, and I'm an Aussie.
  1. Functionally, there is no synedouche or pedagogical or semantic reason, if anyone really gives a flying fuck, about whether you call an apple an apple or a spade a spade. Why change the name of an article just because it sounds clunky? Really, be honest. You all just want a flashy name which fits just right and doesn't have parentheses in it, because it makes it seem like we can't come up- with a perfect one word name for an article. But this is ridiculous; Australia (continent) obviously means many things; this page could EASILY be turned into its own disambiguation page into Australia (continental geology), Continental Australia (biology), or whatever. But should we split or keep, is more a question of clunkiness of the article than of the title.

So, I vote, that until such times as the article becomes so large, unweildy and rotted with the cankers of sub-headings within nested sub-headings and above 30kb in length it should be left well enough alone and our efforts devoted to Christmas cheer, and New Years festivities. Or, you know, not wasting too much time with pedantry.Rolinator 03:49, 29 December 2006 (UTC)


It should be kept the same, since Australia is its own continent. - Anon, May 18, 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.172.36.154 (talk) 12:34, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Some thoughts from Mike Chapman: I agree that 'Meganesia' is used as a 'flippant foil'. However, although Theroux includes NZ and Australia in the section 'Meganesia', he first refers to Meganesia in chapter 3, the first chapter about Australia, where he says "Australia, the gigantic Pacific island of Meganesia,....". Therefore I argue he uses the term for Australia alone, not including NZ. 115.67.238.210 (talk) 05:43, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Similarities to Africa

If one were to rotate (to the right) Australia so it would be on its side, it would look a lot like Africa. Is this pure coincidence? Either way, I think this should be mentioned in the article. Montgomery' 39 (talk) 17:01, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

If you dress a white Australian in lederhosen then he will look Bavarian. I think this should be mentioned in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.240.61.2 (talk) 05:40, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

This continent includes NZ in all theories listed in the "continent" article

While this article states that the Australian doesn't include NZ, the continent article list NZ as part of Australia/Australasia/Oceania/[Insert your name here] in every of the 5, 6 or 7 continents theory. Therefore, this article is inconsistant with the main one. Just look at this image : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Continental_models.gif --zorxd (talk) 15:55, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree they are inconsistent. I think this one is more sensible. Are there any sources we can cite that group Hawaii as part of the Australian continent? -- Avenue (talk) 09:05, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
Why is this article more sensible? What continent would you place New Zealand on, then? There is no widely taught, widely accepted continent model that divides the world into more than 7 continents, hence New Zealand and the pacific islands are part of the Australian continent by common convention, even if they are geologically or even geographically separate. Saying on this page New Zealand is not part of the Australian continent but of some obscure 'micro continent' called New Zealandia is just stupid. Generally speaking, there are at most 7 continents so unless you want to say New Zealand is part of Antartica it is necessarily part of the Australian continent. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.246.61.222 (talk) 01:28, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Because a continent is "one of the main continuous bodies of land on the earth's surface" (OED). Which, with the greatest respect to all kiwis, NZ just ain't.--Gergyl (talk) 06:36, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
Besides which, there is no law which stipulates that every country must be part of a continent. Take Fiji, for example. Is that part of Australia or Asia? Clearly it isn't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.240.61.2 (talk) 01:58, 13 July 2010 (UTC)
There's not much 'micro' about it, if you'd go look at the map. Zealandia's half the size of Australia, and not connected to it except by oceanic crust, the same way any other continents are 'connected' to Australia. If you want to qualify 'dry land continents', go right ahead but be either specific or inaccurate. (P.S. If we can go from eight planets in our solar system to nine back to eight, we can certainly expand our minds enough to recount the continents now that we know more.) Corgi (talk) 18:56, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Population – note not working

What is the population figure 29 million in the summary box based on? The note was not working when I tried to click it. The country Australia have barely 22 million, so where are the other 7 million? Mårten Berglund (talk) 12:03, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

That is a cref missing a cnote, so there are no references. However, as stated in the article, Tasmania (~500.000) and New Guinea (~7.5 million) are part of the continent. --Addingrefs ( talk | contribs ) 14:42, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Must change the map so that it does not include Papua New Guinea. Nathan.tang (talk) 12:14, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Oceania

Isn't this now called Oceania? 98.64.66.248 (talk) 00:27, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

  • Nope. Please see the endless discussions above, esp.: "For Oceania the article states The primary use of the term Oceania is to describe a macrogeographical region that lies between Asia and the Americas, with the Australian continent as the major landmass and consisting of some 25,000 islands in the Pacific. The name Oceania is used because, unlike the other regional groupings, it is the ocean and adjacent seas rather than a continent that link the lands together."--Gergyl (talk) 03:02, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
I agree with 98.64.66.248 because I know the "Australian" continent as Oceania to distinguish it from the isolated island of Australia. Our article does say that Oceania is sometimes used to denote the continent, so I don't see why the Australia (continent) article title couldn't be changed to this. I suppose usage varies to such an extent that we are unlikely ever to agree. The OED defines Oceania as "(A collective name for) the islands and island-groups of the Pacific Ocean and its adjacent seas, including Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia, and sometimes also Australasia and the Malay Archipelago.". Isn't this the continent? Dbfirs 11:57, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
No, the Nesias without Australia would not be. — kwami (talk) 12:01, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Would not be what? Dbfirs 12:03, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
The continent of Australia.
It also wouldn't be the same if Malaysia/Indonesia were included. "Australasia" would be a better match, though still off. — kwami (talk) 12:04, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Australia is an island. The use of Oceania is supported by the Atlas of Canada,[2] and is used in Latin America and Iberia.[3] I suppose we are really disagreeing on what constitutes a continent. I tend to think in terms of the continental shelf, not a contiguous landmass that excludes adjacent islands. Dbfirs 12:13, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Eurasia is an island. Oceania is not linked by a continental shelf. In the narrow sense of the word, the only continent (continental shelf) within Oceania is New Zealand-New Caledonia (Zealandia), but that's only a fraction of the expanse of this "continent". In the broad sense of the word, part of the continent of Asia is included. I don't see how either can be considered a continent of its own. — kwami (talk) 12:40, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Well our article on Torres Strait doesn't give the depth, but claims that is is "very shallow". Does this not count as part of a continental shelf? Do you mean that Asia isn't a continent by your definition? (If so, then I agree!) Our problem is that the real world isn't neatly divided as we would like it to be. Dbfirs 16:43, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
New Guinea is part of the Australian continent by that def. But Borneo and Sumatra are not. See Sahul, Wallace line, Zealandia. — kwami (talk) 22:41, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Yes, that is what I see as the logical division, and that continent is what my atlas calls "Oceania", though it does include New Zealand etc. I do rather like the idea that the British Isles are not part of Europe, but then Japan would not be part of Asia. Dbfirs 23:12, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
The core of Oceania is the open Pacific, which would include New Zealand but not Australia. Extended conceptions include not just Australia but insular SE Asia. If you just want Australia + New Zealand, the name is Australasia (the lands south of Asia). There's also the cognitive dissonance of using the name 'Oceania' for a continent, when 'continent' is an antonym of 'oceanic'. — kwami (talk) 23:39, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
"Oceania" has always included Australia in my usage, and in that of the atlases I have seen, and, rather than "cognitive dissonance", I see the word as aptly descriptive of a region that is mainly ocean. I suppose that if others don't see it that way, then I can't argue for a change of name, but I think modern atlases tend to agree on Oceania for the region. Whether it can logically be called a single continent is a separate argument for Geologists. Most people think of a continent as a logical (or sometimes illogical) division of the surface of the Earth, as in our article except that my atlas used "Oceania" instead of "Australia (continent)". Do we not need to move our viewpoint to match that of modern atlases? Dbfirs 23:53, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Yes, for the region, like the Arctic. That doesn't make it a "continent". Per the OED, a continent is "continuous land, mainland". Polynesia is not a "continent". Also, the OED defines Oceania as "A general name for the islands of the Pacific and its adjacent seas." — kwami (talk) 00:16, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
OK if you want to be pedantic about continents then, as I joked above, the British Isles and Japan are not part of any continent, and Europe, Asia and Africa are all one, as are the Americas, but no-one actually uses the "OED definition". Dbfirs 00:24, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
Sure they do. Continents are land, not water. That's common to everyone's definition. Open sea and scattered coral atolls are not a "continent".
Britain and Japan are part of the Eurasian landmass, just as New Guinea is part of the Australian. If you wish to be pedantic, America and Eurafrasia are a single landmass, so the continents would be that plus Sahul, Zealandia, Madagascar, and various smaller bits which are geological continents. — kwami (talk) 00:31, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
That's not what out Continent article says (though it does give it as an option). I was criticising the over-pedantic and leaning towards modern usage, as evidenced by atlases. I suppose whatever convention we adopt, there will be citicisms[4]. It's impossible to be consistent because the surface of the Earth isn't. Dbfirs 07:14, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
I agree with you there.
There was a long discussion on that article about using "Oceania", and eventually a decision against it. There's no question that "Australia" is in the ballpark, but "Oceania" is not so clear. In any case, this article is not about Oceania, regardless of whether that is considered a continent. — kwami (talk) 07:55, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
Yes, we would need some adjustments to the text if we changed the title. Perhaps it would be better to expand our article on Oceania to reflect the usage in modern atlases. Dbfirs 09:22, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

The map needs fixing?

This page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent has this map http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Continental_models.gif which shows New Zealand and other islands as a part of the Australia continent, but this article has this map http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Australia-New_Guinea_(orthographic_projection).svg which doesn't. Furthermore, this page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zealandia_(continent) says New Zealand is pretty much it's own continent, yet that page also only lists 7 continents, and NZ isn't colored in on the Australia continent map. So does this mean that NZ isn't a part of a continent, but that's OK, because we don't decide the continents in such a way that every part of the planet gets to be a part of a continent? But then why does that article say there's a New Zealandia continent? And if it's not a part of the Australia continent, wouldn't that mean the continental models gif needs to be changed? I'm so confused. byelf2007 (talk) 5 July 2011

There has never actually been a definition for what makes up a continent, and current ideas are simply longlasting irrational choices. In the popular 7 continent model, one area covers all of the Pacific islands and Australia, and is called either Australia, Australasia, or Oceania. Each of these terms can again mean something else. Zealandia is called a continent due to it having its own separate continental shelf. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 08:47, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Comparative continental size

The article says that Australia is the 'smallest continent', then only a paragraph later mentioned Zealandia, which is about half Australia's size (albeit mostly drowned). It can't be both the smallest yet larger than another continent - this needs some well-chosen qualifiers, please. I am hesitant to go after the introduction with a blue pencil myself, but will if needed.

Corgi (talk) 18:50, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Zealandia is a partially submerged continental fragment, which is not a continent as it is generally understood. Cornellbob (talk) 22:40, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
smallest of the seven continents taught in elementary school. — kwami (talk) 19:37, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Still wrong?

Australia doesn't include the other islands, it is a country. This has been mentioned many times. When is it going to be corrected by someone that has been working on the article? This article contains serious misinformation and should be corrected soon.--129.49.21.151 (talk) 04:36, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Country is at Australia. CMD (talk) 11:33, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Technically speaking you are right. Australia is a country in the continent called Oceania. Unfortunately, some people tend to be slightly sloppy and mix terminologies. Therefore, one has to decide if Wikipedia should stick to incorrect but common use of the word "Australia" in the English language (in other languages, this mistake does not seem so frequent) or to the technicalities. From my point of view, as an encyclopedia, not a dictionary, it should always choose science, especially in titles, and mention semantic issues in a special subsection. To conclude, I believe "Australia (continent)" should be merged with "Oceania". I hope I have made a positive contribution. Thanks.

N.B.: A very similar problem occurs in "America". Technically it is the name of the continent between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. However, because of "United States of America", people tend to reffer to the country as "America", almost like an abbreviation. However, this creates an issue with the rest of the continent. Some people artificially use the terminology "Americas" to replace "America (continent)", but then creates a problem for the denonym, as from a more rigourous viewpoint Cubans are - surprise! - Americans. Even though maps of "America" are well documented since much before the creation of the US, it is difficult to convince people to focus on the scientific side. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Passwiki (talk • contribs) 10:22, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Australia can be a continent, but Oceania cannot. Oceania is a region, not a continent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newzild (talk • contribs) 08:17, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
No, these aren't "mistakes" or "artificial" these ARE the continents as defined in the English language. In English, the continent is Australia and Oceania is a region that includes said continent and various Pacific Islands (which ones vary by source). In English the continents (note the plural) are North America and South America. The mistake is in your trying to force the definitions from your language onto the English language. --Khajidha (talk) 13:38, 25 May 2012 (UTC)
Cartography is a science and science has nothing to do with the language. As a matter of fact languages are contantly changing due to slangs and common usage. On the other side assumed science facts do to vary, unless new discoveries modify the previous. Hence, Wikipedia is not an English dictionary but and encyclopedia. Check London 2012 website how the continent is called. I suppose they know English much better than me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.104.9.43 (talk) 23:47, 12 August 2012 (UTC)
Continents are all about language. And, yes, they do vary by language. The concept of continent is not some external thing, it is a label that the human mind appends to things in the real world. What the term "continent" means, what things in the real world can be considered continents and what the individual names of those continents are are all questions of language. As for the London 2012 website, the Olympic games are not the arbiters of geographic names in English. --Khajidha (talk) 14:35, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

This article is stupid

PNG is not part of the Australian continent!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 1.124.127.237 (talk) 23:03, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

Depends on how you define the Australian continent. Since the entire island of New Guinea is connected to the Australian mainland by a shared continental shelf, it is part of the continent of Australia by that definition. In fact, in times of lower sea levels the two would be a continuous land mass. --Khajidha (talk) 09:07, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

Image

An image such as this one:[7] would help clarify things. A picture is worth ... a dozen words, at least. Btw, I agree with μηδείς ('Sahul', above). ~Eric F — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.60.29.141 (talk) 23:59, 3 November 2012 (UTC)

Sahul

This is a geographical article. The consensus modern geographical term for the continent is Sahul. We don't call the continent of North America "The United States". Is there any geological rational for not moving this article to Sahul (continent)? μηδείς (talk) 03:04, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Australia is the name for the continent in the geographical system used in the US (and possibly other countries) and National Geographic in particular lists Australia as a continent and not Sahul (this is in fact the first reference on the continent article). If this is not the usage in the continental system you are used to, please see Australasia or Oceania for alternatives. --Khajidha (talk) 23:52, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Not clear about New Zealand...

In the opening paragraph, it states that New Zealand IS part of the Australian Continent. Was it supposed to read that it is not part of the continent? NZ is not named on the list of countries, nor is it included on the map. Just thought I would clarify -- my class of 1st graders and I were curious about it...

Thanks! 205.155.20.63 (talk) 02:58, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Just a vandal. That's the problem with Wikipedia. A good excercise for your class, the next time you come across something like this, would be to have them check the page history and see if the claim has been stable over time. If some anonymous IP or a new account made the change recently (like here), it's likely to be either vandalism or someone who doesn't know what they're talking about. A good lesson on not being able to believe everything you read. — kwami (talk) 03:11, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Timor

Someone removed Timor. I had included in based on several sources, but it may be that it's a marginal case, only partly joined to the continent. Is this variable in the lit, or were my sources just wrong? — kwami (talk) 21:56, 20 January 2013 (UTC)

First let me say I haven't edited this article so I'm not defending "my edits". I want to see your several sources because claiming Timor as a part of Sahul is a very bold statement to make. Timor is the south eastern extent of Sunda (it could also be argued that it is not part of Sunda and that all of the islands east of Sulawesi are unconnected results of uplift between Sahul and Sunda), thrust upwards by the collision of tectonic plates, and is separated from Sahul by the deep Timor Trench. It is not even marginally connected. I suspect that an argument has been made based on a flawed understanding of the Wallace Line.220.233.34.248 (talk) 21:07, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

First people

I've repeatedly deleted this section. It's a good thing to have, but the deleted version has been quite confused. — kwami (talk) 02:53, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Concur. I deleted it again, as it's unintelligeable, and wanders a bit too. - BilCat (talk) 18:36, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
This article must be using some horrifically outdated sources. The date of 45000 years has not been seriously considered since at least the 1980s. The generally accepted date is 50-60 thousand years ago.

I am also cautious about the method of colonisation. As deeply illogical as it is, most make the argument that Australia was populated by accident - fishermen washed out to sea - because not only could people not build sea-going vessels 50 thousand years ago, they were not intelligent enough to imagine the vast continent on the other side of the water. The linked source (www1.anthro.utah.edu) times out so it cannot be verified. Personally, I think that what is outlined in this article is absolutely correct as the only logical answer is that these people built boats big enough for a breeding population and sturdy enough to make the crossing. Indeed, I have made this argument myself many times over the last 15-20 years but it qualifies as personal research. Of the very few papers I have read that support this theory, one, from about 1999, was heavily mocked as pseudoscience for claiming (and proving) that a basic boat (no sails or anything) would eventually be taken by the currents from Timor(?) to northern Australia... because people simply didn't have the knowledge of how to build such boats back then. An almost identical argument was made in a documentary on a different subject at around the same time. In this documentary, they were trying to prove that Cro-Magnon came from Africa to Europe via Gibraltar, rather than the Middle East... despite being absolutely successful in making their crossing on a raft, the same arguments were made - people were too stupid to build boats so it's impossible and an excercise in pseudoscience. The main issue, I think, lay not in Gibraltar or Australia, but in America because if people were building boats 50 thousand years ago then that almost entirely invalidates the Bering Strait Land Bridge theory of colonisation. With that said, the coastal route into the Americas is becoming more and more accepted because it is, again, the only logical explanation of the evidence. Maybe one day people will accept that Homo sapien Sapiens of the 21st century has an identical mental capacity to that of Homo sapien Sapiens of 20, 30, 40 50 or 60 thousand years ago and these vested interests will just fade away.220.233.34.248 (talk) 21:51, 11 November 2013 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: consensus not to move the page, per the discussion below. Dekimasuよ! 20:20, 23 February 2014 (UTC) Dekimasuよ! 20:44, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Australia (continent) → Australia as a continent – The current title implies that Australia the country and Australia the continent are not the same division of the world. They are, only with a political and a physical description of the region, respectively. Georgia guy (talk) 23:44, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

  • Oppose: They're not the same division. The continent is either sans Tasmania, or with both Tasmania and New Guinea. CMD (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 23:46, 16 February 2014‎
  • Oppose the continent is not called "Australia as a continent", and they are not the same division of the world. The political entity known as Australia is not coterminous with the continent of Australia. -- 70.50.151.11 (talk) 04:11, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose. The proposed title is unacceptable. And yes, the continent and country are two different things. Hot Stop 04:28, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose - No matter how one defines the continent in relation to the country, the current title is the proper way to dismbiguate it from the country's article per WP's naming conventions. - BilCat (talk) 04:40, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose- per all above. In ictu oculi (talk) 08:10, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose per previous respondents. ╠╣uw [talk] 10:32, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose incorrect reasoning, the division is not the same. The Australian continent includes several islands not considered Australian, like Timor Leste and Irian Jaya/Papua New Guinea. It might help you to read the articles before making such a statement. --Falcadore (talk) 11:30, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
  • I'm trying to think of some other natural disambiguation. I have yet to get one. Red Slash 03:15, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Maybe read wp:Naming_conventions#Disambiguation as suggested. BTW, the converse also applies -- the country includes many outlying islands that are not part of the continent (however defined), vis Christmas, Cocos (Keeling), Heard & Macdonald, Macquarie, Lord Howe, Norfolk.--Gergyl (talk) 05:27, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose, There is no difference and i think, a meaningless request. Maurice07 (talk) 22:54, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose, the island Tasmania is not part of the continent of Australia but of the state of Australia. Bandy boy (talk) 15:05, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Volcanic activity

I am not a geologist. I don't know what qualifies as volcanically active. One simple definition I have read is that a volcano is considered dormant if there has been no eruption in the past 10,000 years. The last eruption of volcano in Australia (Mt Gambier) was 4,500 years ago. It was witnessed by aboriginal people according to archaeological evidence. The current hotspot is centred under Bass Strait and encompasses areas of Victoria and Tasmania. Earthquake activity in the region is related to this hotspot. According to some estimates, a volcano could develop in this area with 100 years. So, do we need to clarify how volcanically active the Australian continent is? 60.240.207.146 (talk) 01:03, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

Title article "Australian continent"?

Every continent can be referred to in this way, "the European continent", "the African continent", etc., and it generally refers to the whole continent (as oppose to "continental Australia", the mainland). It is a description rather than an alternative name, but since it is commonly used to unambiguously refer to the continent of Australia, rather than the country, maybe it is an appropriate title, avoiding the parentheses? I'm not proposing a requested move but just a thought for other editors. Rob984 (talk) 23:57, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Country

A lot of sources are saying that Australia as a continent only has one country, which is also called Australia, and all the other small island countries in Australasia and the Pacific Islands are part of a region called Oceania. I noticed that this article also include Papua New Guinea, portions of Indonesia and possibly East Timor in the Australian continent. I wonder which one is correct? 2001:8003:8558:3B00:F00E:929D:902C:5B60 (talk) 05:27, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

Yeah there's something strange going with this article (and I've noticed a few other continent-related articles have the same problem). This article is written using an unconventional definition of "continent". I can't tell whether some user is engaging in original research, or people are just getting carried away with a particular technical terminology (presumably geological terminology).
The conventional definition of a continent is something like "a landmass too big to be considered an island". By convention, Australia and any larger landmass is considered a continent, not an island. So Australia does only have one country and New Guinea is not part of the continent of Australia. New Guinea is an separate island in its own right, it can't be part of a continent.
But there are presumably geological definitions of continents. There are continental plates, perhaps there is a formal definition of something like a "continental shelf" and this definition of "continent" is being conflated with the primary definition of a continent that we're all familiar with.
Someone should edit this article to put the conventional definition of continent front and foremost otherwise everyone's going to be confused when they stumble on this article. I'd do it myself but I just spent a while sorting out the "continent" article. And I don't have much to say about the continent of Australia.
tl;dr: Your sources are right; this article is at best misleading.
Ben Arnold (talk) 10:27, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
Footnote: I've just discovered there's a separate article entitled Australian mainland which is about the continent of Australia. The authors clearly mean this article to be about a continental shelf or other specialist geological concept of an Australian continent and for the Australian Mainland article to be about the actual (conventional) continent of Australia. I'm bound to assume good faith, so I'm going to say this is extremely confusing. If I knew how to, I'd recommend a merge of the two articles. Ben Arnold (talk) 10:39, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
See Mainland Australia. -- Jack of Oz [pleasantries] 21:16, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
Conventionally, Europe spans Mainland Europe and surrounding islands including Britain, Ireland, Aland and Zealand (continental islands) as well as Iceland and the Azores (oceanic islands). But Europe is predominately a cultural region. So from a European perspective, continental islands and surrounding oceanic islands are part of continents. From a geological perspective, "the continents" are the whole of the continental shelf, so include continental islands (and continental shelf) but exclude all oceanic islands.
We should follow usage in reliable sources. "Australian continent" is usually only used in a geological context, so does generally include continental islands. "Mainland Australia" has one unambiguous geographically meaning no matter the context. The cultural definition of Australia would be Australasia or Oceania, similar to how "Europe" is conventionally used to include Iceland. I don't think "Australia" ever means Mainland Australia, however in a geological context, it often means the Australian continent.
Rob984 (talk) 19:31, 27 September 2016 (UTC)
I can think of one situation where "Australia" means "mainland Australia" and that is when Tasmania is described as being "off the coast of Australia" or "south of Australia"--Khajidha (talk) 12:03, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

New Zealand

Source: https://www.whatarethe7continents.com/australia/many-countries-australia/

According to the above article, New Zealand has been included in the continent of Australia under the "most recent" definition. It didn't give the readers any detail of this "most recent" definition and it completely ignored the portion of Indonesia on the island of New Guinea. Should we consider New Zealand's inclusion at all? 2001:8003:862E:1200:B81C:4724:3F78:BB51 (talk) 03:45, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Doesn't seem like a reliable source to me. The definition it uses on that page is contradicted by the definition it uses on its own home page. Not to mention that the text is less than clear and has several grammatical errors. The site is not worth bothering with. --Khajidha (talk) 11:16, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

What comprises the continent of Australia?

It says the continent comprises mainland Australia, Tasmania, New Guinea, New Britain, and small neighbouring islands (such as Misool and Waigeo, just to the northeast of Maluku Islands at the edge of its continental shelf). However, there is no clear consensus on what comprises Australia.[5] Please feel free to discuss this major change to the article. --2601:183:101:58D0:5D57:4B1C:A325:C74C (talk) 11:15, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

I had no idea that what comprises the continent of Australia was so contentious. From what I've gathered, and I propose this for inclusion in the article, is that the continent of Australia is the land masses which sits on Australia's continental shelf. This would include mainland Australia, Tasmania, and the island of New Guinea (comprised of Papua New Guinea and two Indonesian provinces). It would obviously preclude the other islands. Ifnord (talk) 13:19, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
 Done --2601:183:101:58D0:5D57:4B1C:A325:C74C (talk) 14:15, 20 June 2018 (UTC)

Edit request

I would like to request permission to change the hatnote to something more neutral. As in many countries in the world a continental model is taught where Oceania is considered a continent, I request permission to slightly edit the hatnote from this:

"Oceania (continent)" redirects here. For the region, see Oceania.

to this:

"Oceania (continent)" redirects here. For the region sometimes considered a continent, see Oceania.

Civciv5 (talk) 23:49, 1 July 2018 (UTC)

I'd say we'd be better off redirecting Oceania (continent) to Oceania. The continental models that use Oceania tend to include all the Pacific islands, while the continental models that use Australia tend to exclude them. --Khajidha (talk) 22:17, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
Already discussed at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2018 July 1#Oceania (continent), where it closed as "Keep". - BilCat (talk) 00:05, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
See further discussion at Talk:Oceania (continent) and links therein. fgnievinski (talk) 19:47, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Australia as a continent? This is wrong in every level. This isn't knowledge. This is sharing misconceptions.

Since when is it okay to have Australia listed as a continent and then have a pretty much duplicate article speaking about Oceania, which is the correct name for the continent, just based on the difference of one island? SInce when is this correct?

Oceania is the correct continent. So now we would have two continents, on the same place, just because one includes an island the other does not?

This doesn't make any sense.

Page should be removed.

MinistryOfThought (talk) 14:26, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

You'll notice that Oceania is defined as a region and not a continent...2601:85:C202:150:55A1:A7B7:2104:F6DA (talk) 01:01, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
This is pure revisionism.
Oceania has always been taught to be the Continent. Australia the country/island. This is pure disinformation and goes agaisnt what many schools systems still teach.
This is pretty much against what Wikipedia should stand for.
MinistryOfThought (talk) 16:21, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
@MinistryOfThought: Wikipedia reports what the preponderance of reliable sources reports. For what it's worth, Australia is taught as a continent in my part of the world. Your arguments will hold no traction absent a definitive demonstration that the article does not currently comply with the policies linked.--Jasper Deng (talk) 17:41, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
I would agree with Jasper Deng Wikipedia is all about using reliable sources to support any assertions. Phrases such as 'Oceania has always been taught to be the continent' must be supported by reliable sources which can then be used to support this view in the article text. If you can't provide reliable source for your assertions than they are merely opinion. Wikipedia is based on sources not its editors views or assertions. Robynthehode (talk) 20:25, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
"Australia" is the continent in the system I was taught. --Khajidha (talk) 21:35, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
According to this article, New Zeland is in which continent? English language geographical conventions are pretty weird. It's the same as considering North and South America different continents. Xareu bs (talk) 13:43, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
Zealandia. It's actually already mentioned in this article. I agree with you that precise definitions are hard to pin down in this area. I've never understood what makes Europe and Asia two continents. HiLo48 (talk) 23:00, 4 April 2018 (UTC)
In the system I was taught, NZ wasn't part of any continent. And considering North and South America different continents makes a hell of a lot more sense than considering Europe and Asia separate continents. (The system I was taught did separate Europe and Asia, but I never could figure out why) --Khajidha (talk) 20:25, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

In some continental models, Oceania is a continent, and the concept of Australia as a continent does not exist. As Wikipedia tries to be an encyclopedia, covering not only the american world view, it would be of great service to include this other definition. 2804:14C:482:72FD:5837:4300:4F49:B461 (talk) 08:45, 2 July 2019 (UTC)

See related discussion at Talk:Oceania (continent) are links therein. fgnievinski (talk) 19:48, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
Same here, the model I was taught was that Australia is a country, which is also a subregion of the continent of Oceania.

Requested move 9 July 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved per WP:SNOW. (non-admin closure) (t · c) buidhe 10:30, 10 July 2020 (UTC)


Australia (continent) → Australinea – Australia as a continent is technically correct, but using the name of the country for the continent is a nightmare. America is confusing, but at least we can distinguish them by calling the country United States or U.S. instead of America and calling their people U.S. Americans instead of Americans, but this Australia country vs continent thing is even worse. Papuans and Indonesians are not Australians (I doubt they like being called Australians by other people). In my opinion, we should rename the article Australinea and encourage people start to use this new name instead. Hopefully, people would gradually stop using Australia as the name for the continent. I am Australian, and from now on I will start using Australinea and Australineans to describe my continent and its people. If everyone of us uses the new name, eventually, Australinea will become the preferred name for the continent. 2001:8003:9008:1301:8581:BFF9:1757:DF9 (talk) 13:25, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

  • Oppose. Although confusion is possible your suggestion goes against WP:COMMONNAME and against the fact that it is not the job of editors to try to change what people call things including countries / continents. It is an editor's job to report what is said in reliable sources WP:RS. Robynthehode (talk) 13:38, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
If we can reach consensus, we can do our bit to help solve this problem. If we turn a blind eye and do nothing, this problems would persist for the foreseeable future. 2001:8003:9008:1301:8581:BFF9:1757:DF9 (talk) 14:04, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose. This is the first time I've heard of it (Google brought me this), and it's certainly not a common name. I would, however, like to resolve the Sahul matter for the reasons given (see above), and then perhaps we could devote a section in the article to the matter relating to continent vs country and the various schools of thought. Laterthanyouthink (talk) 13:56, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
Few hundred years ago, Australia is not a common word either. Language is always changing, new words will emerge and replace the old ones all the time. 2001:8003:9008:1301:8581:BFF9:1757:DF9 (talk) 14:14, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment – quite frankly, I've seen more and more people and websites (even things like Sporcle and Wikipedia) using Oceania to refer to the area and its countries. But honestly, "Australinea" is a pretty rare phrase at the moment. Paintspot Infez (talk) 14:27, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment 2001:8003:9008:1301:8581:BFF9:1757:DF9 Firstly: Statement of fact - that language changes - is not an argument to use Wikipedia to change language. Second Paintspot Wikipedia does not state Oceania is a continent, it is a geographic region that includes the continent of Australia. Other websites may call Oceania a continent but consensus here is it is geographic region. Robynthehode (talk) 14:55, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose per the first two above. I see the problem, but this little-known term is not the solution. Johnbod (talk) 15:01, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose. I have to agree with the above comments. I have never heard or the term "Australinea" before. The hatnote at the top of the article and the parenthetical disambiguation is sufficient to clear up confusion with the country of the same name. Rreagan007 (talk) 16:47, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
Poking around on a gbooks search, the term seems mainly used in zoology - for where the marsupials live etc. This article covers more than that. Johnbod (talk) 17:16, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
Strong oppose - this is definitely not the WP:COMMONNAME and we shouldn't go by technical names unless the technical name has widespread usage. I forecast a snow closure soon. Interstellarity (talk) 00:51, 10 July 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Merge discussion

There may be a different solution, but at the moment we have a redirect page Sahul continent to this article, and a DAB page at Sahul which has links to this one and others, but not Sahul (continent). Other links to each page will have to be considered. Laterthanyouthink (talk) 05:10, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

  • Support both - stubs for larger prehistoric landmasses, which should be merged. Johnbod (talk) 17:19, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
Thanks Johnbod, Chipmunkdavis and others. I've just got back to this and it's now a work-in-progress (will complete within 24 hours). Laterthanyouthink (talk) 12:10, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
Okay, done. I also did quite a bit of shuffling around to get the citations out of the lead and put relevant bits into appropriately headed sections, but the lead now needs some more work as per WP:LEADFOLLOWSBODY. I'll try to get back to this and the Sunda one in between other stuff I'm busy with... Laterthanyouthink (talk) 02:26, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
You have done a great job. Please also merge Sunda (landmass) into the more detailed Sundaland. Thank you. 2001:8003:9008:1301:18B5:6B38:6E3F:846C (talk) 04:51, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

Is the demonym correct?

Currently it says "Australian", and links to Australians
179.159.56.84 (talk) 22:31, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, no. However the amount of territory of the Australian continent outside of the country of Australia is pretty low. The only major bit of land that is in the first but not the second is New Guinea, whose inhabitants are generally considered Asians in a continental-demonym sense. --Khajidha (talk) 16:01, 16 January 2020 (UTC)
Papuans are not Asians, they are Melanesians. 2001:8003:9008:1301:8581:BFF9:1757:DF9 (talk) 12:36, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
That's an ethnic classification. You will note I specified "continental-demonym sense". --Khajidha (talk) 12:59, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
Continent-wise, Papuans are considered Oceanians. 120.17.162.237 (talk) 07:04, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
Not in English. BilCat (talk) 07:38, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
You're right. Oceanian is not a formal English word. I noticed that when describing things associated with Oceania, the word Oceania is also used as an adjective instead of Oceanian. Examples would be the various Oceania Championships (none of them are called Oceanian Championships). 120.17.162.237 (talk) 08:00, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
Americans have this same problem. 110.145.30.41 (talk) 11:28, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
At least we can distinguish them by calling the country United States or U.S. instead of America and calling their people U.S. Americans instead of Americans, but this Australia country vs continent thing is even worse. In my opinion, we should rename the continent. Hopefully, people would gradually stop using Australia as the name for the continent. I will propose a change of the existing article title first. 2001:8003:9008:1301:8581:BFF9:1757:DF9 (talk) 12:45, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Oceania as a continent

The model I was taught was that Australia is a country, which is also a subregion of the continent of Oceania. Oceania as a continent consists of 2 main regions: Australasia and the Pacific Islands. Australasia can be further subdivided into 3 subregions: Australia, Zealandia (consists of New Zealand and New Caledonia) and New Guinea (consists of Papua New Guinea and Western New Guinea); the Pacific Islands also can be further subdivided into 3 subregions: Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia (including Hawaii and Easter Island). I wonder how many of you actually support this theory?

Under this theory, all the islands in the world can be grouped into their respective continents. Oh, it is a seven-continent model, so North America and South America are considered separate continents. The World Ocean is also subdivided into 7 smaller oceans: North Pacific Ocean, South Pacific Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, Arctic Ocean and Antarctic Ocean (aka the Southern Ocean). 110.145.30.41 (talk) 11:28, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

I think you are confused about continents and geographical regions. Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Europe, North America, and South America can be both a continent and a geographical region. When describing them as geographical regions, those offshore islands close to the continents are also included. When describing them as continents, generally only the mainlands are included. We could also include those nearby continental islands (islands located on the continental shelves) as part of the continents, but those remote oceanic islands aren't really part of any continent.
On the other hand, Oceania is a geographical region only while Australia (aka Australia-New Guinea) is a continent. Oceania is a vast geographical region which contains not one, but two continents. The submerged continent of Zealandia is also a part of Oceania. 120.17.162.237 (talk) 07:45, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
To everything you said, I don’t agree with you. If it’s worth explaining why, I would do so. Craig Lungren (talk) 04:59, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
No one cares. What matters is what reliable sources state is the common view in English, as this is English Wikipedia. BilCat (talk) 05:36, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
Lol, as for you - I know it’s English Wikipedia but still I don’t agree that is how it’s viewed in English. In a way, you have to care in what I think Continents and Regions are. All that matters is what ever is said on the article page, I will just go along with what it says. But in the Talk page, I believe they are just stating their opinion. Craig Lungren (talk) 06:26, 29 April 2021 (UTC)
We are not supposed to be discussing our opinions on the talk page, but what reliable sources state, and how to present them in the articles. Our opinions are irrelevant. If you have prominent reliable sources that state all countries are in continents as a major view taught in the majority of English speaking countries, then by all means present them. If not, it doesn't matter. BilCat (talk) 07:59, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

Sahul Continent?

Need some [WP:RS] that support sahul as a continent name - as it stands, Ive never heard it called anything other than Australia or Oceania - and rarely the latter. The lede at this point could have an awful lot of cn templates added inline. PrimalBlueWolf (talk) 02:49, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

@PrimalBlueWolf: Per WP:LEAD, the lead of an article isn't generally cited as long as sources for the claims made there are in the body of the article, or is a a very contentious claim, etc. There are several citations in the Australia (continent)#Terminology section of the article, including for Sahul. Have you checked those citations to verify that the names are not in those sources? BilCat (talk) 03:05, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

I went looking for citations of it but must have missed those. I have not, I'll do that when Im back at my desk. Thanks for the pointer. PrimalBlueWolf (talk) 07:21, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

No problem, and you're most welcome. BilCat (talk) 09:14, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

Australia is not a continent!

Australia is a country in the continent of Oceania. And if you don't agree with me, let me ask you this: What continent is New Zealand in? Fiji? Papua New Guinea? The theory that Australia is a continent is untrue and needs to be corrected. Krystal Kalb (talk) 00:55, 10 November 2021 (UTC)

Did you even bother to read the article? From your comments, I presume you just saw the title, which disagrees with what you've been taught, and assumed it must therefore be wrong. Please try reading the article in its entirety with an open mind, and perhaps you'll learn something about how people from other countries view the world and its subdivisions. Thanks. BilCat (talk) 01:22, 10 November 2021 (UTC)
@Krystal Kalb: According to Zealandia and New Zealand, New Zealand is part of Zealandia. Incidentally, so is
Betterkeks (talk) 05:45, 21 December 2021 (UTC)

Request for the admin who locked this page

I'm not very familiar with protected edit requests so sorry if this goes wrong somehow, but "netherlandish" in the sixth image down probably ought to be changed to "dutch".--Licks-rocks (talk) 13:59, 22 December 2021 (UTC)

Protection expired, so I did it myself Licks-rocks (talk) 15:41, 24 December 2021 (UTC)
Except the map is French - the date is also way wrong, see the image file. Johnbod (talk) 12:43, 25 December 2021 (UTC)
I just noticed the spelling error, to be honest. I'm not exactly knowledgeable about old maps Licks-rocks (talk) 22:05, 25 December 2021 (UTC)
  1. ^ a b Denoon, Donald (2005). Trial separation: Australia and the decolonisation of Papua New Guinea. pp. p. 2. Scholars refuse to call this lost continent Greater Australia (or Greater New Guinea), so the obscure 'Sahul' is its usual name {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |month= (help)
  2. ^ The World - Continents, Atlas of Canada
  3. ^ "Continente" Portuguese Wikipedia
  4. ^ Lewis, Martin W. (1997). The Myth of Continents: a Critique of Metageography. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 40. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/0-520-20742-4, ISBN 0-520-20743-2|0-520-20742-4, '"`UNIQ--templatestyles-0000000F-QINU`"'[[ISBN (identifier)|ISBN]] [[Special:BookSources/0-520-20743-2 |0-520-20743-2]]]]. The joining of Australia with various Pacific islands to form the quasi continent of Oceania ... {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help); templatestyles stripmarker in |ISBN= at position 16 (help)
  5. ^ "Is Australia a Country or a Continent?". Country Digest. Country Digest. Retrieved 20 June 2018.
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