Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.6% of the earth's total surface area (or 29.9% of its land area) and with approximately 4 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population.

Asia is traditionally defined as part of the landmass of Eurasia — with the western portion of the latter occupied by Europe — located to the east of the Suez Canal, east of the Ural Mountains and south of the Caucasus Mountains (or the Kuma-Manych Depression) and the Caspian and Black Seas. It is bounded on the east by the Pacific Ocean, on the south by the Indian Ocean and on the north by the Arctic Ocean. Given its size and diversity, Asia — a toponym dating back to classical antiquity — is more a cultural concept incorporating a number of regions and peoples than a homogeneous physical entity" Asia". McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science and Technology. 2006. New York: McGraw-Hill Inc. (see Subregions of Asia, Asian people).

The wealth of Asia differs very widely among and within its regions, due to its vast size and huge range of different cultures, environments, historical ties and government systems. In terms of nominal GDP, Japan has the largest economy on the continent and the second largest in the world. In purchasing power parity terms, however, China has the largest economy in Asia and the third largest in the world.

Etymology

The term Asia is originally a concept exclusively of Western civilization. The peoples of ancient Asia (Chinese, Japanese, Indians, Persians, Arabs etc.) never conceived the idea of Asia, simply because they did not see themselves collectively. In their perspective, they were vastly varied civilizations, contrary to ancient European belief.

The word Asia originated from the Greek word Ἀσία, first attributed to Herodotus (ca. 440 BC) in reference to Anatolia or — in describing the Persian Wars — to the Persian Empire, in contrast to Greece and Egypt. Herodotus comments that he is puzzled as to why three women's names are used to describe one enormous and substantial land mass (Europa, Asia, and Libya, referring to Africa), stating that most Greeks assumed that Asia was named after the wife of Prometheus (i.e. Hesione), but that the Lydians say it was named after Asias, son of Cotys, who passed the name on to a tribe in Sardis. Even before Herodotus, Homer knew of two figures in the Trojan War named Asios; and elsewhere he describes a marsh as ασιος (Iliad 2, 461).

In actuality, he Greek name Ἀσία was most probably derived from Assuwa, a 14th century BC confederation of states in Western Anatolia. Hittite assu- 'good' may be an element in that name.

Usage of the term soon became common in ancient Greece, and subsequently by the ancient Romans. Ancient and medieval European maps depict the Asian continent as a "huge amorphous blob" extending eastward. It was presumed in antiquity to end with India — the Macedonian king Alexander the Great believing he would reach reach the "end of the world" upon his arrival in the East.

Other alternatives

Alternatively, the etymology of the term may be from the Akkadian word , which means 'to go outside' or 'to ascend', referring to the direction of the sun at sunrise in the Middle East and also likely connected with the Phoenician word asa meaning east. This may be contrasted to a similar etymology proposed for Europe, as being from Akkadian erēbu(m) 'to enter' or 'set' (of the sun).

T.R. Reid supports this alternative etymology, noting that the ancient Greek name must have derived from asu, meaning 'east' in Assyrian (ereb for Europe meaning 'west'). The terms/ideas of occidental (form Latin Occidens 'setting') and oriental (from Latin Oriens for 'rising') are also European invention, synonymous with Western and Eastern. He further emphasizes that it explains the Western point of view of placing all the peoples and cultures of Asia into a single classification, almost as if there were a need for setting the distinction between Western and Eastern civilization on the Eurasian continent. Ogura Kazuo and Tenshin Okakura are two Japanese outspoken figures over the subject.

However, this etymology is considered doubtful, because it does not explain how the term "Asia" first came to be associated with Anatolia, which is west of the Semitic-speaking areas, unless they refer to the viewpoint of a Phoenician sailor sailing through the straits between the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea.

Definition and boundaries

Physical geography

See also: Geography of Asia, Countries in both Asia and Europe, Geographic criteria for the definition of Europe

Medieval Europeans considered Asia as a continent a distinct landmass. The European concept of the three continents in the Old World goes back to Classical Antiquity, but during the Middle Ages was notably due to 7th century Spanish scholar Isidore of Sevilla (see T and O map). The demarcation between Asia and Africa (to the southwest) is the Isthmus of Suez and the Red Sea. The boundary between Asia and Europe is conventionally considered to run through the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmara, the Bosporus, the Black Sea, the Caucasus Mountains, the Caspian Sea, the Ural River to its source and the Ural Mountains to the Kara Sea near Kara, Russia. While this interpretation of tripartite continents (i.e., of Asia, Europe and Africa) remains common in modernity, discovery of the extent of Africa and Asia have made this definition somewhat anachronistic. This is especially true in the case of Asia, which would have several regions that would be considered distinct landmasses if these criteria were used (for example, Southern Asia and Eastern Asia).

In the far northeast of Asia, Siberia is separated from North America by the Bering Strait. Asia is bounded on the south by the Indian Ocean (specifically, from west to east, the Gulf of Aden, Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal), on the east by the waters of the Pacific Ocean (including, counterclockwise, the South China Sea, East China Sea, Yellow Sea, Sea of Japan, Sea of Okhotsk and Bering Sea) and on the north by the Arctic Ocean. Australia (or Oceania) is to the southeast.

Some geographers do not consider Asia and Europe to be separate continents, as there is no logical physical separation between them. For example, Sir Barry Cunliffe, the emeritus professor of European archeology at Oxford, argues that Europe has been geographically and culturally merely “the western excrescence of the continent of Asia.” Geographically, Asia is the major eastern constituent of the continent of Eurasia with Europe being a northwestern peninsula of the landmass – or of Afro-Eurasia: geologically, Asia, Europe and Africa comprise a single continuous landmass (save the Suez Canal) and share a common continental shelf. Almost all of Europe and most of Asia sit atop the Eurasian Plate, adjoined on the south by the Arabian and Indian Plate and with the easternmost part of Siberia (east of the Cherskiy Range) on the North American Plate.

In geography, there are two schools of thought. One school follows historical convention and treats Europe and Asia as different continents, categorizing subregions within them for more detailed analysis. The other school equates the word "continent" with a geographical region when referring to Europe, and use the term "region" to describe Asia in terms of physiography. Since, in linguistic terms, "continent" implies a distinct landmass, it is becoming increasingly common to substitute the term "region" for "continent" to avoid the problem of disambiguation altogether.

Given the scope and diversity of the landmass, it is sometimes not even clear exactly what "Asia" consists of. Some definitions exclude Turkey, the Middle East, Central Asia and Russia while only considering the Far East, Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent to compose Asia,World University Service of Canada. Asia-WUSC WorldWide. 2006. October 7, 2006. /www.wusc.ca/expertise/worldwide/asia/>. especially in the United States after World War II. The term is sometimes used more strictly in reference to the Asia-Pacific region, which does not include the Middle East or Russia,BBC News 2006. September 9, 2006. /news.bbc.co.uk/>. but does include islands in the Pacific Ocean—a number of which may also be considered part of Australasia or Oceania, although Pacific Islanders are not considered Asian.American Heritage Book of English Usage. Asian. 1996. September 29, 2006. /www.bartleby.com/64/C006/007.html>.

Political geography

Territories and regions

File:Location-Asia-UNsubregions orthographic projection.png|Geographical Subregions of Asia:

File:United Nations geoscheme (Asia).svg|UN geoscheme subregions of Asia:

Name of region  Continental regions as per , except 12. Depending on definitions, various territories cited below (notes 6, 11-13, 15, 17-19, 21-23) may be in one or both of Asia and Europe, Africa, or Oceania. and territory, with flag	Area (km²)	Population (1 July 2008 est.)	Population density (per km²)	Capital
Central Asia:
Kazakhstan is sometimes considered a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe; population and area figures are for Asian portion only.	2,724,927	15,666,533	5.7	Astana
	198,500	5,356,869	24.3	Bishkek
	143,100	7,211,884	47.0	Dushanbe
	488,100	5,179,573	9.6	Ashgabat
	447,400	28,268,441	57.1	Tashkent
Eastern Asia:
The state "People's Republic of China" is commonly known as simply "China", which is subsumed by the eponymous entity and civilization . Figures given are for mainland China only, and do not include Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan.	9,584,492	1,322,044,605	134.0	Beijing
Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of the People's Republic of China.	1,092	7,008,300	6,417.9	—
Macau is a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of the People's Republic of China.	25	460,823	18,473.3	—
	377,835	127,288,628	336.1	Tokyo
Figures are for the area under the de facto control of the Republic of China (ROC) government, commonly referred to as Taiwan. Claimed in whole by the PRC; see political status of Taiwan.	35,980	22,920,946	626.7	Taipei
	120,540	23,479,095	184.4	Pyongyang
	98,480	49,232,844	490.7	Seoul
	1,565,000	2,996,082	1.7	Ulaan Baatar
Northern Asia:
Russia is considered a transcontinental country in Eastern Europe and Northern Asia; population and area figures are for the entire state.	17,075,400	142,200,000	26.8	Moscow
Southeastern Asia:Excludes Christmas Island and Cocos Islands (Australian external territories in the Indian Ocean southwest of Indonesia).
	5,770	381,371	66.1	Bandar Seri Begawan
	676,578	47,758,224	70.3	Naypyidaw
	181,035	13,388,910	74	Phnom Penh
East Timor is often considered a transcontinental country in Southeastern Asia and Oceania.	15,007	1,108,777	73.8	Dili
Indonesia is often considered a transcontinental country in Southeastern Asia and Oceania; figures do not include Irian Jaya and Maluku Islands, frequently reckoned in Oceania (Melanesia/Australasia).	1,919,440	230,512,000	120.1	Jakarta
	236,800	6,677,534	28.2	Vientiane
	329,847	27,780,000	84.2	Kuala Lumpur
	300,000	92,681,453	308.9	Manila
	704	4,608,167	6,545.7	Singapore
	514,000	65,493,298	127.4	Bangkok(Krung Thep Mahanakhon)
	331,690	86,116,559	259.6	Hanoi
Southern Asia:
	647,500	32,738,775	42.9	Kabul
	147,570	153,546,901	1040.5	Dhaka
	38,394	682,321	17.8	Thimphu
Includes Jammu and Kashmir, a contested territory among India, Pakistan, and the PRC.	3,287,263	1,147,995,226	349.2	New Delhi
	300	379,174	1,263.3	Malé
	147,181	29,519,114	200.5	Kathmandu
	803,940	167,762,049	208.7	Islamabad
	65,610	21,128,773	322.0	Sri Jayawardenapura-Kotte
Western Asia:
Armenia is sometimes considered a transcontinental country: physiographically in Western Asia, it has historical and sociopolitical connections with Europe.				Yerevan
Azerbaijan is often considered a transcontinental country in Western Asia and Eastern Europe; population and area figures are for Asian portion only. Figures include Nakhchivan, an autonomous exclave of Azerbaijan bordered by Armenia, Iran and Turkey.	46,870	3,845,127	82.0	Baku
	665	718,306	987.1	Manama
The island of Cyprus is sometimes considered a transcontinental territory: in the Eastern Basin of the Mediterranean Sea south of Turkey, it has historical and socio-political connections with Europe. However, the U.N. considers Cyprus to be in Western Asia, while the C.I.A. considers it to be in the Middle East.	9,250	792,604	83.9	Nicosia
Georgia is often considered a transcontinental country in Western Asia and Eastern Europe; population and area figures are for Asian portion only.				Tbilisi
	437,072	28,221,181	54.9	Baghdad
	1,648,195	70,472,846	42.8	Tehran
	20,770	7,112,359	290.3	Jerusalem
	92,300	6,198,677	57.5	Amman
	17,820	2,596,561	118.5	Kuwait City
	10,452	3,971,941	353.6	Beirut
	212,460	3,311,640	12.8	Muscat
	6,257	4,277,000	683.5	Ramallah
	11,437	928,635	69.4	Doha
	1,960,582	23,513,330	12.0	Riyadh
	185,180	19,747,586	92.6	Damascus
Turkey is generally considered a transcontinental country in Western Asia and Southern Europe; population and area figures are for Asian portion only, excluding all of Istanbul.				Ankara
	82,880	4,621,399	29.5	Abu Dhabi
	527,970	23,013,376	35.4	Sanaá
Total	43,810,582	4,162,966,086	89.07

Note: Part of Egypt (Sinai Peninsula) is geographically in Western Asia

Country name changes

Various Asian countries have undergone name changes during the previous century as the result of consolidations, secessions, territories gaining sovereignty and regime changes.

Previous Name	Year	Current Name
Dominion of India, formerly British India	1950	Republic of India
East Bengal province	1905-1911 and 1947-1955 1955-1971 1971	East Pakistan state Bangladesh, People's Republic of
Democratic Kampuchea	1975	Cambodia, Kingdom of
Empire of Great Qing of China	1912 1949	China, Republic of China, People's Republic of
Portuguese Timor	1975 2002	Timor Timur (province of Indonesia) East Timor, Democratic Republic of
Dutch East Indies	1949	Indonesia, Republic of
Persia	1935 1979	Iran, Iran, Islamic Republic of
Transjordan	1946	Jordan, Kingdom of
Kirghiz SSR (USSR)	1991	Kyrgyzstan, Republic
Malaya, North Borneo, Sarawak and Singapore	1963 1965	Malaysia (including Singapore) Malaysia and Singapore
Burma	1989	Myanmar, Union of
Muscat	1971	Oman, Sultanate of
Dominion of Pakistan	1947-1956 1956-1970 1971	West Pakistan, Islamic State of Pakistan, Islamic Republic of
Islas de San Lorenzo, Spanish East Indies, Philippine Islands and Las Islas Filipinas	1965	Philippines, Republic of the
Hejaz-Nejd, The Kingdom of	1932	Saudi Arabia, Kingdom of
Aden	1970	South Yemen, People's Republic of
Ceylon	1972	Sri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic of
Tajik SSR (USSR)	1991	Tajikistan, Republic of
Siam	1939	Thailand, Kingdom of
Ottoman Empire	1923	Turkey, Republic of
Turkmen SSR (USSR)	1991	Turkmenistan
Trucial Oman and Trucial States	1971	United Arab Emirates
French Indo-China	1949	Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam
Yemen, People's Democratic and Southern Yemen	1990	Yemen, Republic of

Economy

Economy of Asia

During 2003 unless otherwise stated

Population:	4,162,966,086 (2006 Estimate)
GDP (PPP):	US$18.077 trillion
GDP (Currency):	$8.782 trillion
GDP/capita (PPP):	$4,518
GDP/capita (Currency):	$2,143
Millionaires:	2.0 million (0.05%)
Most numbers are from the UNDP from 2002, some numbers exclude certain countries for lack of information.

Asia has the third largest nominal GDP of all continents, after North America and Europe, but the largest when measured in PPP. As of 2007, the largest national economy within Asia, in terms of gross domestic product (GDP), is that of China followed by that of Japan, India, South Korea and Indonesia. However, in nominal (exchange value) terms, they rank as follows: Japan, China, India, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Indonesia. Since the 1960s, South Korea had maintained the highest economic growth rate in Asia, nicknamed as an Asian tiger, becoming a newly industrialized country in the 1980s and a developed country by the 21st century. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the economies of the PRC and India have been growing rapidly, both with an average annual growth rate of more than 8%. Other recent very high growth nations in Asia include Malaysia, the Philippines, Pakistan, Vietnam, Mongolia, Uzbekistan and mineral-rich nations such as Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Iran, Brunei, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Oman.

China was the largest and most advanced economy on earth for much of recorded history, until the British Empire (excluding India) overtook it in the mid 19th century. Japan has had for only several dacades after WW2 the largest economy in Asia and second-largest of any single nation in the world, after surpassing the Soviet Union (measured in net material product) in 1986 and Germany in 1968. (NB: A number of supernational economies are larger, such as the European Union (EU), the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) or APEC). In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Japan's GDP was almost as large (current exchange rate method) as that of the rest of Asia combined. In 1995, Japan's economy nearly equalled that of the USA to tie as the largest economy in the world for a day, after the Japanese currency reached a record high of 79 yen/dollar. Economic growth in Asia since World War II to the 1990s had been concentrated in Japan as well as the four regions of South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore located in the Pacific Rim, known as the Asian tigers, which have now all received developed country status, having the highest GDP per capita in Asia.

It is forecasted that the People's Republic of China will surpass Japan to have the largest nominal and PPP-adjusted GDP in Asia within a decade. India is also forecast to overtake Japan in terms of Nominal GDP by 2020. In terms of GDP per capita, both nominal and PPP-adjusted, South Korea will become the second wealthiest country in Asia by 2025, overtaking Germany, the United Kingdom and France. By 2050, according to a 2006 report by Price Waterhouse Cooper, China will have the largest economy in the world (43% greater than the United States when PPP adjusted, although perhaps smaller than the United States in nominal terms).

Trade blocs

• Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation
• Asia-Europe Economic Meeting
• Association of Southeast Asian Nations
• Gulf Cooperation Council
• Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement
• Commonwealth of Independent States
• South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation

Natural resources

Asia is the largest continent in the world by a considerable margin, and it is rich in natural resources, such as petroleum, forests, fish, water, rice, copper and silver.

Manufacturing

Manufacturing in Asia has traditionally been strongest in East and Southeast Asia, particularly in mainland China, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, India , Philippines and Singapore. Japan and South Korea continue to dominate in the area of multinational corporations, but increasingly mainland China, and India are making significant inroads. Many companies from Europe, North America, South Korea and Japan have operations in Asia's developing countries to take advantage of its abundant supply of cheap labour and relatively developed infrastructure.

Financial and other services

Asia has four main financial centres: Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore and Shanghai. Call centres and business process outsourcing (BPOs) are becoming major employers in India and the Philippines due to the availability of a large pool of highly-skilled, English-speaking workers. The increased use of outsourcing has assisted the rise of India and the China as financial centres. Due to its large and extremely competitive information technology industry, India has become a major hub for outsourcing.

Early history

The history of Asia can be seen as the distinct histories of several peripheral coastal regions: East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia and the Middle East, linked by the interior mass of the Central Asian steppes.

The coastal periphery was home to some of the world's earliest known civilizations, each of them developing around fertile river valleys. The civilizations in Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley and the Huanghe shared many similarities. These civilizations may well have exchanged technologies and ideas such as mathematics and the wheel. Other innovations, such as writing, seem to have been developed individually in each area. Cities, states and empires developed in these lowlands.

The central steppe region had long been inhabited by horse-mounted nomads who could reach all areas of Asia from the steppes. The earliest postulated expansion out of the steppe is that of the Indo-Europeans, who spread their languages into the Middle East, South Asia, and the borders of China, where the Tocharians resided. The northernmost part of Asia, including much of Siberia, was largely inaccessible to the steppe nomads, owing to the dense forests, climate and tundra. These areas remained very sparsely populated.

The center and the peripheries were mostly kept separated by mountains and deserts. The Caucasus and Himalaya mountains and the Karakum and Gobi deserts formed barriers that the steppe horsemen could cross only with difficulty. While the urban city dwellers were more advanced technologically and socially, in many cases they could do little in a military aspect to defend against the mounted hordes of the steppe. However, the lowlands did not have enough open grasslands to support a large horsebound force; for this and other reasons, the nomads who conquered states in China, India, and the Middle East often found themselves adapting to the local, more affluent societies.

Languages and literature

Asia is home to several language families and many language isolates. Most Asian countries have more than one language that is natively spoken. For instance, according to Ethnologue, more than 600 languages are spoken in Indonesia, more than 800 languages spoken in India and more than 100 are spoken in the Philippines. China has many languages and dialects in different provinces.

Nobel prizes

The polymath Rabindranath Tagore, a Bengali poet, dramatist, and writer from Santiniketan, now in West Bengal, India, became in 1913 the first Asian Nobel laureate. He won his Nobel Prize in Literature for notable impact his prose works and poetic thought had on English, French, and other national literatures of Europe and the Americas. He is also the writer of the national anthems of Bangladesh and India.

Tagore is said to have named another Bengali Indian Nobel prize winner, the 1998 laureate in Economics, Amartya Sen. Sen's work has centered around global issues including famine, welfare, and third-world development. Amartya Sen was Master of Trinity College, Cambridge University, UK, from 1998-2004, becoming the first Asian to head an 'Oxbridge' College.

Other Asian writers who won Nobel Prizes include Yasunari Kawabata (Japan, 1966), Kenzaburō Ōe (Japan, 1994), Gao Xingjian (People's Republic of China, 2000) and Orhan Pamuk (Turkey, 2006).

Also, Mother Teresa of India and Shirin Ebadi of Iran were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their significant and pioneering efforts for democracy and human rights, especially for the rights of women and children. Ebadi is the first Iranian and the first Muslim woman to receive the prize. Another Nobel Peace Prize winner is Aung San Suu Kyi from Burma for her peaceful and non-violent struggle under a military dictatorship in Burma. She is a nonviolent pro-democracy activist and leader of the National League for Democracy in Burma(Myanmar) and a noted prisoner of conscience. She is a Buddhist and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991.

Sir C.V.Raman is the first Asian to get a Nobel prize in Sciences. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics "for his work on the scattering of light and for the discovery of the effect named after him".

Other Asian Nobel Prize winners include Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, Abdus Salam, Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Robert Aumann, Menachem Begin, Aaron Ciechanover, Avram Hershko, Daniel Kahneman, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin, Yaser Arafat, Jose Ramos Horta and Bishop Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo of Timor Leste, Kim Dae-jung, and thirteen Japanese scientists. Most of the said awardees are from Japan and Israel except for Chandrasekhar and Raman (India), Salam (Pakistan), Arafat (Palestinian Territories) and Kim (South Korea).

In 2006, Dr. Muhammad Yunus of Bangladesh was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for the establishment of Grameen Bank, a community development bank that lends money to poor people, especially women in Bangladesh. Dr. Yunus received his Ph.D. in economics from Vanderbilt University, United States. He is internationally known for the concept of micro credit which allows poor and destitutes with little or no collateral to borrow money. The borrowers typically pay back money within the specified period and the incidence of default is very low.

The Dalai Lama has received numerous awards over his spiritual and political career.[129] On 22 June 2006, he became one of only four people ever to be recognized with Honorary Citizenship by the Governor General of Canada. On 28 May 2005, he received the Christmas Humphreys Award from the Buddhist Society in the United Kingdom. Most notable was the Nobel Peace Prize, presented in Oslo on 10 December 1989

Beliefs

Mythology

Asian mythology is complex and diverse. The story of the Great Flood for example, as presented to Christians in the Old Testament, is first found in Mesopotamian mythology, in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Hindu mythology tells about an avatar of the God Vishnu in the form of a fish who warned Manu of a terrible flood. In ancient Chinese mythology, Shan Hai Jing, the Chinese ruler Da Yu, had to spend 10 years to control a deluge which swept out most of ancient China and was aided by the goddess Nüwa who literally fixed the broken sky through which huge rains were pouring.

Religions

Almost all Asian religions have philosophical character and Asian philosophical traditions cover a large spectrum of philosophical thoughts and writings. Indian philosophy includes Hindu philosophy and Buddhist philosophy. They include elements of nonmaterial pursuits, whereas another school of thought from India, Cārvāka, preached the enjoyment of material world. Christianity is also present in most Asian countries.

Abrahamic

The Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam originated in West Asia. Judaism, the oldest of the Abrahamic faiths, is practiced primarily in Israel (which has the world's largest Jewish population) , though small communities exist in other countries, such as the Bene Israel in India. In the Philippines and East Timor, Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion; it was introduced by the Spaniards and the Portuguese, respectively. In Armenia, Georgia and Russia Eastern Orthodoxy is the predominant religion. Various Christian denomination have adherents in portions of the Middle East, as well as China and India. The world's largest Muslim community (within the bounds of one nation) is in Indonesia. South Asia (mainly Pakistan, India and Bangladesh) holds 30% of Muslims. There are also significant Muslim populations in China, Iran, Malaysia, southern Philippines (Mindanao), Russia and most of West Asia and Central Asia.

Dharmic & Taoist

The religions of Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism originated in India, South Asia. In East Asia, particularly in China and Japan, Confucianism, Taoism and Zen Buddhism took shape.

See also

References

1. " Asia". Encyclopædia Britannica. 2006. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
2. "Europe" (pp. 68-9); "Asia" (pp. 90-1): "A commonly accepted division between Asia and Europe ... is formed by the Ural Mountains, Ural River, Caspian Sea, Caucasus Mountains, and the Black Sea with its outlets, the Bosporus and Dardanelles."
3. Reid, T.R. Confucius Lives Next Door: What living in the East teaches us about living in the west Vintage Books(1999).
4. " Asia." MSN Encarta Encyclopedia. 2007. Archived 2009-10-31.
5. Welty, Paul Thomas. The Asians Their Evolving Heritage, 6th ed., p. 21. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1984. ISBN 0-06-047001-1.
6. Menon, Sridevi. Duke University. "Where is West Asia in Asian America?Asia and the Politics of Space in Asian America." 2004. April 26, 2007. page 71 [1]
7.   The administrative capital of Burma was officially moved from Yangon to a militarised greenfield just west of Pyinmana on 6 November 2005.
8. General Population Census of Cambodia 2008 - Provisional population totals, National Institute of Statistics, Ministry of Planning, released 3rd September, 2008
9. In 1980, Jerusalem was proclaimed Israel's united capital, following its annexation of Arab-dominant East Jerusalem during the 1967 Six-Day War. The United Nations and many countries do not recognize this claim, with most countries maintaining embassies in Tel Aviv instead.
10. Five Years of China's WTO Membership. EU and US Perspectives on China's Compliance with Transparency Commitments and the Transitional Review Mechanism, Legal Issues of Economic Integration, Kluwer Law International, Volume 33, Number 3, pp. 263-304, 2006. by Paolo Farah
11. Professor M.D. Nalapat. Ensuring China's "Peaceful Rise". Accessed January 30, 2008.
12. Dahlman, Carl J; Aubert, Jean-Eric. China and the Knowledge Economy: Seizing the 21st Century. WBI Development Studies. World Bank Publications. Accessed January 30, 2008.
13. The Real Great Leap Forward. The Economist. Sept 30, 2004
14. Chris Patten. Financial Times. Comment & Analysis: Why Europe is getting China so wrong. Accessed January 30, 2008.
15. Rise of Japan and 4 Asian Tigers from emergingdragon.com

• "Asia". The Columbia Gazetteer of the World Online. 2005. New York: Columbia University Press.
• World Conflicts: Asia and the Middle East [9]. Edited by Carl L. Bankston III. New York: Salem Press.

Further reading

Reference works

• Higham, Charles. Encyclopedia of Ancient Asian Civilizations. Facts on File library of world history. New York: Facts On File, 2004.
• Kapadia, Feroz, and Mandira Mukherjee. Encyclopaedia of Asian Culture and Society. New Delhi: Anmol Publications, 1999.
• Levinson, David, and Karen Christensen. Encyclopedia of Modern Asia. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2002.
• Kamal,Niraj. "Arise Asia: Respond to White Peril". New Delhi:Wordsmith,2002, ISBN 81-87412-08-9

External links

• (European Digital Archive on the Soil Maps of the World - EuDASM)
• Map Asia
• Maps of Asia from the Norman B. Leventhal Map Center at the Boston Public Library
• Philp Bowring, "What is Asia?" (Columbia University Asia For Educators), [10]
• Niraj Kumar, 'Asia's Swan song"[www.ariseasia.blogspot.com]