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ASIA
It is the world's largest and most diverse continent, covering about
30 percent of the land area on Earth.
The name Asia is ancient, and its
origin has been variously explained. The Greeks used it to designate
the lands situated to the east of their homeland. It is also believed
that the name may be derived from the Assyrian word asu, meaning
"east."
Asia is bounded by the Arctic Ocean
on the north, the Pacific Ocean on the east, the Indian Ocean on
the south, the inland seas of the Atlantic Ocean--the Mediterranean
and the Black--on the southwest, and Europe on the west. Asia is
separated from North America to the northeast by the Bering Strait
and from Australia to the southeast by the mingled waters of the
Indian and Pacific oceans. The Isthmus of Suez unites Asia with
Africa, and it is generally agreed that the Suez Canal forms the
border between them. Two narrow straits, the Bosporus and the Dardanelles,
separate Anatolia from the Balkan Peninsula.
Relief features
Asia has the highest average elevation of the continents and contains
the sharpest relief. The highest peak in the world, Mount Everest,
which is 29,035 feet (8,850 metres) high; the lowest place on the
Earth's land surface, the Dead Sea, which averages about 1,312 feet
(400 metres) below sea level; and the world's deepest continental
trough, occupied by Lake Baikal, which is 5,315 feet (1,620 metres)
deep and whose bottom lies at 3,822 feet (1,165 metres) below sea
level, are all located in Asia. These physiographic extremes and
the overall predominance of mountain belts and plateaus are the
result of Asia's prolonged and intense geologic activity. Asia is
the youngest of the continents; broadly speaking, it consists of
several ancient platform cores, which over time accumulated immense
quantities of material around them and were subjected to a series
of collisions with one another that resulted in uplifting along
the zones of collision.
The mountain systems of Central
Asia have provided the continent's great rivers with water from
their melting snows.
Also as a result of this configuration,
Asia's population is unevenly distributed. There is a concentration
of population in western Asia as well as great concentrations in
the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent and the eastern half of China and
appreciable concentrations in the Pacific borderlands and on the
islands; but vast areas of Central and North Asia have remained
sparsely populated. Nonetheless, Asia, the most populous of the
continents, contains almost three-fifths of the world's people.
Religion
Asia is the birthplace of all the world's major religions--Buddhism,
Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism--and of many minor ones.
Of these, only Christianity developed primarily outside Asia; it
exerts little influence on the continent, though many Asian countries
have Christian minorities. Buddhism has had a greater impact outside
its birthplace in India and is prevalent in various forms in China,
Korea, Japan, the Southeast Asian countries, and Sri Lanka. Islam
has spread out of Arabia eastward to South and Southeast Asia, as
well as westward and southward to Africa. Hinduism has been mostly
confined to the Indian subcontinent.
Climate
The enormous expanse of Asia and its abundance of mountain barriers
and inland depressions have resulted in great differences among
regions in existing conditions of solar radiation, atmospheric circulation,
and climate as a whole. Climates in Asia range from that of the
equatorial rain forest to that of the Arctic tundra. For the most
part, the northern part of Asia is dominated by movement of polar
continental air masses that travel from western Siberia to the northern
Pacific. Winters here are long and harsh, summers are short and
cool, and the annual precipitation is light. A similar climate is
characteristic of the Tibetan Plateau and other uplands. The interior
regions have middle-latitude desert or semiarid climates, with harsh
winters and warm to hot summers and an average annual precipitation
of less than 230 mm (less than 9 in). The southern and eastern margins
of the continent, however, are characterized by monsoonal air movements
from the cold interior east and south in winter and from the oceans
north toward the warmer land in summer. For the most part the margins
of Asia have cool to cold, dry winters and hot, humid summers, with
a strong concentration of rainfall in the summer months.
Patterns of Economic Development
Most of Asia is economically underdeveloped. The majority of the
continent's population is employed in agriculture, but most agricultural
activity is characterized by low yields and low labor productivity.
Relatively few people in Asia are employed in manufacturing. In
general, urban centers and their industries are not well integrated
economically with the rural sector. Transportation systems, both
within countries and between them, are poorly developed. A number
of exceptions exist, and they are important. Japan has successfully
modernized its economy, as have Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore,
and, to a lesser extent, Malaysia and Thailand.
Food
Given its diverse nature, Asia prides about myriad cuisine. Click
here to get the feel of it:
Central Asian arts
Folk dance
Among the peoples of Central Asia, folk dancing occurs as a form
of entertainment at social occasions, such as festivals, weddings,
and other celebrations, and private parties. Often impromptu, folk
dances are sometimes performed without the accompaniment of musical
instruments, and the performers rely on singing and footwork to
maintain the rhythm.
Formalized folk dance does not appear
to have evolved among nomadic peoples of the steppe and desert regions,
but such dances did develop among the sedentary agriculturists,
particularly in the Himalayan regions, where troupes of amateur
performers were formed for local entertainment. Some dances were
performed by a group of men and women forming a circle; in others,
the dancers faced each other in lines. The dance steps and body
movement were performed according to a stylized routine, and the
rhythmic beat was accented by a measured stamp of the foot.
Indian Independence Day is also a major event and a national
holiday.
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