A: CONTINENT OF EXTREMES AND CONTRASTS GENERAL INTRODUCTION Asia has been identified by the National Geographic Society Education Foundation as our topic for geographic awareness emphasis. Why do you suppose this continent has been chosen for study? There are many reasons Asia has been identified as a critical continent for examination in the early part of the twenty-first century. This introduction will provide a selection of facts and generalizations about the physical and cultural geography that make Asia important to the United States and the world at this time. It is a continent of extremes and invites internal comparison and contrast. Just a few examples will be given in this introduction but students are encouraged to identify other data, in addition to what is provided here, that help us understand the geography of this great continent. As you review the following descriptive comments about Asia use an atlas to orient your spatial thinking and understanding. Geographic terms are always important. Why do we refer to parts of Asia as the Near or Middle East and other parts as the Far East? These terms originated in Europe many hundreds of years ago. Historically, to the European, those lands on the Eastern shore of the Mediterranean were ‘near’, or ‘middle’, when compared to China which was ‘far’ east. This logic also gave the islands of Southeast Asia the name the East Indies and the islands of the Caribbean region the West Indies. We in the United States have accepted this labeling of lands by the Europeans. Therefore, from the United States today, we must travel east to go to the West Indies and go west to get to the East Indies. Note: The author (in some cases the word compiler might be more appropriate) of this introduction wishes to acknowledge the Wiley and Sons book, deBlij and Muller, THE WORLD TODAY: CONCEPTS AND REGIONS IN GEOGRAPHY, 2007, as a reference source. I recommend this reference as a major help to any teacher who wishes to study the continent of Asia. It can serve as an important shelf reference for students who would engage in such a study. SELECTED LOCATION AND PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS The largest of the continents, Asia extends more than 150 degrees of longitude from east to west and more than 90 degrees of latitude from north to south. Asia is the location of Mount Everest in the Himalayas, the highest elevation on earth, to the Dead Sea located between Israel and Jordan, the lowest. It includes some of the hottest and coldest, driest and wettest lands on Earth. It is diverse to the extreme as to its cultural characteristics of language, religion, type of government and in other ways. Asia is located on what many people have called the “Eurasian” landmass. An examination of any world map will substantiate that reasoning. However, to simplify a bit, most geographers agree that Asia is bordered by the Ural Mountains in Russia, the Arctic, Pacific, Indian Oceans, the Mediterranean and Black Seas and the Caucasus Mountains. Additional smaller features could be included. Can you find some of them such as the Bering Strait or the Sea of Marmara? An analysis of the physical map of Asia will show a number of features that give Asia its unique character. Three of the world’s largest nations, Russia in size, China in area and population, and India in population, are there and the extremely long coastline and large number of islands belie (give a false impression) the fact that the continent has, of forty eight total nations, thirteen countries that do not have direct access to the oceans of the world. Georgia and Jordan have only marginal access to the world’s trade routes. Deserts, tundra and mountains are other noticeable features with their distinctively different climates and vegetation regimes. Great areas of needleleaf forests cover Siberia and in Southeast Asia are millions of square miles of subtropical and tropical rainforest. The physical environment suggests and limits what humans can do as they develop their lifestyles, but it does not dictate. Very broad generalizations about the east-west bands of climates of Asia would reveal that the north is very cold, the central band is dry, the mountain band is called ‘undifferentiated’ climate because slope, altitude and latitude can change highland climates significantly over short distances, and the south has humid climates Drought and unreliable precipitation dominate the natural environments in the realm. The southwestern part of Asia is in the desert belt of the world, the Himalayan Mountains in the South-Central part of the continent and the high latitudes in the North each has an impact on the dry characteristic of the land. South of the Himalayas the winds are warm as they come off of the Indian Ocean. They are full of moisture and cause monsoon conditions in Bangladesh, Myanmar and Northern India. Some years Bangladesh will receive over 500 inches of rain, causing flooding and great destruction. As the winds proceed north over the mountains, they become cool, dropping their rain. As they continue north and cross the high peaks as very dry winds they cause evaporation rather than rain. This condition is called a rain shadow. A result of this transfer of moisture from the ground to the air creates desert conditions. Any area that receives ten inches or less of rainfall in a year is called a desert. Notice on the map the Takla Makan, Gobi and contiguous deserts. This extremely large dry area includes the nations of China, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and part of southern Siberia. From the north, the very cold winds move from the Arctic south through Russia and they too release very little moisture. These dry conditions make it difficult to produce agricultural products in much of central Asia. Asian soils are varied and very important. Where there is adequate rainfall and warm weather multiple harvests are made on the same land. The best examples are in Southern and Southeast Asian river valleys and lowlands where rice is the most important crop. In many areas relatively small patches of productive soils are farmed very intensively to produce wheat and other grains critical to the survival of the population. Irrigation is important in many of the dryer areas of the continent. An important physical characteristic of Asia can be noted as we look at a map of plate tectonics. A pattern shows that along the Pacific rim from the Kamchatka Peninsula south and then west following the Indonesian islands is a zone that has had a high number of recorded earthquakes and volcanic activity over the years. Most recently was the Indian Ocean tsunami that killed over 200,000 people and caused hundreds of millions of dollars of destruction. Rivers are both visually prominent and very important to the character of Asia. Several of the rivers are among the largest in the world and others, particularly the Indus, Ganges, Yangtze, and Yellow have been called ‘cultural hearths’, places where early civilizations developed. Interestingly, three large Asian rivers are in the Russian north. The Ob, Yenisey and Lena Rivers have very sparse human population and activity due to their relative location. The mouths of each of these rivers empties into seas of the Arctic Ocean and are ice bound much of the year. Several rivers, such as the Mekong in the Southeast and the Euphrates in the Southwest, either border, or go through, multiple countries. They impact farmers, fishermen, tradesmen, and in some cases cause conflict. In every case, they provide transportation from the inland areas to the coasts. Natural resources are abundant in Asia. However, the problem is that they are very uneven in their distribution. While some nations are very rich from natural resources, some must spend what wealth they have to purchase goods to meet their basic needs. Where water is available, soils are the most important resource but oil and gas deposits are the most coveted natural gifts. Many natural resources have been stressed, or depleted, due to population pressure. Soil, timber and fish are examples of this resource problem. SELECTED POPULATION AND CULTURAL CHARACTERISTICS A dot map of Asia’s human population of nearly four billion of the world’s six and a half to seven billion people shows several concentrations. A large grouping has grown in East China from the historic location along the Yellow (Huang) and Yangtze (Chang) Rivers to show a dense pattern over the Pacific third of the country. A second concentration is along the Ganges River in northern India, but it too has spread to virtually all of the Indian sub-continent, including Bangladesh and into Pakistan. Additional concentrations are seen in the Indonesian Island of Java and in the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. The Southeast Asian peninsular mainland and its archipelago is an area of high relief, of geologic instability, and more than one half billion people including the most populous Muslim nation, Indonesia. Not only does Asia have, by far, the largest human population of any of the six permanently inhabited continents, it also has the most square miles with no population at all due to the lack of population supporting potential. Overall Asia has high growth rates as compared to world standards. World history provides us with information about the ancient civilizations that developed in the Yellow, Yangtze, Ganges and Indus River valleys. From these hearths, innovations and technologies have spread throughout and changed the world. Asia has been the source of most of the world’s great religions, including Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Shintoism, and other beliefs. Unfortunately, in addition to good deeds, religions can emphasize fundamentalism and nationalism and cause conflict.