Talk:Oceania/Archive 1

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Inclusion

Biogeographically or ethnographically or in terms of plate techtonics, the inclusion, as part of Oceania, of Australia/New Guinea ('Papua New Guinea' is a political designation, like 'Haiti/Dominican Republic') might be explained, as it is unusual. New Zealand is in all these senses part of Oceania. But is Australia actually included because of accidents of European 'discovery' or British Empire history? User:Wetman [ 19:35, 28 September 2003 (UTC) ]

I'm not sure for which reasons Australia is (or can be) included, but AFAIK it's very common to see it lumped together with Oceania. This doesn't mean that I think it should be. (BTW, Paul Theroux used the name 'Meganesia' for Australia and New Zealand in his book The Happy Isles of Oceania.) OTOH, I thought that ethnographically speaking, New Guinea and the surrounding islands were part of Melanesia (and thus Oceania). D.D. 20:02, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Australasia

Instead of including New Zealand in Polynesia, couldn't we group Australia, Papua New Guinea and New Zealand into one group called Australasia.

Well, you could, but you'd risk the wrath of everyone in New Zealand. New Zealand does not consider itself part of Australasia - it is in Oceania. Conversely, Australia is a continent, so it can't really be considered part of Oceania if you regard Oceania as a continent. The term Australasia may have some uses when talking politically, economically or - to some extent - in terms of ecology, but geographically Australia is a continental landmass whereas New Zealand and the Poly/Mela/Micronesian Islands are all island chains.

Well I am a New Zealander and NZ is definatley part of Australasia, and we are part of Oceania. I havent heard of any New Zealanders objecting to being part of Australasia.

Please sign your posts, people. Someone has replaced as fairly nuanced discussion of this issue with a simple "Now known as Australiasia." [sic] In the absence of any evidence, I'm reverting it. 172.201.205.3, feel free to discuss this here, preferably logged in though. —rodii 02:52, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

On further reflection, this section still needs clarification. If the differing views of Autralasia and Oceania can't be ironed out (is Australia in Oceania or isn't it?), then should should be acknowledged. Simply stating a pseudo-definitive "Now known as Australiasia" isn't really a solution. —rodii 02:57, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

This all boils down to whether the corresponding territories are at all to be considered an independent continent, which in turn depends on whether a continent is defined as a major landmass or one of a set of collectively exhaustive geographic zones. Labelling comes later. The term Australasia does not appear viable other than in a popular context.

Note that there is a separate Australasia entry, btw rodii 13:57, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

The difference is that Australasia is an officially recognised continent containing at least Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea whereas Oceania is a regional description of the islands in that area which contains countries from the continents of both Asia and Australasia. (rather like North and South America being known as the Americas) Except in this case neither Oceania or Australasia are wholly contained within the other.

Officially recognised continent appears to be a somewhat pretentious categorisation, of what I would rather like to refer to as a semantic attempt to construct a name for what should most adequately be referred to as “the residual of global sector division”.

The category is often best decided by residents of the country being categorised. New Zealanders and Australians have long been familiar with 'Australasia' referring to common activities. I have belonged to several Australasian organisations in the last 55 years. I think that that includes Papua New Guinea, the half that has been administered by Australia for 70 years (1905 to 1975). moza 12:37, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Although the "bottom-up-approach" always has its justification and charm I maintain, that from a theoretical point of view, the application of "Australasia" still appears just a little bit too arbitrarily invented to be promoted from the regional to the global context just like that. Furthermore this is quite contrary to the case with the similarily hybridic denomination Benelux, where the local opinion, in particual when it comes to the Walloons, is rather sceptic.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.225.114.121 (talk • contribs) .

Dear anon at 81.225.114.121, please sign your posts--it get difficult to figure out whether we are talking to one or several people.

You make some good points. I agree with you (if that is you) about "officially recognized continent"--what is the official body here? (When I was a kid I had a series of books on the continents, and the "residual" one was "Oceania." So that seemed, from my kid perspective, to be an "official" viewpoint, though it was only a kid's book. What seems authoritative often is just a matter of what we first encounter and what uses it's been put to, until we reflect a bit.) The whole concept of "continent" doesn't really bear close inspection when it comes down to it. So I think we have to agree here that there are several points of view on the subject, and that it is likely to remain contested, so for the purposes of an encyclopedia we should let a hundred flowers bloom and be sure to provide cross-links and critical voices. That's my take on the issue anyway. I'm not sure exactly what you're advocating, but I'd like to hear it. rodii 21:47, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

To articulate my position, the ambiguity when it comes to naming the sixth continent is due to the fact that this actually is not a continent in the same sense as the other ones. It is by no means evident that there are six continents and for example Cervantes mentioned Europe, Asia, America and Africa and afterwards concluded that all four continents had been listed. If there is not a more distinct name for the sixth continent than “Australasia”, the whole discussion grows a bit quasi. /Copywriter

Melanesia, Micronesia, Polynesia

I am aware of the difficulties with the three-part division, but does anyone have a cite for the idea that it is "no more recognised as correct by most geographers and scientists"? Linguistically, at least, Polynesia and Micronesia are still viable concepts. The idea of Melanesia is on much shakier footing, however.

Also, the list of places in Polynesia is incomplete. I suggest either syncing that list up with the articles on Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia, or simply replacing it with links. Rodii

No, Micronesia is not a viable concept. Not in linguistics, at least. This was not a 3-part division, but a 4-part, as Jules Dumont d'Urville who invented it, has proposed 4 parts for Oceania (Polynésie, Micronésie, Mélanésie and… Malaisie, in English Malay). And most modern linguists and geographers consider that division (in 3-part) as obsolete. Enzino 19:59, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Enzino, I think you'll have to elaborate. As far as I know, no one has contested the existence of the Micronesian branch of Oceanic, and all the languages spoken in Micronesia except the outliers Yapese, Nukuoro and Kapingamarangi are Micronesian (and in fact very closely related). See Ethnologue for details and a map. (Thanks for the link to d'Urville.) Rodii 02:17, 16 Mar 2005 (UTC)

No one has contested? I do not think that I will have to elaborate. Micronesian is a branch of Oceanic. But it does not include all the geographic Micronesian region. Chamorro is not Micronesian. Yapese is not Micronesian. Palau is not Micronesian. And are not closely related. You are confused between Nuclear Micronesian and the Micronesian Region. And you probably have no better source than Ethnologue. Please, have a look to The Lexicon of Proto Oceanic, The culture and environment of ancestral Oceanic Society, 1. Material Culture, — 2. The Physical Environment. edited by Malcolm Ross, Andrew Pawley and Meredith Osmond. ISBN 0 85883 507 X (v. 1) & 0 85883 539 (v. 2). It's not only a concept of outliers (from Polynesia or elsewhere). The history of these frontiers is far more interesting (and delicate) that you could imagine. The 3-Division of Oceanic is a non-sense... Enzino 18:36, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)

• shrug* Well, if your point is that Micronesia in its putative geographical sense and in its linguistic sense are not completely coextensive, sure. The world abounds with vague but pragmatically useful concepts. (I think your point could be made a little less obnoxiously, by the way. I'll refrain from responding in kind.)

Map

Unfortunately, the map on this page is hardly readable and completely omits New Zealand.

---

True. Apparently, it was cropped from the CIA World Factbook map in an attempt to exclude NZ and Australia from the definition of Oceania. If someone finds a hi-res version of the picture in the link below, that would be a better choice.

http://www.faqs.org/docs/factbook/reference_maps/oceania.html

East Timor

I noticed East Timor is in the list. Is it really part of Oceania? If so, then the bit about the only international land border being between Papua New Guinea and Indonesia needs to be updated to reflect the border between East Timor and Indonesia. If not, it should be removed from the list.

Proposed merge (with Australasia)

Hi, in order to have the merge discussions at one place, I hv suggested that all discussions about the proposed merge take place here so that continuity is not lost (else, we would end up with discussions on both talkpages - the other talk page being Talk:Australasia making it difficult to follow who is saying what). I believe that the merge is justified because of the following reasons: -

1. Both the articles cover similar ground, by and large.
2. Duplication of articles is not justified.
3. The controversy about the existence of these two terms can be dealt in a separate section in the merged article.
4. The controversy about which term is more prefered can be debated. Hence, I have not suggested which article should be retained and which one should be converted into a redirect.

--Gurubrahma 11:30, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

Honestly, I think merging these two would confuse the issues. With Oceania, the question is whether or not Australia and New Zealand are included, whereas with Australasia, the question is whether anything except Australia and New Zealand are included. It seems that the terms have some overlap, but are definitely not synonymous. -- Dpark 01:13, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Dpark. Perhaps it would be fruitful to talk about ways in which these articles could be made more distinctive. rodii 04:30, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

I, too, oppose the proposal, and echo Rodii's suggestion.--cj | talk 04:34, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Strong oppose These two terms are not synonymous and should remain in discrete articles; I also agree with rodii. E Pluribus Anthony 05:48, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Very Strong oppose Brian (talk) 22:02, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

• It's been about a month since this proposal was made, and the only reaction has been negative to very negative, and I think that should be considered the consensus. If no one objects, I'm going to remove the mergewith template soon. That is not to say these articles don't need improvement, just that this particular idea isn't going to fly. OK? rodii 02:44, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

• While I still believe that the articles can and should be merged, the consensus, without doubt, is against the merger. I agree with rodii and I'll save him some work by removing the merge templates myself ;-) Btw, it should be ok as long as the See also section in each article provides a link to the other article. --Gurubrahma 05:22, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

I think the distinction is justified. There are a lot of overlapping spheres within the Pacific, and depending on whether you're talking about colonial history/language/people/climate/sport/politics whatever, the different terms serve to highlight different associations. For example, Australia and New Zealand have a lot in common, but in different contexts New Zealand is more associated with the Pacific Islands, and at other times other groupings are also useful. Anecdotally, I've found Oceania to be the new fangled term (and really only associate it it with soccer and the olympics), with Pacific/Polynesia/Australasia being the terms I'm more familiar with. So I guess that's a belated oppose...Limegreen 10:41, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

I concur with rodii and Lg: there are too many interpretations and definitions regarding Australia/Australasia/Oceania/etc. Having all of these distinct treatments in one article would confuse the terms and issue, so it isn't unnecessary repetition and (if in a single article) redirects would lead a visitor incorrectly down a garden path.

These various interpretations are not only limited to the current topic, either: I'm finding other landmass descriptions (continent, region, etc.) and content somewhat lacking. For example, the A/NZ interpretation that Lg describes is somewhat similar to what some may or may not consider North America (for various reasons): Canada/United States (which the UN describes as Northern America, et al.), Central America (which commonly excludes Mexico but the UN does not), and the Caribbean.

To that end, I've been on a minor quest of sorts to improve the related articles/templates, various definitions (where applicable), and add data tables (others for Asia and Oceania (which generally encompasses Australia/New Zealand and surrounding island territories) to follow soon!) explaining these distinctions and summarising important data points. When there's any doubt (a la neutrality), I'm deferring to UN geographic categorisations. Please let me know if you've any questions. E Pluribus Anthony 18:02, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

• Support I concur that it should be merged, I don't think Australia is even the name of the continent anymore, I think Australia, New Zealand, and the islands are all the continent of Oceania. I mean, South America isn't called Brazil. Matty-chan 20:14, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Oceania is not a continent in any geographical or geological sense. It is a region.--cj | talk 03:34, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Strongly Oppose Australasia and Oceania are two different regions. Suggesting they are merged into one article is tantamount to suggesting Central America be merged with North America or New South Wales with the Australia article. Factoid Killer 20:56, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Proposed General Name: Indo-Pacifica

This easily encompasses the territories between the East Indian Ocean and the Western Pacific. Sure, one can question the credibility, but a term should define the boundaries of a place. Australia only accounts for the latin Australis for South, and Asia is a large section of the Eurasian landmass. Bubble the terms into the Ocean defined category and it makes it a bit simpler. But one still has to consider the cultural congruencies of the regions... Aminatam 21:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I can't make much sense of what you've written here ("Bubble the terms into the Ocean defined category"?). My take on the idea, however, is that "Indo-Pacifica" is a neologism, and thus not suitable for a Wikipedia article (see WP:Avoid_neologisms). People will come here looking for articles on Oceania and Australasia, because those are recognized terms. No one will search for "Indo-Pacifica". In my opinion, the question of whether those terms really make sense is best left to a critical discussion in the article, and shouldn't be answered by tinkering with the article namespace itself. rodii 02:39, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

That's not really what Wikipedia is for. We don't try to create new terms. In fact, that's specifically against the guidelines. -- Dpark 22:01, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Come again? --cj | talk 11:12, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

ASIA-PACIFIC is also a term used for many years, I dont think its that specific enough. PACIFIC RIM is also a useful description for a wider area of interest. I like INDO-PACIFIC as it contains elements of the continental plates that make up the region geologically; The INDO-AUSTRALIS meets the PACIFIC plate under the exact location I write this!! India and South-East Asia are very important influences on this region, perhaps thats related to the Southern Hemisphere part of Oceania more than the Northern Hemisphere part. Indonesia and China are also increasing in importance to this zone, perhaps more evenly distributed though, it all needs checking. PACIFICA or PACIFIKA ( 'k' used here in NZ) is used ncreasingly to describe cultural blends in art, particularly music. moza 12:49, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree strongly with Rodii, Dpark and (I think) cj about Indo-Pacifica. No neologisms please. I do like Pacifica as a cultural term, but haven't seen it used in a geographical sense. -- Avenue 11:40, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree with R, dp, cj: there's little to support the use of this neologism in Wp. Apropos, there are 859 online notations for "Indo-Pacifica", so it'll have to gain much more acceptance in common usage before being used to describe the region in Wp. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 11:46, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

sorry, I didnt make it clear that I wouldnt like the suggestion to be used for a major title to an article, I was just musing about liking it for something. I prefer Oceania. Likek CJ i wasnt taking it seriously... I also can not see the value in using any recently made up names for something as ancient as this collection of 'communities of interest'. moza 13:04, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

recognize/recognise

Folks, edit wars over spelling are lame. Let's not go there, please. Both variants are acceptable here. rodii 14:45, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

There isn't an edit war. An anon broke MoS convention, and Brian rightly reverted them.--cj | talk 14:51, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

I know, I'm saying, let's not have an edit war. rodii 15:45, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Orwell's 1984

Wasn't Oceania one of the three major powers in George Orwell's book "1984"? Should that be in this article somewhere?

It is--look at the disambig notice at the very top: "For other uses of this term, see Oceania (disambiguation)." And that page has a link to Oceania (fiction). —rodii 23:36, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Countries and territories of Oceania

Wouldn't it be better to have two groups, one for independent countries and the other for dependent territories? The current grouping seems rather messy. Leftist 04:34, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

If you're referring to the table, I don't think so: as noted, it is based on the UN scheme for geographical subregions, representing both a neutral and systematic way of classifying such things. Pending another agreeable scheme, which is nigh impossible, I think the UN scheme (which is also used for the (other) five popularly known continents/regions) is the way to go.

If you're referring to the list of territories above, perhaps ... and – since the definition of Oceania can vary – also brought inline with the scheme of the table. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 08:49, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I was referring to the list. Actually, I find that list rather redundant, considering that the table below it has the same information. Leftist 10:22, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I know: such duplication exists not only for this article but for the other continent articles. I'm unsure how to address it: the tables are summative, but there are arguably useful tidbits in the lists that (I think) would probably overload the tables if carried over to them. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 11:08, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Same here, hopefully someone who has a better idea would be bold and change it. Leftist 06:47, 20 March 2006 (UTC)