Continents Vocabulary
A continent is one of the world's main continuous pieces of land. (The word continent comes from the Latin terra continens, meaning "continuous land".) Continent is a geographical term, not political (continents are not man-made).
Unfortunately, even the experts cannot agree on how many continents there are:
- 7 continents: Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Europe, North America, Oceania, South America
- 6 continents: Africa, Antarctica, Eurasia, North America, Oceania, South America
- 6 continents: Africa, America, Antarctica, Asia, Europe, Oceania
- 5 continents: Africa, America, Antarctica, Eurasia, Oceania
- 4 continents: Eurafrasia, America, Antarctica, Oceania
This chart lists what is probably the most widely-accepted number of continents (7), and shows the associated adjective and the noun used for a person from each continent:
| continent | adjective | person |
|---|---|---|
| Africa | African | an African |
| Antarctica | Antarctic | - |
| Asia | Asian | an Asian |
| Europe | European | a European |
| North America | North American | a North American |
| Oceania | Oceanian | an Oceanian |
| South America | South American | a South American |
Curiously, we have a word for somebody who comes from the planet Mars (a Martian), but we have no word for somebody who comes from the continent Antarctica ;)