Well, everybody born in the american continent is technically “american” too, including Central and South America. Is there a specific term in english for these people?

Edit: Thanks for all your answers, especially the wholesome ones and those patient enough to explain it thoroughly. Since we (South Americans) and you (North Americans) use different models/conventions of continent boundaries, it makes sense for you to go by “Americans”, while it doesn’t for us.

  • DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe
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    9 months ago

    Um

    AKSHUALLY

    It’s debatable that North and South America are separate continents. I prefer the continental plate system but some countries literally teach that there is an “American” continent that includes both landmasses.

    They also typically merge Europe and Asia, which is absolutely the right thing to do regardless.

    The reason you have this disagreement is that there simply isn’t a good, concise definition of “continent,” and because at the end of the day it only matters for semantics and racism.

    So the number of continents in the world is between 5 to 7, all debatably correct, depending on who you ask.

    Possibly even 4 if you want to get particularly spicy and say any large, connected landmass is a single continent, merging Africa, Europe, and Asia into a single entity.

    Which is also a more valid take than “Europe is its own continent because white people live there.”

    Edit: I forgot to mention the Indian homies are more deserving of a continent than Europe, thanks to having their own tectonic plate.

    Tl;DR the world has 4-8 continents, but it is typically taught as anywhere from 5-7, it just depends on how actually consistent you want to be with your rules for what defines a continent, and 7 is just straight up the scientifically worst option unless India is recognized as a separate continent from Eurasia.

    • nixcamic@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Yeah that’s kinda my point haha. Continents are made up and don’t mean anything. If you’re going by plates then there’s dozens of continents.