oceania

The Oceania Portal

An orthographic projection of Oceania

Spanning the Eastern and Western Hemispheres, at the centre of the water hemisphere, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of about 9,000,000 square kilometres (3,500,000 sq mi) and a population of around 44.4 million as of 2022. When compared to the other continents, Oceania is the smallest in land area and the second-least populated after Antarctica. It is sometimes used interchangably with the Australia (continent), although few key differences exist.

Oceania has a diverse mix of economies from the highly developed and globally competitive financial markets of Australia, French Polynesia, Hawaii, New Caledonia, and New Zealand, which rank high in quality of life and Human Development Index, to the much less developed economies of Kiribati, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, and Western New Guinea, while also including medium-sized economies of Pacific islands such as Fiji, Palau, and Tonga. The largest and most populous country in Oceania is Australia, and the largest city is Sydney. Puncak Jaya in Highland Papua, Indonesia, is the highest peak in Oceania at 4,884 m (16,024 ft).

The arrival of European settlers in subsequent centuries resulted in a significant alteration in the social and political landscape of Oceania. The Pacific theatre saw major action during the First World War with the Japanese occupying many German territories. During the Second World War, Allied powers the United States, Philippines (a U.S. Commonwealth at the time) and Australia fought against Axis power Japan across various locations in Oceania. (Full article...)

Refresh with new selections below (purge)

Selected geographic article - show another

The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI; Chamorro: Sankattan Siha Na Islas Mariånas; Carolinian: Commonwealth Téél Falúw kka Efáng llól Marianas), is an unincorporated territory and commonwealth of the United States consisting of 14 islands in the northwestern Pacific Ocean. The CNMI includes the 14 northernmost islands in the Mariana Archipelago; the southernmost island, Guam, is a separate U.S. territory. The Northern Mariana Islands were listed by the United Nations as a non-self governing territory until 1990.

During the colonial period, the Northern Marianas were variously under the control of the Spanish, German, and Japanese empires. After World War II, the islands were part of the United Nations trust territories under American administration, before formally joining the United States as a territory in 1986, with their population gaining United States citizenship. (Full article...)

List of geographic articles

edit

Related portals

Selected article - show another

Oceanic art or Oceanian art comprises the creative works made by the native people of the Pacific Islands and Australia, including areas as far apart as Hawaii and Easter Island. Specifically it comprises the works of the two groups of people who settled the area, though during two different periods. They would in time however, come to interact and together reach even more remote islands. The area is often broken down into four separate regions: Micronesia, Melanesia, Polynesia and Australia. Australia, along with interior Melanesia (Papua), are populated by descendants of the first waves of human migrations into the region by Australo-Melanesians. Micronesia, Island Melanesia, and Polynesia, on the other hand, are descendants of later Austronesian voyagers who intermixed with native Australo-Melanesians; mostly via the Neolithic Lapita culture. All of the regions in later times would be greatly affected by western influence and colonization. In more recent times, the people of Oceania have found a greater appreciation of their region's artistic heritage.

The artistic creations of these people varies greatly throughout the cultures and regions. The subject matter typically carries themes of fertility or the supernatural. Art such as masks were used in religious ceremonies or social rituals. Petroglyphs, Tattooing, painting, wood carving, stone carving and textile work are other common art forms. Contemporary Pacific art is alive and well, encompassing traditional styles, symbols, and materials, but now imagined in a diversity of contemporary forms, revealing the complexity of geographic, cultural and individual interaction and history. (Full article...)

List of selected articles

Did you know - load new batch

... that Michaela Foster, a New Zealand footballer playing in the 2023 World Cup, is known for her mana?

General images - load new batch

The following are images from various Oceania-related articles on Wiki English.

Image 1Canoe carving on Nanumea atoll, Tuvalu (from Polynesia)
Image 2Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, Prime Minister of Samoa from 1998 to 2021, who initiated the Polynesian Leaders Group in late 2011. (from Polynesia)
Image 3The arrival of Abel Tasman in Tongatapu, 1643; drawing by Isaack Gilsemans (from Polynesia)
Image 4Polynesian (Hawaiian) navigators sailing multi-hulled canoe, c. 1781 (from Polynesia)
Image 5The Polynesian spread of colonization in the Pacific (from Polynesia)
Image 6Spinner dolphins (from Micronesia)
Image 7Aerial view of Solomon Islands (from Melanesia)
Image 8King Kamehameha I receiving the Russian naval expedition of Otto von Kotzebue. Drawing by Louis Choris in 1816. (from Polynesia)
Image 9Tarawa Atoll (from Micronesia)
Image 10A Melanesian child from Vanuatu (from Melanesia)
Image 11Grinding stones discovered from archaeology in Samoa (from Polynesia)
Image 12A pan flute from Solomon Islands, 19th century (from Melanesia)
Image 13Subregions (Melanesia, Micronesia, Polynesia, and Australasia), as well as sovereign and dependent islands of Oceania (from Polynesia)
Image 14Map from 1961 of the US Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, formerly Japan's South Seas Mandate. (from Micronesia)
Image 15Outline of sovereign (dark orange) and dependent islands (bright orange) (from Micronesia)
Image 16A common fishing canoe va'a with outrigger in Savaiʻi island, Samoa, 2009 (from Polynesia)
Image 17Polynesia is generally defined as the islands within the Polynesian Triangle. (from Polynesia)
Image 18Outline of sovereign (dark orange) and dependent islands (bright orange) (from Polynesia)
Image 19Outline of sovereign (dark orange) and dependent islands (bright orange) (from Melanesia)
Image 20Australia's concept of Australasia, which includes Australia, New Zealand and, in this case, Melanesia (from Australasia)
Image 21On February 14, 1779, Capt. James Cook was killed on the island of Hawaii (from Polynesia)
Image 22Painting of Tahitian Women on the Beach by Paul Gauguin—Musée d'Orsay (from Polynesia)
Image 23Māori war canoe drawn after James Cook's voyage to New Zealand. (from Polynesia)
Image 24Melanesia is one of three major cultural areas of the Pacific Ocean islands, along with Micronesia and Polynesia. (from Melanesia)
Image 25Polynesia is one of three major cultural areas of the Pacific Ocean islands, along with Melanesia and Micronesia. (from Polynesia)
Image 26Chronological dispersal of Austronesian peoples across the Indo-Pacific (from Melanesia)
Image 27A depiction of a royal heiau (Hawaiian temple) at Kealakekua Bay, c. 1816 (from Polynesia)
Image 28Polynesians with outrigger canoes at Waikiki Beach, Oahu Island, early 20th century (from Polynesia)
Image 29Kili Island is one of the smallest islands in the Marshall Islands. (from Micronesia)
Image 30Chamorro people in 1915 (from Micronesia)
Image 31Köppen-Geiger climate classification map of Melanesia (from Melanesia)
Image 32Map of Melanesia, showing its location within Oceania (from Melanesia)
Image 33An illustration of the Cross Spikes Club of the US Navy on Bikini Atoll, one of several Marshall Islands used for atomic bomb tests. (from Micronesia)
Image 34Manila Galleon in the Marianas and Carolinas, c. 1590 Boxer Codex (from Micronesia)
Image 35Mount Marpi in Saipan. (from Micronesia)
Image 36Carving from the ridgepole of a Māori house, ca 1840 (from Polynesia)
Image 37Sailors of Melanesia in the Pacific Ocean, 1846 (from Melanesia)
Image 38German New Guinea before and after the German-Spanish treaty of 1899 (from Micronesia)
Image 39Mokoliʻi Isle near Oahu, Hawaii (from Polynesia)
Image 40Cinder plain of Mount Yasur in Vanuatu (from Melanesia)
Image 41Map showing the migration and expansion of the Austronesians which began at about 3000 BC from Taiwan. The Polynesian branch is shown in green. (from Polynesia)
Image 42Beach scenery at Laura, Majuro, Marshall Islands (from Micronesia)
Image 43Languages of Micronesia. (from Micronesia)
Image 44Subregions (Melanesia, Micronesia, Polynesia and Australasia), as well as sovereign and dependent islands of Oceania (from Micronesia)
Image 45Image of the Castle Bravo nuclear test, detonated on 1 March 1954, at Bikini Atoll (from Micronesia)
Image 46Cook's Bay on Moorea, French Polynesia (from Polynesia)
Image 47Chronological dispersal of Austronesian peoples across the Indo-Pacific (from Micronesia)
Image 48New Caledonia (from Melanesia)
Image 49Micronesia is one of three major cultural areas of the Pacific Ocean islands, along with Melanesia and Polynesia. (from Micronesia)
Image 50German trading station at Jaluit Atoll with a Marshallese korkor outrigger canoe in the foreground (from Micronesia)
Image 51Mount Tavurvur in Papua New Guinea (from Melanesia)
Image 52Moai at Ahu Tongariki on Rapa Nui (from Polynesia)

Topics

Subcategories

Category puzzle

Select [►] to view subcategories

Things you can do

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Verify : List of islands of Australia, List of lakes of Australia, List of mountains in Australia, List of World Heritage Sites in Oceania

Associated Wiki

The following Wiki Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:

In other languages

Wiki in other languages used in Oceania:

More portals

Discover Wikipedia using portals

Purge server cache

This article uses material from the Wikipedia English article Portal:Oceania, which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 license ("CC BY-SA 3.0"); additional terms may apply (view authors). Content is available under CC BY-SA 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
®Wikipedia is a registered trademark of the Wiki Foundation, Inc. Wiki English (DUHOCTRUNGQUOC.VN) is an independent company and has no affiliation with Wiki Foundation.