World map: continents, countries, seas, oceans

O world map, also known as the planisphere, is nothing more than the representation of the terrestrial globe in a plane. It has various functions that range from calculating distances to studying different aspects of the earth's surface.

In general, represents the disposition of different countries, continents and oceans. Its production is based on different cartographic projections.

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Political world map with identification of countries. Source: IBGE.

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World map function

THE making and using a world map can serve several purposes, which may appear directly expressed in some of the planisphere elements (title and caption) or vary according to the reader's intention.

One of its main functions is the identification and spatial location of countries as well as the recognition of their territorial limits and borders. Likewise, it is used to identify continents, hemispheres, and seas and oceans.

Considering the history of cartography and the making of the first world maps, it serves:

• navigation and spatial orientation in general;
• for performing distance calculations between different points;
• for calculations related to the planet's time zones.

When it's about thematic letters, the function of the map can still be the study, on a world scale:

• of physical aspects (relief, which sometimes includes oceans, climate zones, vegetation);
• of the political division;
• population distribution and other criteria selected at the time of making the map.

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continents of the world

The emerging lands of the planet are subdivided into six continents:

• Africa
• America
• Antarctica
• Asia
• Europe
• Oceania

Its spatial distribution can be seen in the map below, produced by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE).

Graphic representation of the six continents. Source: IBGE.

THE Africa is the continent that brings together the largest number of countries, 54. Its territorial extension is just over 30 million km² or 20% of the surface surface of planet Earth, being the second largest.

O largest continent in territorial extension is the Asia, with 44.46 million km² (29.85% of the total) and 49 countries.

THEAmerica can be subdivided into three: North America, Central America and South America. Altogether, they bring together 35 countries in a total area of ​​42.29 million km² (28,39%).

THE Europe has 49 countries and 9.94 million km², which is equivalent to 6.67% of the emerged lands.

THEOceania totals 7.6 million km² (5.1% of the total) and brings together 14 countries.

Lastly we have the AntarcticadThe, with 14.2 million km² (9.53%), not constituting a country nor being an integral part of any other territory.

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Countries of the world

The world currently has 193 countries. This number is in accordance with the total number of member countries of the United Nations Organization. Some sources report a total of 195 countries, including the Vatican it's the Palestinian State.

In the following tables we present all the countries, separated by the continent of which they belong.

• African countries

South Africa	Eritrea	mali	Senegal
Angola	Ethiopia	Morocco	Sierra Leone
Algeria	Swatini	Mauritania	seychelles
benin	Gabon	Mozambique	Somalia
Botswana	Gambia	Namibia	Sudan
Burkina Faso	Ghana	Niger	Southern Sudan
Burundi	guinea	Nigeria	Tanzania
Cape Green	Guinea Bissau	Kenya	Togo
Cameroon	Equatorial Guinea	Central African Republic	Tunisia
Chad	Lesotho	Democratic Republic of Congo	Uganda
Comoros	Liberia	Congo Republic	Zambia
Costa do Marfim	Libya	Republic of Mauritius	Zimbabwe
Djibouti	Madagascar	Rwanda
Egypt*	Malawi	Sao Tome and Principe

*Country whose territory extends over more than one continent.

• countries of america

The countries are separated by blocks:

• North America, in yellow;
• Central America, in red;
• South America, in blue.

Canada	Dominica	Saint Lucia	Ecuador
U.S	El Salvador	Saint Kitts and Nevis	Guyana
Mexico	Grenade	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	French Guiana
Antigua and Barbuda	Guatemala	Trinidad and Tobago	Paraguay
Bahamas	Haiti	Argentina	Peru
Barbados	Honduras	Bolivia	Suriname
Belize	Jamaica	Brazil	Uruguay
Costa Rica	Nicaragua	Chile	Venezuela
Cuba	Dominican Republic	Colombia

• Asian countries

Afghanistan	Singapore	Japan	Russia*
Saudi Arabia	North Korea	Jordan	Syria
Armenia*	South Korea	Kuwait	Sri Lanka
Azerbaijan*	Egypt*	Laos	Tajikistan
Bahrain	UAE	Lebanon	Thailand
Bangladesh	Philippines	Malaysia	East Timor*
Brunei	Georgia*	Maldives	Turkmenistan
Bhutan	Yemen	Myanmar	Turkey*
Cambodia	India	Mongolia	Uzbekistan
Kazakhstan*	Indonesia*	Nepal	Vietnam
Qatar	Will	Oman
China	Iraq	Pakistan
Cyprus*	Israel	Kyrgyzstan

*Countries whose territories extend over more than one continent.

O State of Palestine belongs to the Asian continent.

• European countries

Albania	Slovakia	latvia	Portugal
Germany	Slovenia	Liechtenstein	Czech republic
Andorra	Spain	Lithuania	Romania
Austria	Estonia	Luxembourg	Russia*
Belgium	Finland	Northern Macedonia	San Marino
Belarus	France	Malta	Serbia
Bosnia Herzegovina	Greece	Moldavia	Sweden
Bulgaria	Hungary	monaco	Switzerland
Kazakhstan*	England (United Kingdom)	Montenegro	Turkey*
Cyprus*	Ireland	Norway	Ukraine
Croatia	Northern Ireland (United Kingdom)	Netherlands	Vatican**
Denmark	Iceland	Wales (United Kingdom)
Scotland (United Kingdom)	Italy	Poland

*Countries whose territories extend over more than one continent.

**The Vatican integrates Europe, being located in the Italian capital, Rome.

• Oceania countries

Australia	Solomon Islands	palau	Tuvalu
Federated States of Micronesia	Kiribati	Papua New Guinea	Vanuatu
fiji	Nauru	Samoa
Marshall Islands	New Zealand	tonga

Also access: The 10 poorest countries in the world

Seas and oceans of the world

The surface of the water covering the Earth it has a length of 361,132,000 km², which is equivalent to 70.8% of the entire surface area of ​​the planet. splits into big five oceans:

• Atlantic
• Pacific
• Indian Ocean
• arctic glacier
• Antarctic Glacier

Distribution of oceans in the world.

O Pacific ocean is the largest in extension (155.55 million km²) and bathes the west coast of South, Central and North America, as well as eastern Asia and Oceania and Antarctica. It can be divided into North Pacific and South Pacific.

O Atlantic ocean is 76.76 million km² and bathes the east coasts of the Americas and the west of the African and European continents. It is divided into North Atlantic and South Atlantic.

O Indian Ocean has 68.55 million km² surface area and completely bathes Oceania, the western portion of Africa and a portion of Asia.

O arctic glacial ocean it bathes the northern end of the continents located in the Northern Hemisphere and has just over 14 million km² of area. O antarctic glacial ocean, located in the Southern Hemisphere, bathes the homonymous continent and has an area of ​​20 million km². These oceans do not always appear broken down, as their classification is not unanimous. It is common to find only the three oceans described above as the main bodies of water on the planet.

There are also large masses of salt water in contact with the continental surface and that correspond to extensions or part of the oceans, receiving the denomination of seas. Considering their surface area, some of the largest seas on the planet are:

• Red Sea, located between the African and Asian continents, in a gulf that connects to the Indian Ocean.
• China Sea (or South China Sea), located south of China and connecting to the Pacific Ocean.
• Caribbean Sea in Central America, connected to the Atlantic Ocean.
• Bering Sea, located in the Pacific Ocean, between Asia and North America, more specifically between Siberia and Alaska.
• Mediterranean Sea, located between Europe and Africa and connecting to the Atlantic Ocean to the east and Asia to the west.

Imaginary Lines of the World Map

The world map is divided by imaginary perpendicular horizontal (or latitudinal) and vertical (or longitudinal) imaginary lines - called, respectively, parallels and meridians.

Distribution of imaginary lines on the planisphere and identification of hemispheres. Source: IBGE.

The Earth has five parallels which receive special names and have specific attributions, in addition to helping to define the geographic coordinates and location of a point on the surface. Are they:

• equator line: parallel of 0° that divides the Earth into Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere. Above and below it, the counting of parallels is made in an increasing way until reaching 90º at the poles.
• Tropic of Cancer: 23º27’ parallel located in the Northern Hemisphere, crossing 19 countries.
• Tropic of Capricorn: 23º27’ parallel located in the Southern Hemisphere, crossing 10 countries.
• Arctic Circle: 66º33’ North parallel crossing eight countries.
• Antarctic Polar Circle: 66º33’ south parallel that circles Antarctica.

You meridians correspond to vertical lines drawn on the globe, which are used to mark the longitude, whose values ​​range from 0º to 180º west and east. O Greenwich Mean Time represents the 0º longitude and separates the world between the two hemispheres, western and eastern; it is also used as the zero point of the time zone count.

World map representations

The world map or planisphere can be represented based on different cartographic projections.

As a result of the difficulty transposing a spherical surface to a plane, there are distortions of surface aspects in all projection systems, namely the size or shape of territories, location and positioning of continents, among others. The type of distortion will depend on the surface used (conical, cylindrical or spherical).

Read too: What is the shape of the Earth?

• Mercator projection

THE Mercator projection it is of the cylindrical type and has parallels and meridians forming right angles to each other. The map resulting from its application ends up centralizing the European continent and distorting the territories located in higher latitudes.

Planisphere produced based on Mercator projection.

• Galls-Peters Projection

Also known as Peters projection, consists of a equivalent cylindrical type projection. This means that there is no distortion of the size of territories, contrary to their shapes.

Planisphere produced based on Peters' projection.

This projection highlights developing countries, which appear elongated and centralized, unlike developed countries.

• azimuth projection

The maps made based on the azimuthal projection appear in the circular shape, in which the parallels form concentric circles cut by meridians that converge at the central point.

Azimuthal projection is the same used in the composition of the symbol of the United Nations. Source: IBGE.

In this type of projection, a flat surface tangent to the curvature of the globe in the area to be represented, in the case of the previous example, the South Pole of the Earth. Distortions increase as you move away from the center point.

• Robinson's projection

Robinson's projection is the one that presents the fewer distortions in the final product, both in the area of ​​the territories and in their form. Parallels are represented in straight lines, while meridians appear curved. It is the most used projection for the production of world maps.

World map produced based on Robinson's projection, which sought to minimize distortions.

Read too: Mollweide projection - correct representation of the central areas and distorted at the ends

solved exercises

Question 1 – (Unicamp) A world map in the Mercator projection is reproduced below.

It is possible to say that in this projection:

A) the meridians and parallels do not intersect at 90° angles, which promotes an increase in continental masses at high latitudes.

B) the meridians and parallels intersect at 90° angles, which distorts the terrestrial portions close to the poles more and less the portions close to the equator.

C) there are no distortions in the continental masses and oceans at any latitude, allowing the use of this map for maritime navigation up to the present day.

D) the meridians and parallels intersect at perfect 90° angles, which makes it possible to represent the Earth without deformations.

Resolution

Alternative B. The projection in question deforms the surfaces at higher latitudes and, therefore, farther from the Equator and closer to the poles.

Question 2 – (Unesp 2018)

1. It is the angular value of the meridian arc between the equator and the parallel of the reference place. It will always be north or south.

2. It is the angular value, along the Earth's axis, of the plane formed by the extension of the ends of the arc included between the Greenwich Meridian and the arc of the place of reference, considering this plane always parallel to the plane of Ecuador. It will always be east or west.

(Paul A. Duarte. Basics of cartography, 2008. Adapted.)

In the excerpt, 1 and 2 correspond, respectively, to

A) longitude and latitude.

B) latitude and longitude.

C) longitude and meridian.

D) tropic and parallel.

E) latitude and parallel.

Resolution

Alternative B. Section number 1 refers to latitude, while section number 2 describes longitude.

By Paloma Guitarrara
geography teacher