Just how many continents are there?

I periodically get complaints from readers about the geographic groupings in our Morning Brief. Why does news from North Africa get lumped in with the Middle East? What about separating Central and East Asia? Can Oceania and the Pacific get some love? Don’t Canada and the Caribbean get short shrift in the "Americas" category? To ...

By , a former associate editor at Foreign Policy.

I periodically get complaints from readers about the geographic groupings in our Morning Brief. Why does news from North Africa get lumped in with the Middle East? What about separating Central and East Asia? Can Oceania and the Pacific get some love? Don't Canada and the Caribbean get short shrift in the "Americas" category?

I periodically get complaints from readers about the geographic groupings in our Morning Brief. Why does news from North Africa get lumped in with the Middle East? What about separating Central and East Asia? Can Oceania and the Pacific get some love? Don’t Canada and the Caribbean get short shrift in the "Americas" category?

To which I respond, that’s the way we do it so deal with it. And as the video below clearly illustrates, what constitutes a continent is not all that clear anyway:

Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan

Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating

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