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Mainland Australia is the main landmass of the Australian continent, excluding the Aru Islands, New Guinea, Tasmania, and other Australian offshore islands.The landmass also constitutes the mainland of the territory governed by the Commonwealth of Australia, and the term, along with continental Australia, can be used in a geographic sense to exclude surrounding continental islands and external ...
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, [17] is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. [18] Australia has a total area of 7,688,287 km 2 (2,968,464 sq mi), making it the sixth-largest country in the world and the largest in Oceania .
Continental landmasses are not usually classified as islands despite being completely surrounded by water. [Note 1] However, because the definition of continent varies between geographers, the Americas are sometimes defined as two separate continents while mainland Australia is sometimes defined as an island as well as a continent.
The Commonwealth of Australia comprises the mainland of the Australian continent, the major island of Tasmania, other nearby islands, and various external territories. [1] Neighbouring countries are Indonesia , East Timor , and Papua New Guinea to the north, the Solomon Islands , Vanuatu , and New Caledonia to the north-east, and New Zealand to ...
The term is relative: in Tasmania, continental Australia is the mainland, while to residents of Flinders Island, the main island of Tasmania is also "the mainland", though the geological Australian continent includes all the former plus the island of New Guinea and all the smaller islands (e.g. the Torres Strait Islands) in between.
One, especially in Australian use, is "Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, and the neighbouring islands of the Pacific". The other, especially in New Zealand use, is just Australia and New Zealand. [5] Two Merriam-Webster dictionaries online (Collegiate and Unabridged) define Australasia as "Australia, New Zealand, and Melanesia".
1859 – Northeastern mainland Australia and Coral Sea Islands become the independent colony of Queensland. 1860 – A pocket of New South Wales territory remaining in southern central mainland Australia is transferred to South Australia. 1862 – Some of New South Wales' northern central mainland Australian territory is transferred to Queensland.
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. Australia has a total area of 7,688,287 km 2 (2,968,464 sq mi), making it the sixth-largest country in the world and the largest in Oceania. It is the world's oldest ...