About the Caribbean
The Caribbean is a major marine region south of the eastern
United States, east of
Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico, east of Central America, and north of the Isthmus of Panama and the land masses of northwestern
South America. The region is considered to be part of
North America.
The Caribbean consists of the Caribbean Sea and its islands, also known as the West Indies. Part of the region borders the Atlantic Ocean to the northeast and east and is connected to the Gulf of Mexico to the west by the Yucatán Channel. Almost all of the more than 700 islands and islets are situated on the Caribbean Plate. Even so, many Caribbean Islands were formed by volcanoes erupting from the ocean floor; the Caribbean is not considered part of the
Pacific Ring of Fire.
The Caribbean is divided into four major island groups: the Greater Antilles, the Lesser Antilles, the Bahama Archipelago (Lucayan Archipelago), and the Leeward Antilles. The Lesser Antilles are further divided into three island groups: the Leeward Islands in the north, the Windward Islands in the south, and the Leeward Antilles, a chain of islands along the southeastern fringe of the Caribbean Sea, north of Venezuela's coast.
The largest Caribbean islands are Cuba, Hispaniola, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico, known as the Greater Antilles. Trinidad, the larger island of Trinidad and Tobago, is situated just north of the Venezuelan coast.
A typical Caribbean landscape with tropical beaches, clear waters, lush vegetation and overgrown hills (volcanic plugs). Diamond Rock (far left) and Morne Larcher, two landmark mountains on the island of Martinique, an overseas department of France in the West Indies.
Image: Sapakagadewmoinjadiw
More about the Caribbean
Topographic and bathymetric (submarine topography) map of the Caribbean.
Image: Natural Earth, kk - nationsonline.org
The islands of the Caribbean were originally inhabited by Arawak and
Carib Indians.
In 1492
Columbus 'found' the islands of the Bahamas; assuming that he had reached the coast of India, he called the locals
Indians.
Geography of the Caribbean
Area
With an
area of 2,753,000 km² (1,063,000 sq mi),
[EB] the Caribbean Sea is about five times the size of France, or four times the size of Texas.
Population
More than 44 million people live in the Caribbean.
[UN]
Languages
What languages are spoken in the Caribbean?
There are six official
languages in the Caribbean, and many other unofficial languages are spoken.
The official languages are Dutch, English, French, Haitian Creole, Papiamentu and Spanish. Haitian Creole and Papiamentu are creole languages.
Time zones
UTC−5 to UTC−4
Climate
Most of the Caribbean is situated south of the
Tropic of Cancer; its climate is influenced by its location near the equator, the oceans and trade winds. The whole area is under the influence of a prevailing, east-to-west,
easterly trade wind, which creates the North Equatorial Current (NEC), a westward wind-driven current. The climate is tropical maritime (warm and humid) with annual average coastal temperatures of about 26 °C (80 °F). The coolest temperatures are generally in January, and the warmest in August. There is a dry (February to June) and a wet season (June to November). The entire Caribbean lies in the so-called hurricane belt. Hurricane season is from June to December.
When you're on one of the Caribbean islands, sometimes it's hard to picture how they fit with the rest, but when you see them all joined together like a necklace from space, you see the natural geographic connectedness of them all.
Chris Hadfield - Canadian astronaut
Sovereign island nations
The Caribbean is home to
thirteen sovereign island nations: Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Cuba, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Haiti, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago (on the continental shelf of South America).
Some definitions of the Caribbean include countries with Caribbean coastlines, such as Belize, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana; even so, Suriname, French Guiana and Guyana are not bordered by the Caribbean Sea.
Also sometimes included is
Bermuda, a British island territory lying further to the north in the North Atlantic Ocean and the northernmost point of the
Bermuda Triangle.
Dependent territories of the Caribbean
A number of islands in the Caribbean remain dependent on former colonial powers, such as
France, the
Netherlands, the
United Kingdom, and the
United States.
[1]
Anguilla (UK), Aruba (NL), British Virgin Islands (UK), Caribbean Netherlands (Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba), Cayman Islands (UK), Curaçao (NL), Guadeloupe (France), Martinique (France), Montserrat (UK), Puerto Rico (US), Saint Barthélemy (France), Saint Martin/Sint Maarten (France/NL), Turks and Caicos Islands (UK), US Virgin Islands (US).