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Concept
Far East
Summary
In European terminology, the Far East is the geographical region that encompasses the easternmost portion of the Asian continent, including East, North and Southeast Asia. South Asia is sometimes also included in the definition of the term.
The term first came into use in European geopolitical discourse in the 15th century, particularly the British, denoting the Far East as the "farthest" of the three "Easts", beyond the Near East and the Middle East. Likewise, during the Qing dynasty of the 19th and early 20th centuries, the term "Tàixī (泰西)" – i.e., anything further west than the Arab world – was used to refer to the Western countries.
Since the mid-20th century, the term has mostly gone out of use for the region in international mass media outlets due to its eurocentric connotations. North Asia is sometimes excluded due to cultural and ethnic differences.
Among Western Europeans, prior to the colonial era, Far East referred to anything further east than the Middle East. In the 16th century, King John III of Portugal called India a "rich and interesting country in the Far East (Extremo Oriente)." The term was popularized during the period of the British Empire as a blanket term for lands to the east of British India.
In pre-World War I European geopolitics, Near East referred to the relatively nearby lands of the Ottoman Empire, Middle East denoted north-western Southern Asian region and Central Asia, and the Far East meant countries along the western Pacific Ocean and eastern Indian Ocean. Many European languages have analogous terms, such as the French (Extrême-Orient), Spanish (Extremo Oriente), Portuguese (Extremo Oriente), Italian (Estremo Oriente), German (Ferner Osten), Polish (Daleki Wschód), Norwegian (Det fjerne Østen) and Dutch (Verre Oosten).
Significantly, the term evokes cultural as well as geographic separation; the Far East is not just geographically distant, but also culturally exotic. It never refers, for instance, to the culturally Western nations of Australia and New Zealand, which lie even farther to the east of Europe than East Asia itself.
Official source
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