SW and Central Asia Background Notes from P. 348-355

SW and Central Asia Background Notes from P. 348-355

Name: ______Date: ______Sec: ______

SW and Central Asia Background Notes from p. 348-355

  1. Southwest and Central Asia is a region (area) in the continent of ______. Directly to the west is

the continent of ______. To the south is the continent of ______.

  1. Much of Southwest Asia (Israel, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, etc.) is referred

to as ______.

Human Geography:

  1. Looking at the map on p. 352, list four countries that are south of the Tropic of Cancer and thus in the Tropical Zone and hot all year:
  1. How many countries are in this region? ______Which country has the biggest population? ______
  1. Which country in this region is the richest on a per capita (per-person) basis? ______
  1. Which religion do most people in SWC Asia follow? ______

History:

  1. What are two reasons that Southwest Asia is known as the “cradle of civilization?”
  1. Three major religions started in this region. Fill in details about each:

a) Judaism began around ______years ago. (You need to do math to calculate this.)

Its holy book is called the ______. The Holy Land for Jews is ______.

b) Christianity started with a man named______around the year ______(do math). Its

holy book is called the ______. It was started in a place called ______.

c) Islam was started in a region called the ______Peninsula by a prophet named

______around ______years ago (do math for this). Its holy book is called the

______. People who follow this religion are called ______.

  1. Israel was founded as a ______state in 1948 (after World War II when millions of people of that religion were killed, and started a movement to officially reclaim their Holy Land as a safe space).
  1. The countries of Central Asia (like Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan) used to be part of a giant

country called ______(which is now just Russia), but broke free after 1991.

  1. One ongoing fight in this region is between the religions ______and ______about whether Israel should be a Jewish country or not. (Israel is the only non-Muslim country in the region.)
  1. In some Muslim countries, there are ongoing arguments between ______and ______, two types of Islam.

Population:

  1. Around ______people live in SWC Asia, which makes up ______% of the world’s population.
  1. SWC Asia has one of the ______growing and ______populations in the world, with the majority of its people under the age of ______.
  1. What percent of people in SWC Asia are Muslim (practice the religion Islam)? ______

What percentage are the specific type of Muslim called Sunni? ______% to ______%.

  1. The capital city of Israel, which is holy for Islam, Christianity, AND Judaism is: ______
  1. In SWC Asia, ______% of people live in urban areas (cities) and ______% in rural (countryside), but every year the population is moving more and more to ______areas.
  1. Look at the diagram at the bottom of page 354 that shows how fast the population is growing in this region. How many times bigger was the population in 2008 than 1950? ______times bigger.

Economic Activity:

  1. Why is oil (also called petroleum) so important in this region?
  1. Why is water so important in this region?
  1. Fossil fuels are natural resources from the Earth like coal, gas, and oil that humans use for energy. Southwest Asia has the world’s largest deposits of the fossil fuel called ______, which has made countries with a lot of this very ______. Central Asia has an important fossil fuel called ______.

Oil in Southwest Asia (p. 357-363):

  1. What reaction (1-4 words) do you have about the photos on p. 356 of how Dubai changed due to oil money?
  1. Most people in Southwest Asia are ______, or people who speak Arabic. (p. 358)
  1. Looking at the map on p. 359, list the 10 countries that posses half the world’s known oil reserves.
  1. What is GDP (Gross Domestic Product)?
  1. What is GDP per capita? (Note: For the U.S.A. it is $53,000)
  1. What is HDI (Human Development Index)?

Southwest and Central Asia is circled on this world map. Label the 7 continents:

Here is an alphabetical list of the countries in Southwest and Central Asia:

1. Afghanistan

2. Armenia

3. Azerbaijan

4. Bahrain

5. Cyprus

6. Georgia

7. Iran

8. Iraq

9. Israel

10. Jordan

11. Kazakhstan

12. Kuwait

13. Kyrgyzstan

14. Lebanon

15. Oman

16. Pakistan

17. Qatar

18. Saudi Arabia

19. Syria

20. Turkey

21. Turkmenistan

22. United Arab Emirates

23. Uzbekistan

24. Tajikistan

25. Yemen

Below is a cheat sheet of some of the biggest conflicts right now in Southwest and Central Asia:

Syria – There has been a major civil war going on since 2011 in which around 300,000 people have been killed and 11 million people displaced (forced to move). Rebels are fighting the dictatorship of the leader, Bashar al-Assad, but now ISIS, a violent terrorist group, has started getting involved.

Iraq – In 2003 the U.S. invaded this country and threw out the leader, Saddam Hussein, saying he had “weapons of mass destruction.” These weapons were never found, and some suspect the U.S. invaded for other reasons such as oil. Since then, Iraq has fallen into chaos, and the violent terrorist group ISIS is taking over sections.

Iran - This country has been an “enemy” of the U.S. since 1979 when the Iranian revolution threw out the “puppet” government supported by the U.S. Recently, however, President Obama has started to reopen connections with Iran, saying we can connect with each other again if Iran stops building nuclear weapons.

Afghanistan – The U.S. invaded this country in 2001 after Sept. 11 and threw out the violently repressive Taliban (who don’t believe women should get an education). Now that the U.S. troops have left, however, the country has become chaotic and violent, and the Taliban may be coming back.

Israel – This is currently the only Jewish country in the region (almost all the others are Muslim), and was founded in 1948 after WWII when millions of Jews were killed in the Holocaust and others started a movement to return to their Holy Land. Israel is very upsetting for Palestinians (and many other Arabs) who feel their land was taken.

Yemen – A civil war has recently started there, and Saudi Arabia (a rich and stable oil-producing country on the Arabian Peninsula which is considered a U.S. friend) is starting to get involved.

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