Why Is Greenland Bigger Than Africa On Some Maps Of The World?

Maybe you have seen a map inside your classroom or on a website and you noticed that Greenland is bigger than Africa. Shouldn’t a continent be bigger than an island? Why isn’t Greenland considered a continent? The answer is that Greenland is an island that is a lot smaller than the continent of Africa.

Greenland has an area of 2.166 million km² while Africa is a giant mass of land with an area of 30.37 million km². Below are photos from thetruesizeof.com that show how large of a difference the size of both land masses has.

The blue outline is Greenland inside the Continent of Africa if they were proportional to their real-world size. https://www.thetruesize.com/

How did Greenland became larger than continents?

Greenland appears larger than Africa on some maps due to the distortions introduced by certain map projections, particularly the Mercator projection. Coincidently, Mercator has been a very popular map projection used in many parts of the world and has spread some misinformed ideas about the real size of some places in the world.

The Mercator projection is a cylindrical map projection created by Gerardus Mercator in the 16th century. It was designed for navigation purposes, making it easier for sailors to plot straight-line courses on a map. However, the Mercator projection has some significant distortions, especially in the polar regions. In Mercator, as land masses get close to the earth’s poles, their shape and size get distorted and make them look bigger and stretched out than their real dimensions.

Why do we use the Mercator Projection in the classroom?

The Mercator Projection maps are designed for navigation use. Gerardus Mercator, the cartographer who designed the map, drew straight lines parallel to each other vertically and horizontally that intersect in a 90-degree angle. He exaggerated the sizes of the landmasses to fit the needs of traders and sailors that will use his maps.

Due to how popular his maps were for navigation in the 16^th century, his maps were brought to colonies and were inevitably used as a reference and representation of the earth in a flat plane. Mercator was also a pioneer of publishing another navigation tool, a collection of maps in a book that he called an “Atlas”. This book would use the Mercator projection when showing the geography of the world and consequently, it would introduce map projection in many classrooms.

Criticism and moving away from the Mercator Projection

One most talked about criticism, the Mercator projection, specifically, enlarges privileged international powers while shrinking non-European or non-American nations and continents. For instance, Africa is portrayed as being smaller than North America although it is actually three times bigger. Many people believe that these differences show racism and prejudice against developing and underdeveloped nations. People who support Peters frequently claim that this projection only benefits colonial powers while disadvantages others. https://www.thoughtco.com/peters-projection-and-the-mercator-map-4068412

By the 1940’s Atlases, would stop using the Mercator Projection in favor of other cylindrical projections or any equal form projection. One of the currently favored projections as of now is the Galls-Peter Projection.

Most schools in Boston, USA, have started to replace the Mercator projection map with the Galls-Peter Projection.

Why is Greenland bigger than Africa on some maps of the world? 1

Is there any accurate map of the world?

Almost all map projections would have different distortions and skewed representations of the world. It is hard to capture the whole spherical Earth on a flat surface. If really want to have an accurate representation of the world, the globe is the closest and most accurate depiction of our world.

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