Is mexico in north america or central america?

Show all answers

The Ghost

It is interesting to see all of these answers, but in reality Mexico is part of North America. It is not part of Central America. Much confusion arises when Latin America is mentioned because that does include Mexico, and most of Central and South America, but the concept of Latin America is not so much geographic as it is demographic.
Geographically speaking, Mexico is part of North America and if it is taught in some American schools that way, it may arise from the above confusion.

The confusion continues:
In Mexico, Mexico is considered and taught as being part of North America, but on most ocassions Americans (from the USA) are referred to as or are called "North Americans". Also, Mexico's real complete name is Estados Unidos Mexicanos, or Mexican United States, and the US name is Estados Unidos de America. The reason this can be a little confusing is because Mexico considers America to be all the land from the tip of Chile to the Northwest tip of Alaska, including Canada.
This is particularly confusing to some Mexicans because USA people refer to the US as America.

There are also many other countries that comprise North America that are often left unmentioned as is the case with

Anguilla
Antigua and Barbuda
Aruba
Bahamas
Barbados
Belize
Bermuda
British Virgin Islands
Canada
Cayman Islands
Clipperton Island
Costa Rica
Cuba
Dominica
Dominican Republic
El Salvador
Greenland
Grenada
Guadeloupe
Guatemala
Haiti
Honduras
Isla Aves
Jamaica
Martinique
Mexico
Montserrat
Navassa Island
Netherlands Antilles
Nicaragua
Panama
Puerto Rico
Saint Barthelemy
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia
Saint-Martin
Saint Pierre and Miquelon
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
San AndrÃ©s y Providencia
Trinidad and Tobago
Turks and Caicos Islands
United States
United States Virgin Islands

As you can see there are many countries here that would be considered Central America as is the case with Nicaragua, Honduras, and panama, and the reason these too are North American is because North America is considered a continent, while Central America is not. So you can make the argument that Nicaragua is part of Central America as well as North America as well as Latin America!

Aaaall of this information can be quite confusing as you can see, so in the end it just boils down to practical observations as opposed to labels. Is Mexico North America or Central America. It is definitely North America, but it might be both, it just depends who's the one doing the talking. Is taiwan a country? According to the US it is, but it's not recognized a country by more than 200 other countries! wow!

I realize this is a lot of information, but I tried writing it in a way that could best lead you to a deeper understanding of your question. If you're in school or have friends with which to discuss this problem, you'll probably impress the pants off of them, not bad huh?
If you found it helpful, I'd appreciate the ten points, thanks

abono11746

Why we ever stopped teaching geography in our schools I'll never understand. It's questions like this that has the rest of the world laughing at our educational system.

Meghan <3

Mexico is one of the 3 countries in North America the others are Candada and U.S

S F

North America, along with the US and Canada.

Charlie

It is in North America. In fact "Central America" is actually part of North America...it is not a continent...it is just a name used for convenience to refer to a section of North America. Geographically, it is part of North America. See site below with map and good explanation. In fact, there are 23 countries in North America, as the Caribbean nations are included in North America.

nth_iq

north america
central america is usually used to refer to the countries above south america and below the usa
central america is really just the lower part of north america.,.
so the answer is it's both...

Ashley

North America. It is part of NAFTA (The North American Free Trade Agreement) along with Canada and the USA.

Isaac R

Answered this question a LOT of times....

And its pretty fun, but it seems that in Mexicos schools it is learned that the country is located in North America (Geographical phocus: Mexico is located mainly over the Northamerican plates). Teachers says that since the first grades at elementary school.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Plate
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_America

But in the US, they tend to locate Mexico in Central America, maybe using a demographic perspective. (Mexicans definatley are more related to Central Americans than to Americans and Canadians both cultural and in an ethnical basis).

Some sources consider Central America its just a region that its included within Northamerica
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_America
Cheers.

Edit:
Sorry for the answers above, but i dont think that the need of a passport has something related to the subject. You need a passport to leave your country and sometimes a visa to enter the destination country. Passport and Visa requirements are settled based on Foreign Affairs and International Policies & Controls. If Americans didnt need a Passport or VISA to enter in Canada, it should be thanks to a Political arrangements (Maybe the US Government think its non sense to control the departures to and arrivals from Canada becuase its a developed and friendly country, but thinks its very important to control this issues for passengers coming from the south, becuase of the inmigrants theme). We mexicans dont need a VISA to get into most of Europe and definatley we are a little far for them.

Mumof5

North America. (and FYI, you do not yet need a passport to get into Canada from the US if you are American).

christina c

Central America. otherwise we wouldn't need a pass port to enter the country or tell the guards at the stop how long we will be in the country and where we will be going.

Enter Your Message or Comment

User Name:
User Email:
Post a comment: