East Indies

The East Indies or Indies are the lands of South and Southeast Asia. In a more restricted sense, the Indies can be used to refer to the islands of Southeast Asia, especially the Malay Archipelago. The name "Indies" is derived from the river Indus and is used to connote parts of Asia that came under Indian cultural influence (except Vietnam which is in the Chinese cultural sphere).

Dutch-held colonies in the area were known for about 300 years as the Dutch East Indies before Indonesian independence, while Spanish-held colonies were known as the Spanish East Indies before the US conquest and later Philippines' independence. The East Indies may also include the former French-held Indochina, former British territories Brunei and Singapore, and former Portuguese East Timor. It does not, however, include the former Dutch New Guinea western New Guinea (West Papua), which is geographically considered to be part of Melanesia.

The inhabitants of the East Indies are almost never called East Indians, distinguishing them both from inhabitants of the Caribbean (which is also called the West Indies) and from the indigenous peoples of the Americas who are often called "American Indians." In colonial times they were just "natives". However, the peoples of the East Indies comprise a wide variety of cultural diversity, and the inhabitants do not consider themselves as belonging to a single ethnic group. Buddhism, Islam, Christianity and Hinduism are the most popular religions throughout the region, while Sikhism, Jainism, Chinese folk religion and various other traditional beliefs and practices are also prominent in some areas. The major languages in this area draw from a wide variety of language families, and should not be confused with the term Indic, which refers only to a group of Indo-Iranian languages from South Asia.

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