At 592,800 square kilometres (228,900 sq mi),Madagascar is the world's 47th largest country,the 2nd largest island country and the fourth-largest island.
Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar , and previously known as the Malagasy Republic, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately 400 kilometres (250 miles) off the coast of East Africa across the Mozambique Channel. At 592,800 square kilometres (228,900 sq mi) Madagascar is the world's second-largest island country, after Indonesia. The nation consists of the island of Madagascar (the fourth-largest island in the world) and numerous smaller peripheral islands.
According to the U.S. Department of State in 2011, 41% of Malagasys practiced Christianity, and 52% adhered to traditional religions,which tends to emphasize links between the living and the razana (ancestors); these numbers were drawn from the 1993 census. However, according to the Pew Research Center in 2010, 85% of the population now practiced Christianity, while just 4.5% of Malagasys practiced folk religions; among Christians, practitioners of Protestantism outnumbered adherents of Roman Catholicism.
A wide variety of oral and written literature has developed in Madagascar. One of the island's foremost artistic traditions is its oratory, as expressed in the forms of hainteny (poetry), kabary (public discourse) and ohabolana (proverbs).An epic poem exemplifying these traditions, the Ibonia, has been handed down over the centuries in several different forms across the island, and offers insight into the diverse mythologies and beliefs of traditional Malagasy communities.This tradition was continued in the 20th century by such artists as Jean-Joseph Rabearivelo, who is considered Africa's first modern poet,and Elie Rajaonarison, an exemplar of the new wave of Malagasy poetry.