Chinese Studies
Contact: Jianye He
Scope of Collection
Chinese language monographs and serials are comprehensively acquired at research level for most areas of the humanities and social sciences with an emphasis on Chinese history, languages and literature, philosophy, religion, politics, economics, social conditions, fine arts. Reference and translations in other languages are collected selectively.
The collection priorities include: primary resources, high quality secondary scholarship, important reference works, and critical electronic resources. For networked databases see East Asia - Electronic.
Strengths
The strong subject areas of the Chinese collection are: (1) Language (2) Literature and Literary criticism (3) History and Auxiliary sciences (4) Philosophy and Religion (5) Fine arts, and (6) Social sciences.
Special Collections
- Chinese rare books collection: East Asian Library has more than 800 titles of Chinese rare books dated before year 1795, including some important manuscripts, scrolls; In addition, the Chinese collection contains over 4,000 titles of thread-bound Chinese classics dating back to prior 1911.
- John Fryer collection: It was built up based on the donations of EAL founder, Prof. John Fryer, who had assumed official position in the late 19th century's China. The collection is distinguished by its Chinese translations of western scientific and technological works.
- Chinese oracle and stone rubbings (over 3,000 pieces).
- The Ho-Chiang collection of Buddhist scriptures, which documents the development of Buddhism in China, Japan, and Korea, contains manuscripts written in silver and gold. The Mongolian and Manchu collections include an exceedingly rare seventeenth-century work, Tai Sang-ni acabume karulara bithe. Among the pre-1949 xyhographs of the Tibetan collection is a body of Tantric texts of the Nying-ma-pa sect and an eighteenth-century Narthang edition of the Kanjur section of the Buddhist cannon.
- Local gazetteer collections.
Primary Languages and Formats
Chinese. Chiefly monographs and serials, manuscripts, some microfilms, and electronic.
Related Collections
Ethnic Studies Library and the Center for Chinese Studies Library
More
For information about research tools, library guides, and related pages, see East Asian Library.
