Archival Collections and Primary Sources
Resources that list, or provide access to, materials typically found in archives and used for primary source research. Examples include manuscripts, diaries, letters, first-hand accounts or documentary sources on a subject, person, event or issue.
- CORMOSEA (Committee on Research Materials on Southeast Asia) Technical Processes Archives, 1980-1990
This is a collection of historical technical processes files about Southeast Asia cataloging and classification issues collected by CORMOSEA Subcommittee on Technical Processes from 1980-1990. Very useful reference source for Southeast Asia cataloging.
- The Hann So Collection on Cambodia Archive, 1979-1993
The materials of this collection focus largely upon Cambodian-American support for the forces opposing the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia, in the years leading up to the Paris Peace Accords. The collection, which includes a broad range of documents in English, French and Khmer, spans the period 1979-1993, and is especially strong in documenting the development of the publication "Khmer Conscience." This collection's materials consist of approximately 100 monographs on a range of cultural, political, and historical.
- Interviews and Life Histories of Thai Writers [sound recording], 1975-1976
A collection of 48 sound tape reels containing the life histories and ideas of Thai intellectuals writing during the 1950's - 70's. Collected by Professor Herbert P. Phillips in 1975-76, the tapes are raw field data and thus are highly variable in length, detail and richness. The speakers are considered as key informants on Thai culture and include: M.R. Kukrit Pramoj, M.L. Boonlua Kunjara Thebayasuwan, Bhuthathaad Bhikkhu, Sulak Sivaraksa, Lao Khamhom, Angkhan Kanlayanaphong, Puey Ungphakorn, Suchit Wongthet, Chintana Yaudsunthormn, Rong Wongsawan, Vasit Dejkhunjorn, Seni Sauvapong and Archin Banchaphaan.
- Khmer Palm Leaf Manuscripts
Lpoek Qangar Vatt
Engraved in Siem Reap, Cambodia, 2001.
ca. 17 leaves ; 5 x 56 cm.
In Pali (in Khmer script) and Khmer.
A Khmer poem on the construction of Angkor Vat.
- Mahavessantara Jataka
Engraved in Siem Reap, Cambodia, 2001.
ca. 288 leaves ; 5 x 56 cm.
In Pali (in Khmer script) and Khmer.
This is the canonical Vessantara jataka tale, recounting the Buddha in his last life before rebirth as Samana Gautama (the "historical" Buddha). The text is composed of Pali phrases followed by a Khmer "translation" or gloss. The entire story is told in 17 chapters.
- Nibbana Sutr
Engraved in Siem Reap, Cambodia, 2001.
ca. 108 leaves ; 5 x 56 cm.
In Pali (in Khmer script) and Khmer.
- Sangayana
Engraved in Siem Reap, Cambodia, 2001.
v. ; 5 x 56 cm.
In Pali (in Khmer script) and Khmer.
Buddhist recitation from the Vinaya.
- McFarland Collection
Note: Please inquire The Bancroft Library about access to this collection.
The McFarlands, an important American missionary family, donated a major archive of Siamese materials, dating 1860 - 1950 to the South/Southeast Asia Library. In addition to rare editions of early Thai printed books, the collection includes outstanding photographs of Siam dating from as early as the 1860's, and journals, diaries, notes, and scrapbooks written by family members. A particularly valuable group of photographs was taken at Angkor and other archaeological sites in Cambodia and Siam, some as early as 1878.
- Swift Family Collection: Buddhist Palmleaf Manuscripts ca. 1782 CE-ca.1898 CE
23 manuscripts in boxes.
"Collection includes 19 manuscripts written on palm leaves and 4 written on folded paper. Fifteen of the manuscripts are written in variants of scripts belonging to the family of Laos Tham or Northern Thai scripts; three manuscripts are written in Devenagari script, two in Khmer, and one each in Burmese, Tamil, and Thai. The texts represent a wide range of samples from the Buddhist Tripitaka as well as from the Hindu scriptures. A number of manuscripts from the Abhidhamma Pitaka and the Vinaya (the Mahavagga and Cullavagga sections), as well as Sutta Pitaka (Majjhima-nikaya, Anguttara-nikaya, and Jatakas) represent the Buddhist canonical texts. The Hindu scriptures are represented by, for example, the Visnupurana." --The Bancroft Library
- Thai Printed Palm Leaf Manuscript
Phikkhu Ratcharattanobon
Ruang Thao Kalaket: pen khamklon samnuan Phak 'Isan 22 kan chop / chamra doi Phra Ratcharattanobon.
Phra Nakhon: Samnakngan Luk So. Thammaphakdi, 2530 [1987]
22 parts in 1 v. ; 5 x 50 cm.
A narrative poem about Monk Thao Kalaket of northeastern Thai folklore.
Listings of articles in journals, magazines, newspapers, etc. Many include abstracts (article summaries). Some include, or link to, the full text of articles.
Atlases, Maps and Gazetteers
Resources that provide maps or tools you can use to generate maps. Gazetteers are geographical dictionaries, giving information about cities, mountains, rivers, etc.
- Atlas of Laos : the spatial structures of economic and social development of the Lao People's Democratic Republic. Bountavy Sisouphanthong. Chiang Mai, Thailand : Silkworm Books, 2000.
- Atlas for Singapore. Collins-Longman. 2nd ed. Glasgow, UK : Wm. Collins Sons & Co., 1985.
- Atlas of Southeast Asia. Richard Ulack, Gyula Pauer ; with the assistance of Jane Johnshoy Domier and Julsun D. Pacheco. New York : Macmillan Pub. Co., 1989.
- Atlas of Southeast Asia: population. Research: Brian Wawn, Deborah Webb. Canberra, Australia : Aust-Asia Publications, 1983.
- Atlas du Viet-Nam = Atlat Viet Nam = An atlas of Vietnam. Vu Tu Lap, Christian Taillard. Montpellier : Reclus : La Documentation francaise, 1994.
- Goode's world atlas. Editor, Edward B. Espenshade, Jr. ; senior consultant, Joel L. Morrison. 18th ed. Chicago : Rand McNally, 1991.
- Hammond Southeast Asia map. Scale [ca. 1:5,500,000] ; Lambert Azimuthal equal-area proj. (E 900--E 1400/N 300--S 100). [Union, N.J.] : Hammond World Atlas Corp., [1999?]
- Historical atlas of Indonesia. Robert Cribb. Honolulu : University of Hawai'i Press, 2000.
- Historical atlas of South-East Asia. J. M. Pluvier. New York : E.J. Brill, 1995.
- A historical gazetteer of Southeast Asia. Robert F. Austin. [Ann Arbor, MI] : Institute of Mathematical Geography, [1983]
- The Philippine atlas. Manila : Philippine guides, [1998]
Bibliographies and Subject Guides
Lists of materials in any format (books, articles, videos, web sites, etc.) organized around a common theme or topic.
Biographical Sources
Information about people, including biographical dictionaries, profiles of people or "Who's Whos", personal narratives, and other resources with significant biographical information.
Country Data Sources
Sources of information about specific countries.
- Library of Congress Country Studies
A continuing series of books prepared by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress under the Country Studies/Area Handbook Program sponsored by the Department of the Army. This online series presently contains studies of 100 countries. Countries that were previously in multi-country volumes are now available individually.
Dictionaries, Thesauri, and Quotations
General and subject specific dictionaries in any language, dual language dictionaries, thesauri, dictionaries of quotations, and acronym lists.
- Historical and cultural dictionary of Burma. Joel M. Maring and Ester G. Maring. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1973.
- Historical and cultural dictionary of the Philippines. Ester G. Maring and Joel M. Maring. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1973.
- Historical dictionary of Indonesia. Robert Cribb. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1992.
- Historical dictionary of Laos. Martin Stuart-Fox. Lanham, MD : Scarecrow Press, 2001.
- Historical dictionary of Singapore. K. Mulliner and Lian The-Mulliner. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1991
- Historical dictionary of Thailand. May Kyi Win, Harold E. Smith. Lanham, Md. : Scarecrow Press, 1995.
- Historical dictionary of Vietnam. William J. Duiker. Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1989.
Dissertation and Thesis Sources
Sources for locating masters theses and doctoral dissertations.
Encyclopedias and Almanacs
General or subject-specific encyclopedias, almanacs, and other collections of factual information.
- Electronic Resource Finder
- Print Resources
- CCP encyclopedia of Philippine art. By Cultural Center of the Philippines. Manila : Cultural Center of the Philippines, 1994.
- Encyclopedia of Asian history. Prepared under the auspices of the Asia Society ; Ainslie T. Embree, editor-in-chief. New York : Scribner ; London : Collier Macmillan, 1988.
- Encyclopaedia of Buddhism. Edited by G. P. Malalasekera. [Colomba] : Govt. of Ceylon, 1961.
- Encyclopaedia of Hinduism. Editor-in-chief, Nagendra Kr. Singh. New Delhi : Centre for International Religious Studies : Anmol Publications, 1997.
- The encyclopedia of Malaysia. Singapore : Archipelago Press, 1998.
- Encyclopedia of modern Asia. David Levinson, Karen Christensen, editors. New York : Charles Scribner's Sons ; Farmington Hills, MI : Thomson/Gale, 2002.
- Indonesian heritage. Senior editor, Sian Jay. Jakarta : Published by Buku Antar Bangsa for Grolier International : Distributed exclusively by PT. Widyadara, 1996.
- Indonesian heritage. Singapore : Archipelago Press, 1996
- Kasaysayan : the story of the Filipino people. [Project Director, Teresa Ma. Custodio ; Executive Editor, Jose Y. Dalisay, Jr. Manila : Asia Pub. Co. ; Pleasantville, N.Y. : Reader's Digest, 1998.
- The Oxford encyclopedia of the modern Islamic world. John L.Esposito, editor in chief. New York : Oxford University Press, 1995.
- Philippine encyclopedia of the social sciences. Quezon City : Philippine Social Science Council, 1993.
- Worldmark encyclopedia of cultures and daily life. Timothy L. Gall, editor. Detroit : Gale, 1998.
Government Information Sources
Listings of publications and other information published by authority of a governmental body, whether federal, state, local, or foreign, and of intergovernmental organizations, such as UNESCO, etc. Many of these sources include the full text of the items.
Handbooks, Manuals and Yearbooks
Collections of information designed to help practitioners in a specific field or profession, or in the case of yearbooks, to provide annually cumulated information in brief descriptive and statistic form.
Library and Book Catalogs
Listings of books and other items belonging to a particular library or, as with union catalogs, a group of libraries, and usually containing information on the location and subject classification of each item. This category also includes national bibliographies, or lists of all books published in a particular country.
News Databases, Indexes and Web Sites
Listings (may include abstracts or full text) of articles in newspapers, newsmagazines broadcast, news transcripts, or wire services. Also includes web sites of these media, or directories of such sites.
Organizations
Listings of subject-related associations, learned societies, or professional organizations.
Statistics and Numeric Data
Resources that provide tables of numerical information, or listings indicating where such information can be found.
Web Gateways and Search Engines
Broad, subject-related sites and subject-specific search engines available without restriction on the World Wide Web.
Collection Description
The Southeast Asian collections at Berkeley rank first statewide, and they are among the top collections for Southeast Asian studies nationally. The comprehensive collections include materials from and about the six insular countries (Brunei, East Timor, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, and Singapore) and five mainland countries (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam) in the region. They are the strongest research collections on the West Coast, with the emphasis on social sciences and humanities in western and vernacular languages, covering both prewar and postwar periods of Southeast Asia. The collections are quite influential in earlier western language publications on Burma, the Philippines, and Indochina since the pre-World War II period. The Library has an excellent run on annual reports of the colonial administrators in Southeast Asia, including departmental and other agency reports on Burma. Dutch colonial literature on Indonesia is well represented, including all the major journals. In particular, the Indonesia Collection is one of the most comprehensive Southeast Asia collections in this country. Berkeley has had a strong interest in the Philippines that has resulted in comprehensive library collections on the American and Republic periods.
The Library has been collecting Southeast Asian vernacular materials in Burmese, Chinese, Hmong, Indonesian, Khmer, Lao, Malay, Tagalog, Tamil, Thai, and Vietnamese to support our teaching and research in Southeast Asia Studies. The Library of Congress Cooperative Acquisitions Program on Southeast Asia (CAPSEA), formerly known as the Public Law 480 Program in Jakarta, Indonesia, has played a critical role in acquiring both English and Southeast Asian vernacular materials in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences for Berkeley since 1964. To further enhance our Southeast Asian vernacular collections, The Library also collects materials from commercial vendors as well as through gift and exchange programs with Southeast Asia counterparts and acquisition trips.
Due to space restrictions, the South/Southeast Asia Library includes only the reference collection, a small non-circulating collection of basic works on the Southeast Asia region, and a collection of high-use newspapers and journals. The rest of the Southeast Asian collections in both printed and non-printed formats, over 400,000 holdings, is housed in Doe and Moffitt libraries, subject specialty libraries, and affiliated libraries on the Berkeley campus.
Electronic Journals
Journals in electronic form, available online either individually or as part of a larger collection. E-Journals only available for the Berkeley campus are listed in Pathfinder. The California Digital Library maintains a list of e-journals available to all UC libraries.
New Acquisitions
Monthly lists of new acquisitions in a given subject area.
South/Southeast Library Recent Acquisitions
Purchase Recommendation Form
If you'd like to recommend an item to be added to the collection, please use the Purchase Recommendation Form.
