Duke University Libraries have been collecting English language materials in Chinese Studies since its earliest days. It began to collect in Chinese in the late 1960s and have been expanding its Chinese collections from the late 1990s. While collecting comprehensively in all subject areas in English, it has built strong Chinese language collections in social sciences (especially census materials and statistics), popular culture (especially film studies) and modern history. As an accessible collection with a strong reputation for service, it supports not only faculty and students at Duke and the Triangle, but also faculty and researchers throughout the Southeast, nationally and internationally.
Additionally, the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library is building on its historic collections of missionary manuscripts, business, and the history of medicine and is particularly strong in collections of nineteenth and twentieth century photography of China in the United States.
The graduate program in East Asian Studies and the recent addition of a graduate program in Critical Asian Humanities, which attracts students able to use sources in Chinese together with increased fluency among undergraduates, has strengthened demand and use of Chinese language materials. Financial support for a restricted collection endowment will help Duke University attract the brightest students, faculty, and researchers in this area of research.
Establish a restricted collection endowment ($300,000)
Duke University Libraries’ collections support rich programming in the Asian/Pacific Studies Institute (APSI). APSI is interdisciplinary in their nature with faculty in History, Cultural Studies, Political Science, Literature, Religious Studies, Film Studies, Anthropology and Economics. While the collection is rich in particular resources, (e.g., social sciences and popular culture), there are many areas which need to be developed (e.g., contemporary literature, contemporary history, pictorial works). In addition, historical photography from the region needs to be further developed, as well as traditional aspects of rare collections, like manuscripts, rare books, and travel literature. Doing so will not only further support scholarship and teaching on campus, but enhance Duke’s reputation as a major site for conducting research in Chinese Studies.
Expendable Gifts
By making one-time gifts, you can enable us to purchase unique materials for the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library that strengthen our outstanding collections.
