Guides: HIST 445: Late Imperial China: Home

Getting Started

Librarian Office Hours

Wednesdays 10:00am - 12:00pm
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*Note: There will be no Office Hours on March 22 or 29, 2023.

Encyclopedia and Bibliographies

Chinese History: A New Manual by Endymion Porter Wilkinson
Call Number: DS735 W695 2015
ISBN: 9780674088467
Publication Date: 2015
Brill's Encyclopedia of China by Daniel Leese (Editor)
Call Number: DS755 B86 2009
Publication Date: 2009
Available as an eBook or for in-library use (Reference Collection).

Oxford Bibliographies: Chinese Studies
Authoritative bibliographies on a wide variety of Chinese topics.

Find Secondary Sources

Find books and eBooks

Library Catalogue

Find peer-reviewed articles

Database

Bibliography of Asian Studies
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Bibliographic database covering principally the areas of humanities and the social sciences on the East, Southeast, and South Asia. Abstracts published worldwide from 1971 to present.

Individual Journals

Late Imperial China
Late Imperial China is the principal journal for scholars of China’s Ming and Qing dynasties.
Modern China
Modern China (MCX), peer-reviewed and published bi-monthly, is an indispensable source of scholarship in history and the social sciences on late-imperial, twentieth-century, and present-day China.
Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies
Disseminates original, outstanding research and book reviews on the humanities in Asia, focusing at present on the areas of China, Japan, Korea, and Inner Asia.
T'oung pao
International journal of Asian studies.
Journal of Chinese History
Publishes research articles, review essays, and book reviews on all periods of Chinese history and all sub-specialties of history—social, cultural, political, economic, and intellectual.

Find Primary Sources

Digital Collections

The following databases include items related to Chinese history between the mid-14th to the early 20th century; note that some of these database primarily contain documents written from a Western perspective.

North China Herald (1850-1940)
The English North China Herald is the prime English-language source for the history of the foreign presence in China from around 1850 to the 1940s. It was published in Shanghai. As the official journal for British consular notifications, and announcements of the Shanghai Municipal Council, it is the point of reference for a range of foreign and Chinese activities; translations of Chinese official notifications and news were regularly included. This database is fully text-searchable.
Early Chinese Periodicals Online
Hosted at the University of Heidelberg, ECPO collects newspapers and other periodicals from the late Qing and Republican era. So far the emphasis has been on Chinese Women’s Magazines in the Late Qing and Early Republican Period and Chinese Entertainment Newspapers.
Internet Archive: Historical Chinese Newspapers
The Internet Archive collects scans of various historical Chinese newspapers and journals; they are not full-text searchable.
A geographic discovery tool for the newspapers and journals put together by Yan He from George Washington University and is available here: https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/yanhe/viz/PeriodicalsinLateQingandRepublicanEraOpenAccess/sheet2

Ming Qing Women‘s Writings
The Ming Qing Women's Writings digital archive and database is dedicated to the digitization of collections of writings by women in late imperial China (1368-1911). Contains 414 collections of poetry and other writings by women from the holdings of seven participating libraries.
Area Studies: China and Southeast Asia (Adam Matthew)
A varied array of records of traders, travellers, missionaries and diplomats, from the mid-seventeenth century to the late twentieth century, offering Western perspectives on all aspects of Chinese culture and society.
Text mining is permitted, but certain conditions apply. Please contact Digital Scholarship Hub
China : Trade, Politics and Culture 1793-1980 (Adam Matthew)
English-language primary sources relating to China and the West, from 1793 to 1980. Contains manuscripts, Chinese Maritime Customs documents, personal letters, survivors descriptions of the Boxer War, collected diaries, photographs and fully searchable runs of missionary periodicals.
Text mining is permitted, but certain conditions apply. Please contact Digital Scholarship Hub
China, America and the Pacific (Adam Matthew)
Explore an extensive range of archival material connected to the trading and cultural relationships that emerged between China, America and the Pacific region between the 18th and early 20th centuries. Manuscript sources, rare printed texts, visual images, objects and maps document this fascinating history.
Text mining is permitted, but certain conditions apply. Please contact Digital Scholarship Hub
China from Empire to Republic
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Missionary, Sinology and Literary Periodicals 1817-1949
China : Culture and Society (Adam Matthew)
Full text searchable collection of digitised colour docuements from the Charles W. Wason Collection on East Asia housed at Cornell University. Texts published between c. 1750 and 1929, mostly in English. Includes pamphlets, speeches, annual reports, catalogues, magazine and journal articles.
Text mining is permitted, but certain conditions apply. Please contact Digital Scholarship Hub

Books and eBooks

Find more translated primary sources by using the Subject Headings in the catalogue records below.

The Search for Modern China: A Documentary Collection by Pei-kai Cheng (Editor); Michael Lestz (Editor); Jonathan D. Spence (As told to)
Call Number: DS753.86 S33 1999
Sources in Chinese History: Diverse Perspectives from 1644 to the Present by David G. Atwill; Yurong Y. Atwill
Call Number: DS703 S68 2010
Newest edition available as an eBook; older edition available in physical copy and can be checked out.
Sources of Chinese Tradition: From 1600 through the Twentieth Century (vol. 2) by Wm. Theodore de Bary (Editor); Irene Bloom (Editor)
Call Number: DS721 D37 1999
Chinese Civilization by Patricia Buckley Ebrey (Editor)
Call Number: DS721 C517 1993

Discover More

Chinese Archival Handbook Collection
From Princeton University Library. The map viewer of the Chinese Archival Handbooks collection allows discovering the holdings of archival handbooks on the provincial, prefectural, and the county level. Clicking on any region will provide an overview of the archival handbooks that cover the specific region. Many of these handbooks have been digitized by the Princeton Library. To access digitized handbooks: after identifying a useful archival collection, copy and paste the title into the Princeton Library Catalogue: https://catalog.princeton.edu/.
Digital Library of Qing Archives
The Digital Library of Qing Archives of the National Palace Museum (NPM) in Taibei integrates the former Grand Council Archives Database, the Qing Historical Figures Database, and the Index to Qing Archival Volumes Database as well as other holdings of Qing archives at the NPM.
Available only in Chinese.
Chinese Studies Guide (Princeton University Library)
For even more resources on Chinese history, see the excellent guide developed by Joshua Seufert of Princeton University Library, which helped guide the selection of the resources on this Course Guide.

Citation Styles

For this course, you can use any standard citation style. Find style manuals and helpful links for APA, Chicago, and MLA below.

American Psychological Association Style Guide (APA 7)
Call Number: BF76.7 P83 2020
Publication Date: 2019

Purdue OWL APA Style Guide
Resource from Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) with explanations of how to write APA-style citations.
Attend an APA Style Workshop
Virtual workshops on APA citation stye offered by McGill librarians. Click the link to find the date and time and register!

The Chicago Manual of Style, 17th Edition
Call Number: Z253 U69 2017
Publication Date: 2017
VPN required to access online resource off-campus.

Purdue OWL Chicago Style Guide
Resource from Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) with explanations of how to write Chicago-style citations. Select the source type (books, periodicals, web sources) on the left-hand side.
Attend a Chicago Citation Style Workshop
Virtual workshop on Chicago citation style offered by McGill librarians. Click the link to find the date and time and register!

MLA Handbook (9th ed.)
Call Number: LB2369 M52 2021
Publication Date: 2021

Purdue OWL MLA Style Guide
Resource from Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) with explanations of how to create MLA in-text citations.
Attend an MLA Style Workshop
Virtual workshop on MLA style offered by McGill librarians. Click the link to find the date and time and register!

Liaison Librarian

Kristen Howard

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Subjects: Classical studies, History, Indigenous studies, Religious studies