University of Cambridge : Institution Main

About Cambridge University:

The University of Cambridge (informally known as "Cambridge University" or simply "Cambridge"; abbreviated as "Cantab" in post-nominals) is a collegiate public research university in Cambridge, England.

Originally founded in 1209, it is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world, and the world's third-oldest surviving university. Early records suggest that the university grew out of an association formed by scholars leaving the University of Oxford after a dispute with townsfolk; the two "ancient universities" have many common features and are often jointly referred to as "Oxbridge".

Cambridge is formed from a variety of institutions that include 31 constituent colleges and over 100 departments, faculties and institutes which are organised into six Schools. The University occupies buildings throughout the town, many of which are of historic importance. Student life is centred around the colleges and numerous artistic activities, sports clubs and societies. Cambridge has many notable alumni, and 90 Nobel laureates have been affiliated with it. Cambridge University Press, one of its department, is the world's oldest publishing house, and the second-largest university press in the world. Its largest library, Cambridge University Library, holds over 8 million volumes and is a legal deposit library; all together Cambridge's libraries contain about 15 million volumes. Cambridge is also a member of various academic associations and forms part of the "golden triangle" of English universities. It is regularly placed among the world's best universities in different league tables.

The University of Cambridge offers Japanese Studies course at both undergraduate and Graduate level. Cambridge is today a major national and international centre for the study of Japanese language and culture, both classical and contemporary.

• Admissions information for perspective students can be found on the undergraduate admissions and on the graduate admissions page.

For more information about the history of the Japanese studies at Cambridge see the PDF compiled and edited by Professor Richard Bowring: Fifty years of Japanese at Cambridge 1948–98

Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies

Needham Research Institute

Japanese Palaeography and Textual Scholarship

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