University of Southern California: East Asia Library

Officially founded in 1989, the East Asian Library's collections date as far back as the 1940s, while East Asian Studies date back to 1911. The university's relationship with East Asia dates back to the 19th century, when missionaries trained at USC were sent to China, Japan, and Korea.  USC's library has an especially important Korean studies collection reflecting the large Korean-American population of the Los Angeles area and includes the Korean American Digital Archive. 

For more information concerning the Japanese collections, please contact the library at (213) 740-8025 or by email.

Asian History Guide

Chinese History Guide

Chinese Studies Guide

Japanese Studies Guide

Korean Studies Guide

Korean Studies Multimedia Collections Guide

For all comments and questions about the Guide, please e-mail us:

mlaguide@nccjapan.net

Collection size: as of October 2014

• 50,000 Japanese language volumes
• 520 Japanese Serial titles
• Other Japanese resources number 470 in various media

The East Asian Library's collection's main purpose is supporting the teaching and research needs of the faculty and students at USC. The collections focus primarily on the humanities and social sciences, with special strengths in pre-modern Japanese resources.  Their digital collections include maps of the Japanese colonial period and also the Japanese American Relocation Digital Archive 1941-1946. 

URL: www.usc.edu/libraries/locations/east_asian/

Online catalog: www.usc.edu/libraries/

Including the subseries Sea of Korea maps, the collection dates from 1606 to 1895 in multiple languages, include English and Japanese.

Digitized collection documenting artifacts excavated from two sites, in Santa Barbara and and the Los Angeles Chinatown. Artifacts date from the 1880s to the 1930s.

Digital collection of over 220 photographs documenting the relocations of Japanese Americans from California during World War II.

Digital collection of approximately 15,000 items documenting the actions of the Korean American community during the resistance to Japanese rule in Korea.

Digitization of an exhibit of photographs from the exhibit "Beauty in Exile: Works and Manuscripts of Chang Ai-ling."

Interactive map

Printable map

Access to the library, as well as borrowing privileges, are limited to library account holders. These primarily include current USC faculty, staff, and students. Current Friends of the Library, sponsored guests, visiting scholars, summer program participants, individual or corporate fee borrowers, and members of affiliate institutions may also receive a library account. For more information, please visit their Access & Borrowing Policies page.