Asia General Reference Collection Policy

OVERVIEW

subject description and guidelines

  • The Asia Reference collection contains more than 7,000 books on East Asia, Southeast Asia, and South Asia, (24 countries in all), and on general Asia topics. General Asia refers to materials covering multiple countries, cross-geographic regions, and Asian Americans. The collection has a concentration in arts & humanities and social sciences.

constituencies

  • The collection serves undergraduates, graduates, and visiting international scholars and researchers.

COLLECTION SCOPE

collection strength

  • General Asia reference materials are collected on a research level.

collection level

  • research

geographical guidelines

  • The Reference collection is unique in that the major portion of it is sustained by the three collections and is part of their collection development plans (Charles W. Wason Collection on East Asia; John M. Echols Collection on Southeast Asia; South Asia Collection). General Asia reference, while concentrating on materials covering multi-country or multi-area topics, also collects items concerning individual countries, to complement or assist the area collections. Until early 2011, there was no separate location designation for materials purchased by General Asia reference; books purchased on this fund had to be assigned an existing arbitrary collection designation (ech,ref; was,ref). As of 2011 the new “asia,ref” location is used for General Asia reference.

areas of significant geographic coverage

transnational region

  • Asia 

language guidelines

  • General Asia reference collects primarily English language materials. However the reference collection has extensive materials in the languages of East Asia, Southeast Asia, and South Asia, as well as English. Items acquired by the Area collections in English and other languages may include materials dealing with general Asia topics. Please see the collection policies of the individual collections regarding the level of collecting for various language materials.

language

  • English

chronological guidelines

  • The reference collection as a whole contains publications from early or mid-20th c. to current years, materials considered by the curators to be germane to research in area studies. Most General Asia materials purchased are published within the last five years.

material types

  • General Asia reference contains books primarily; also CD’s and e-books.

COLLECTION CONTEXT

housed in

  • Carl A. Kroch Library 

RESPONSIBILITY

library contact

  • Atkinson, Carole E. -  Asia Collections Reference Assistant