Institute of East Asian Studies

The C.V. Starr East Asian Library, which opened its doors in March, 2008, houses more than 900,000 volumes of Chinese, Japanese, and Korean materials, including woodblock prints, rare maps and scrolls, contemporary political posters, and Buddhist scriptures. The new library consolidated the holdings of the Center for Chinese Studies Library (CCSL) and the East Asian Library (EAL) into one collection.

The CCSL began as a reading room in the 1960s, and grew to become one of the premiere libraries on post-1949 China in the United States. The holdings included some 100,000 volumes in both Chinese and English, an extensive microfilm collection, a large number of newspapers and journals, and video collections. Its collection included primarily Chinese- and English-language materials, but also contained works in Japanese, German, French and Russian. The EAL housed a comprehensive research collection of materials in Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Manchu, Mongolian, and Tibetan. Founded in 1898, the library included more than 700,000 bound volumes and serials, and expanded at the rate of 12,000 volumes annually.

The Starr Library is the first freestanding library in the United States constructed exclusively for an East Asian collection. The facility occupies a prominent, central-campus location next to Memorial Glade and Doe Library, reflecting Berkeley's role as a worldwide Pacific Rim hub for students and researchers of East Asian studies.

See also: UC Berkeley Library Website