The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) Library began collecting limited Asian language books in the 1920s. In the 1960s, UIUC joined many higher education institutions in the nation to take advantage of heightened interest in Asia to establish the Center for Asian Studies in 1964. In 1965, a Far Eastern Library and a South and West Asian Library were created within the Special Languages Department in the Library. In 1979, as part of the Library reorganization, the Far Eastern Library and the South and West Asian Library were merged to form the Asian Library. This newly consolidated Asian Library was allocated the third floor office space and reading room, which is also adjunct to the 7th and 8th stacks East housing the Asian language collections brought together by the merge.
Chinese Studies
Contact:
ShuYong JIANG, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Library Administration
Chinese and Korean Studies Librarian
Phone: 217-244-3669
Email: shyjiang@illinois.edu
Korean Studies
The Korean Collection at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign contains nearly 17,000 volumes and 2,000 volumes of non-Korean language that support teaching and research in the Korea related studies. Recently, Korean collection developed Golden Age Korean film collection and Korean feature film collection at Media center, Undergraduate library and Korean Graphic Novel collection at Undergraduate library. The Korean language are housed in the International & Area Studies Library at the third floor of Main library while titles in western languages are located in the main stacks and departmental libraries.
Japanese Studies
Contact: Steve W. Witt
Associate Professor of Library Administration
Head, IAS Library and Interim Japanese Studies Librarian
Phone: 217.265.7518
Email: swwitt@illinois.edu