Two new databases added to East Asia Library collections

The East Asia Library has recently obtained access to two new databases: a collection of Chinese Communist Party documents in English translation, and a database of funerary inscriptions from the Song dynasty.

Party and Government Documents in English (PGDiE) is a valuable resource for researchers interested in studying the workings of the Chinese government but unable to read primary source documents in Chinese.  This database brings together a large number of documents dating from 1921 onwards covering activities at all levels of the Chinese government, Communist Party of China (CPC) and National People's Congress (NPC), all accessible with full-text search capabilities.  The database includes highlighted sub-collections on specific areas of research, such as the Cultural Revolution, government policy towards Taiwan, policy white papers, official five-year plans, and other topics.

Song dai mu zhi ming shu ju ku 宋代墓志铭数据库 is a new database containing over six thousand tomb inscriptions dating from the Song dynasty, and is the first installment in Zhonghua shuju's China Stone Inscriptions Database (Zhonghua shi ke shu ju ku 中华石刻数据库).  Tomb inscriptions are an important resource for historians and scholars of religion and literature, among others.  The database is equipped for full-text searching and all inscriptions are edited and punctuated and presented in an easty-to-read interface that includes a popup dictionary function.