Digital Resources

This list was created and is curated by Dr. Thomas Mazanec at UC Santa Barbara for his course “Chinese 211: Bibliography and Research Methods.” Please feel free to suggest updates and revisions by email to admin@sinologymethods.com.

1. General

• UCSB Library: Chinese Studies guide
• East Asian Information Literacy, brief video tutorials created by UCSB Librarian Yao Chen
• Classical Historiography for Chinese History, compiled by Benjamin Elman (Princeton University); redesigned in July 2014.
• Research Guide for Chinese Studies, Harvard University
• Bibliography of Oriental Studies, version 7, and version 6 (Tōyōgaku bunken rēmoku kensaku 東洋学文献類目検索), an excellent resource for finding Japanese scholarship on specific China-related topics, compiled by Kyōto University’s Institute for Research in the Humanities 人文科学研究所. It is necessary to consult both versions because they cover slightly different time periods.
• Song Research Tools, from the Society for Song, Yuan, and Conquest Dynasties Studies.
• Ming Studies Reference Guide, compiled by Leo K. Shin (University of British Columbia)
• Oxford Bibliographies in Chinese Studies. Annotated bibliographies by recognized experts on a wide range of topics. Good resource to get a handle on the scholarship and resources in a new or tangential field.
• Society for Qing Studies: Teaching Tools, curated by Michael Szonyi and Mark Elliot (Harvard)
• Modern Chinese Literature and Culture Resource Center, a suite of publications, videos, and bibliographies related to the study of modern Chinese lit & culture, maintained by Kirk Denton (The Ohio State University)

2. Lexicography

Dictionaries

General

• Pleco, best Chinese-dictionary smartphone app, for Apple and Android; app and some dictionaries are free, but many more specialized dictionaries and features must be purchased; includes Hanyu da cidian 漢語大詞典 (the OED of Chinese), Le Grand Ricci, and Paul Kroll’s A Student’s Dictionary of Classical and Medieval Chinese, as well as the digital edition of Wilkinson’s Chinese History: A New Manual.
• 汉典, historical Chinese-Chinese dictionary. Recent updates have begun to replace content from the Hanyu da cidian 漢語大詞典 with content from the inferior Guoyu cidian 國語辭典.
• 國語辭典, from R.O.C.’s Ministry of Education
• Le Grand Ricci, encyclopedic Chinese-French dictionary.
• Cidian wang 词典网, aggregation of several dictionaries.

Specialized

• Digital Dictionary of Buddhism, edited by Charles Muller (University of Tokyo).
• 佛光大辭典, reliable Chinese-Chinese Buddhist dictionary
• 道教詞典, compiled by Li Shuhuan 李叔還
• Thesaurus Linguae Sericae, an ambitious attempt at systematically cataloguing, translating, and analyzing classical Chinese texts and conceptual schemes, led by Christoph Harbsmeier (University of Oslo).

Historical Phonology

• Digital Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese, by Jeff Tharsen (University of Chicago), which digitizes a variety of historical linguists’ reconstructions of Early and Middle Chinese.
• The Baxter-Sagart reconstruction of Old Chinese, by William H. Baxter (University of Michigan) and Laurent Sagart (Centre de recherches linguistiques sur l’Asie orientale). The most widely-used reconstruction of Old and Middle Chinese in the West. Version 1.1 (Sept 2014) currently available for viewing and download.
• 小學堂, by Academia Sinica, collection of philological resources.
• 古音小鏡, collection of materials and tools for historical linguistics.

Fonts, character sets

• Unihan Database, for typing obscure characters.
• CHISE IDS 漢字検索 (Kanji kensaku), also for typing obscure characters.
• 书法字典 (Shūfǎ zìdiǎn), database of Chinese calligraphy, searchable by character.
• Dictionary of Chinese Character Variants 異體字字典, maintained by the Mandarin Promotion Council, Ministry of Education, R.O.C.

Learning Classical Chinese

• Classical Chinese, the best free online course for learning classical Chinese, focused on early philosophical texts, by Mark Edward Lewis (Stanford University).
• A Primer in Chinese Buddhist Writings, by John Kieschnick (Stanford University).

Regional Sinitic Languages 方言

• Phonemica 乡音苑, interactive map featuring recordings of stories told in regional forms of speech, edited by Kellen Parker van Dam, Steve Hansen, and Qi Jiayao 祁嘉耀.
• Words.hk, crowd-sourced descriptive dictionary of Cantonese, featuring numerous linguists on the editorial team. English version available at Cantowords.com.
• Hambaanglaang 冚唪唥, open-access resources for learning Cantonese, including a series of graded readers, run by Viveik Saigal and Chaak Ming Lau 劉擇明
• 開放辭典, hosts Creative Commons 3.0-licensed dictionaries of Cantonese (Yue 粵), Taiwanese (Southern Min 閩南), Wu (吳), and more.
• 臺灣客家話常用詞辭典, Hakka dictionary from Taiwan’s Ministry of Education
• 臺灣閩南話常用詞辭典, Taiwanese (Southern Min) dictionary from Taiwan’s Ministry of Education

3. Manuscripts and Digitized Texts

Digitized Texts

• Chinese Text Project, maintained by Donald Sturgeon (Durham University)
• Scripta Sinica (漢籍電子文獻資料庫), reliable online repository of classical Chinese texts, run by Academia Sinica in Taiwan.
• Zhonghua jingdian gujiku (中華經典古籍庫), online editions of the Zhonghua shuju editions of classic texts
• Digital Resources and Collection Replication of Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica (史語所數位典藏資料庫整合系統)
• 国学大师, large, if somewhat chaotic, collection of premodern texts
• 搜韵 (Sōuyùn), textual database, often includes commentary, linked to the Hanyu da cidian 漢語大詞典. Includes many resources for studying, reading, and writing classical poetry.
• CBETA-RP, integrated platform for searching, analyzing, and visualizing the Chinese Buddhist canons (Dazangjing 大藏經 and Xuzangjing 續藏經)
• Kanseki Repository (漢籍リポジトリ), large, open-access database of classical Chinese texts. Includes links to Github account which features txt files for download and processing. Editorial team led by Christian Wittern (Kyoto University).
• Taishō Buddhist Canon (大正新脩大藏經)
• Resources for Tang Studies, a TEI-encoded version of Zizhitongjian 資治通鑑
• Chant (Chinese Ancient Text Database)
• Ming Qing Women’s Writings, containing collections of writings by 5028 Chinese women from about 1600–1800, project directed by Grace S. Fong (McGill University)
• Internet Archive, includes a surprisingly large number of periodicals and books from the late Qing and early Republican periods.
• Chinese Rare Books at the Harvard-Yenching Library. “With over 9,600 items, Harvard-Yenching’s Chinese rare book collection is one of the largest of its kind in the Western world.”
• National Palace Museum’s Digital Library of Qing Archives
• 书格, open library of old books, including many high-quality scans
• Chinese Women’s Magazines in the Late Qing and Early Republican Period, by Joan Judge, Barbara Mittler, and Grace Fong

Dunhuang Manuscripts 敦煌文獻

• International Dunhuang Project
• Database of Chinese Medieval Texts, TEI-encoded versions of Dunhuang manuscripts, mostly related to Buddhism
• Dunhuang Documents Database 敦煌遗书数据库, new (2022) database for Dunhuang documents, run by the Dunhuang Academy 敦煌研究院
• Gallica, online catalogue of the Bibliothèque nationale de France, which contains high-quality scans of the Pelliot collection. The Pelliot collections can also be browsed here.

Inscribed Epitaphs 墓誌銘

• 中國歷代墓誌數據庫, database of epitaph inscriptions, from Zhejiang University
• 新版唐代墓誌所在総合目録（増補版 (Catalogue of Bibliographic Sources of Stone Tomb Inscriptions), from Tōyō bunko 東洋文庫

Stone Rubbings

• Chinese Stone Rubbings Collection, UC Berkeley
• Chinese Rubbings Collection, Harvard Library
• Chinese Rubbings, Field Museum
• 佛教造像石刻拓本 (Buddhist Rubbings), Academia Sinica
• 漢代石刻畫像拓本 (Rubbings of Han Dynasty Stone Relief), Academia Sinica

Archaeology 考古

• 中国考古 (Chinese Archeology), summaries of recent archeological findings in China, run by the Institute of Archeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

Early Excavated Texts

• 先秦甲骨金文簡牘詞彙資料庫 Lexicon of Pre-Qin Oracle Bones, Bronze Inscriptions, and Bamboo Scripts, Academia Sinica
• 漢代簡牘數位典藏 Digital Archive of the Han Wooden Slips, Academia Sinica
• 竹簡帛書出土文獻電腦資料庫 from the D.C. Lau Research Center for Ancient Chinese Texts at Chinese University of Hong Kong 香港中文大學劉殿爵中國古籍研究中心
• 郭店楚簡資料庫, Chinese University of Hong Kong
• 中國古代簡帛字形辭例數據庫, Wuhan University
• Yinxu Oracle Bone Inscription Database, edited by Chen Nianfu 陳年福 (Zhejiang Normal University); see also the guide to this database on Digital Orientalist (part 1 and part 2)

Qing Documents

• Harvard Research Portal for Ming-Qing History, includes primary texts and research tools related to the famed Qing documents seminar at Harvard, established by Fairbank and Kuhn

4. Compendia and Encyclopedia

• For a list of resources, see the relevant page of Benjamin Elman’s Bibliography.
• See also Wilkinson’s Manual, section 73. 

5. Chronology

• Chinese-Western Calendar Converter, Academia Sinica
• Buddhist Studies Time Authority Database, Dharma Drum Institute of Liberal Arts
• PeriodO, “a public domain gazetteer of scholarly definitions of historical, art-historical, and archaeological periods,” led by Adam Rabinowitz (University of Texas at Austin) and Ryan Shaw (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)

6. Religion

General

• Chinese Religious Culture: A Research Guide, by Barend ter Haar (Oxford University)
• Online Spiritual Atlas of China, maintained by Fenggang Yang (Purdue University)
• Database of Religious History, run by the University of British Columbia
• Sichuan Religions, run by Stefania Travagnin (SOAS) and Elena Valussi (Loyola University, Chicago)
• Online Spiritual Atlas of the Global East, created by the Center on Religion and the Global East at Purdue University
• Chinese Religious Texts Authority, wiki-based bibliographic catalogue of Chinese religious texts

Buddhism

• East Asian Buddhist Studies: A Reference Guide, compiled by various UCLA professors.
• Tools for Buddhist Studies, curated by Marcus Bingenheimer (Temple University).
• INBUDS (Indian Buddhist Studies and Treatise Database), database of scholarship on Indian studies and Buddhist studies, mainly Japanese.
• Chinese Buddhist Canonical Attributions Database, curated by Michael Radich (Universität Heidelberg).
• CBETA-RP, integrated platform for searching, analyzing, and visualizing the Chinese Buddhist canons (Dazangjing 大藏經 and Xuzangjing 續藏經)
• Taishō Buddhist Canon (大正新脩大藏經)
• A Database of Chinese Buddhist Translation and Their Sanskrit Parallels for Buddhist Chinese Studies (漢譯佛經梵漢比分析語料庫)
• Buddhist Geographical Information System, run out of the University of Arizona’s Center for Buddhist Studies
• BDK English Tripitaka, PDFs of English translations of key texts in the East Asian Buddhist canon (from the Bukkyō Dendo Kyōkai 仏経伝道協会).
• 佛教造像石刻拓本 (Buddhist Rubbings), Academia Sinica
• Buddhist Temple Gazetteers 中國佛教寺廟志數位典藏, Dharma Drum Buddhist College
• NTI Reader, digital tool for parsing and analyzing Buddhist texts, developed for the Nan Tien Institute of Dharma Drum Buddhist College

Daoism

• 道教詞典, compiled by Li Shuhuan 李叔還
• FYSK Daoist Culture Center Database (Chinese and English versions), wiki-style encyclopedia on Daoist topics, run by the Fung Ying Seen Koon 蓬瀛仙館, a Hong Kong-based Quanzhen Daoist abbey. The Chinese version is more complete than the English one. Good for basic info, but lacks proper citation.
• Daoist Digital Museum, cataloguing Daoist temples of Guangzhou, run by Prof. Lai Chi-Tim of Chinese University of Hong Kong
• Stephen Jones, a wealth of resources on contemporary Daoists in rural China from one of the leading ethnographers in this field
• Global Daoist Studies Forum, a “virtual venue seeking to foster a global community for scholars interested in the academic study of Daoism,” run out of the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa

Popular Religion

• Bibliography of Western Publications on Chinese Popular Religion, 1995–present, compiled by Philip Clart (Leipzig)

Christianity

• China Historical Christian Database, maintained by Daryl IRELAND (Boston University), LIU Xian (Renmin University), Alex MAYFIELD (Boston University), and Eugenio MENEGON (Boston University) 
• Chinese Christian Texts Database. Research database of primary and secondary sources concerning the cultural contacts between China and Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (from 1582 to ca. 1840), from KU-Leuven.
• 十九世紀中後期（1865-1894）粵語基督教典籍資料庫, Database of late-19th century Christian scriptures in Cantonese, run by the Department of Chinese and Bilingual Studies at Hong Kong Polytechnic University (香港理工大學中文及雙語學系)

7. Geography

• China Historical Geographic Information System (CHGIS), run by Peter Bol (Harvard) and others
• 中國大陸各省地方志書目查詢系統, search interface for local gazetteers, from Academia Sinica
• Chinese Gazetteers Database, from Erudition 愛如生. Must be connected to UCSB server to use
• Buddhist Geographical Information System, run out of the University of Arizona’s Center for Buddhist Studies
• History of the Jingban tianwen tu, interactive version of an 18th-century Chinese map of the world, introduced by Richard J. Smith (Rice University)
• Antique Maps of China, collection from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
• Bodies and Structures, a platform for researching and teaching spatial histories of Japan, its empire, and the larger worlds of which they were a part. Designed by David Ambaras (North Carolina State University) and Kate MacDonald (UC Santa Barbara) 
• GeoNames, free geographical database, founded by Marc Wick
• China Dimensions, from NASA
• 中国古代史地图, from Guo Gang 郭钢 (University of Mississippi)
• Buddhist Temple Gazetteers 中國佛教寺廟志數位典藏, Dharma Drum Buddhist College
• Rare Local Gazetteers at Harvard-Yenching Library: An Open Access Collection, maintained by the Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte (Max Plank Institute for the History of Science) 
• Online Spiritual Atlas of China, maintained by Fenggang Yang (Purdue University)
• A Chinese Gazetteer of Foreign Lands: A new translation of Part 1 of the Zhufan zhi 諸蕃志 (1225), interactive map and annotated translation created in ArcGIS, by Shao-yun Yang (Denison University)
• Frontiers of the Tang and Song Empires, interactive map created in ArcGIS, by Shao-yun Yang (Denison University)
• Virtual Shanghai, series of interconnected databases featuring historical photographs, texts, and maps about Shanghai, hosted by the Institut d’Asie Orientale (CNRS-University of Lyon) and the Center for Chinese Studies of the University of California, Berkeley, developed by Christian Henriot (Aix-Marseille University).
• World Historical Gazetteer, founded by Ruth Mostern (University of Pittsburgh)
• 中國聚落地名分佈查詢, searchable database of local geographic names

8. Biography and Gender

• Chinese Biographical Database, a database of biography and relationships in imperial China, resulting from a collaboration between Harvard, Peking University, and Academia Sinica. English search page here. An offline version for Macs was released in February 2015 and can be found on the Communication and Empire website.
• Pers DB /  唐代人物知識ベース (Tōdai jinbutsu chishikibēsu), well-researched biographical database of the Tang dynasty (from the Institute for Research in Humanities at Kyōto University).
• Traditions of Exemplary Women: Liu Xiang’s Lienüzhuan
• The Red Brush, online companion to the narrative anthology The Red Brush: Women Writers of Imperial China, edited by Wilt Idema and Beata Grant (Harvard University Asia Center, 2004)
• Eminent Chinese of the Ch’ing Period, originally edited by Arthur Hummel in 1943; it has been digitized and improved by the editors of the Qing Research Portal (Dartmouth). Also available in Wiki form.

9. Visual and Material Culture

General

• Artstor, resource for finding visual material
• Chūgoku kaiga sōgō zuroku 中国絵画総合図録 (Comprehensive illustrated catalogue of Chinese paintings), searchable version of 2001 print catalogue; in Japanese and English (Tokyo University)
• Historical Photographs of China, focuses on the period 1850–1950 (University of Bristol)
• Visualizing Modern China: Resources, resources page from the online companion to the book Visualizing Modern China (2014)
• MCLC Resource Center: Visual Arts, bibliography of sources related to Chinese visual arts from the Modern Chinese Literature and Culture Resource Center (Kirk Denton, Ohio State University)
• Useful Links: Visualizing China
• Chinese Iconography Thesaurus, a “taxonomic vehicle” for exploring Chinese visual culture spearheaded by Hongxing Zhang 張弘星 and hosted by the Victoria & Albert Museum (London)

Scrolls

• East Asian Scroll Paintings, from University of Chicago

Posters

• Chinese Propaganda Posters, Stephan Landsberger (Leiden University)
• University of Westminster Chinese Poster Collection, covers late 1950s–1980s
• Chinese Christian Posters, images of Christian propaganda posters in Chinese from 1927–1949, contains high-res images, translations, and bibliographies  

Films

• Chinese Film Classics, “a project, a book, and a website dedicated to making early Chinese films and cinema history more accessible.” By Christopher Rea (University of British Columbia)

Museums

• National Palace Museum (Taiwan) 國立故宮博物院, rich archive of hundreds of thousands of images and documents from imperial Chinese history, much available for free download

Specific Sites

• Xiantangshan Caves project, University of Chicago
• Digital Dunhuang, includes the famous Mogao Caves 莫高窟 and Yulin Caves 榆林窟 of Gansu, Dunhuang Academy 敦煌学院

10. Digital Humanities Tools, Methods

General

• Docusky, suite of digital humanities tools made especially for scholars of China and Taiwan. Includes tools for text markup, text conversion, database building and cleaning, exploration and analysis, and mapping, along with links to external tools and sources. Developed by Hsiang Jieh 項潔 (National Taiwan University) and others.
• Communication and Empire: Chinese Empires in a Comparative Perspective,  hosts a variety of digital tools for Chinese historiography, run by a team of scholars led by Hilde de Weerdt (Leiden University).
• Taiwan History Digital Library 台灣歷史數位圖書館 (THDL), suite of tools and sources for Taiwanese and Chinese history.
• Digital Resources and Projects on East Asia, table of 330+ records compiled by Paula Curtis (UCLA).
• The Digital Orientalist, includes tutorials of DH tools and posts about DH projects designed especially for scholars in East Asian, South Asian, Central Asian, and Near Eastern studies. Founded by L. W. Cornelis van Lit (Utrecht University), currently edited by Maddalena Poli (Pomona College)

Lessons, Tutorials

• Programming Historian, tutorials on multiple digital research tools designed for humanists. Each lesson is peer-reviewed and ranked by difficulty. Maintained by a rotating editorial board and funded by Canadians.
• The Historian’s Macroscope, another introduction to digital tools for humanists. Written by Shawn Graham, Ian Milligan, and Scott Weingart 
• Hacking the Humanities, video series on text mining and digital humanities designed by Paul Vierthaler (formerly Leiden University, now Wiliam & Mary)
• UCSB Library Carpentry. Workshops on software “carpentry” (fundamental skills), run by staff at the UCSB Library. Workshops often require no prior knowledge of programming. The archive of past workshops includes extensive guides that may be used as personal tutorials.

Exploratory Tools

• Palladio, a relatively easy-to-use tool for digital humanists that contains basic network and GIS capabilities. Runs online, so no installation necessary. For serious analysis, however, its functionality is limited. From Stanford’s Humanities + Design Lab.
• Breve, tool for visualizing data and discovering gaps in it. Runs online, so no installation necessary. From Stanford’s Humanities + Design Lab.
• Voyant, online tool for basic text analysis and visualization. By Stéfan Sinclair and Geoffrey Rockwell.

Regular Expressions

• RegexOne, basic tutorial for regular expressions
• AutoRegex, “effortless conversion” from English to Regex (and vice versa), using AI

Text Markup

• Markus, automated and assisted text markup platform for sinologists, includes links to many other resources (Hilde De Weerdt and Brent Ho, Leiden University)
• TEI (Text Encoding Initiative), set of guidelines for marking up humanities texts with XML; site includes links to many tutorials
• Recogito, intuitive tool for annotating documents and images, part of the Pelagios network
• TEI Guidelines for Critical Editions of Dunhuang Manuscripts, by Chang Po-yung 張伯雍 and Marcus Bingenheimer (Temple University)
• Full Text Markup of Selected Dunhuang Manuscripts, an example of a TEI edition of several Dunhuang manuscripts, by Marcus Bingenheimer, Chang Po-yung 張伯雍, and Ray Chou 周邦信; full data hosted at Zenodo (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.1133490)
• A Critical, Digital Edition of the Song gaoseng zhuan 宋高僧傳之校勘與數位化版本, another example of the power of text markup

Text Scraping, Cleaning

• OpenRefine, powerful tool for regularlizing messy data. Can also be used for scraping data directly from websites. 
• Web Scraper, a Chrome extension that allows you to scrape web pages without having to use Python, Javascript, or other programming languages.

Network Visualization/Analysis

• Gephi, powerful open-source network visualization and analysis tool that has become the standard in digital humanities circles.
• Cytoscape, another great, free network visualization and analysis tool. Originally designed by geneticists, its interface and analytic tools are slightly different from Gephi.

GIS, Mapping

• QGIS, open-source GIS software
• Flowmap.blue, easy-to-use tool for visualizing the movement of objects. Uses Google Sheets and Google Maps.

Relational Database Software

• Microsoft Access, proprietary software, costly, compatible only with Windows
• SQLite, free, open-source, lacks intuitive interface, so best used in conjunction with DB Browser for SQLite or other such visual tool

11. Other

Professionalization

• Course Wiki for Asia 592/2018W2 at University of British Columbia, includes links to resources on Conferences and Presentations, Cover Letters, Curriculum Vitae, Employment, Funding, General Sources of News and Advice, Online Presence, Syllabi and Course Design, Syllabus, Teaching Statements, and Writing and Publishing (compiled by Bruce Rusk)
• East Asia-related Job Market Data Reports and Visualizations. Exhaustively compiled and synthesized studies of data related to the job market in East Asian studies, from 2019 to the present. Compiled by Paula Curtis (UCLA).
• Tom Mullaney’s YouTube channel. Includes short videos explaining many aspects of academia, from an entrepreneurial Stanford historian.
• Imre Galambos’s YouTube channel. Includes short videos on topics such as research tips, Chinese writing, and Dunhuang manuscripts, from a Cambridge scholar of Asian manuscripts.

Finding Scholarship

• Duxiu 读秀
• Bibliography of Oriental Studies, version 7, and version 6 (Tōyōgaku bunken rēmoku kensaku 東洋学文献類目検索), an excellent resource for finding Japanese scholarship on specific China-related topics, compiled by Kyōto University’s Institute for Research in the Humanities 人文科学研究所. It is necessary to consult both versions because they cover slightly different time periods.
• Early China Sinology, summaries and tables of contents for new academic books in English, Chinese, and Japanese related to early and medieval China, run by Wen-yi Huang (Academia Sinica) 
• Classic French Sinology, contains high-quality files of early works of French Sinology that have entered public domain.
• Les livres gratuits à télécharger – Bibliothèque chine ancinenne, free-to-download Francophone scholarship on premodern China.
• Women in the Study of Asian Religions, database of female, non-binary, or gender non-conforming scholars working on Asian religions, started by Natasha Heller (University of Virginia) and Elena Valussi (University of Chicago)
• Women Also Know History, database of female or non-binary historians

Citing Scholarship

• Quick Guide on Citation Style for Chinese, Japanese and Korean Sources, includes examples for Chicago, APA, and MLA styles, from Yale University’s Library

Poetry

• Bibliography of Chinese Poetry in Translation, compiled by Zeb Raft (Academia Sinica, Taipei) and Thomas Mazanec (UC Santa Barbara).
• How to Read Chinese Poetry podcast, hosted by Zong-qi Cai (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and Lingnan University), featuring guest hosts introducing a wide variety of traditional verse genres, themes, and periods.