Taiwan Studies: Databases

Commonwealth Magazine is a storehouse of information on Taiwan's economic development and the transformation of its society. This electronic journal includes over 310 issues, from the first issue in 1981 through the current issue.

The North China Herald was a major English-language newspaper published in China from the 1850s to the 1940s. It is a major source for the history of the foreign presence in China in that period. It was the official journal for British consular notifications and announcements of the Shanghai Municipal Council, and published translations of Chinese official notifications and news from across China.

Offers full-text Taiwanese periodicals in five main categories: Social Sciences, Humanities, Applied Sciences, Medical & Life Sciences, and Natural Sciences. Searchable in English or Chinese. Abstracts are in English. Full-text (PDF) articles are in Chinese.

Access to this Japanese magazine published by the Taiwan Governor House during the Japanese colonial period. Issues included were politics, industry, trade, transportation, military, education, judiciary, police, civil engineering, technology, handicraft and arts. NOTE: For off-campus access, please use the GW VPN.

Covers a time span from the Tang Dynasty to the Japanese colonial period and incorporates local histories, and official documents of the Ming and Qing Dynasties. The database covers a wide variety of dimensions of Taiwan, including history, geography, local customs, politics, economy, sociology, laws and culture. NOTE: For off-campus access, please use the GW VPN.

This database provides news articles from eight newspapers (see below for coverage), among which are five major newspapers published by the United Daily News Group in Taiwan. These include United Daily News, Min Sheng Daily, United Evening News, Economic Daily News, and Star News. 聯合報: September 1951-present: 經濟日報: April 1967-present; 聯合晚報: February 1988-present; 民生報: February 1978-November 31, 2006; 星報: September 1999-October 31, 2006; 歐洲日報: February 2000-August 31, 2009; 美洲世界日報: February 2000-present; Upaper: March 2007-present

This database offers reports and commentary on various events from the past seventy years in Taiwan, spanning from the martial law period to the post-martial law era, covering political, social, environmental, human rights, and other issues. It traces the course through which Taiwan underwent social movements, public debates, and political struggles to transform into the society it is today, making it a valuable resource for the study of modern Taiwanese history. The database provides bibliographic information for online searching. However, due to intellectual property considerations, full-text access is limited to the Chilin Education Foundation Cultural and Educational Center, the NTU Main Library, the National Human Rights Museum Library, and The Estelle and Melvin Gelman Library Global Resources Center at The George Washington University. As of 2024 (Minguo 113), the database contains nearly 200,000 records linked to about 500,000 pages of full-text images, including over 20,000 newspaper clipping records and approximately 175,000 magazine records. New content will continue to be added on a regular basis.

For access to full-text, please contact khamo at khamo.khamo@email.gwu.edu.

Taiwan Academic Classics offers classic works from China/Taiwan and contemporary scholarly thought from academic societies in Taiwan and around the world. The federated search platform of Taiwan Academic Classics incorporates full text searchable Web access to core journals in the humanities and social sciences from 1928 to the present with ancient compilations from China's earliest Dynasties. Taiwan Academic Classics includes authoritative archives and historic documents from the era of the Chinese Republic. Taiwan Academic Classics integrates a total of 2 billion characters, 300 different journals, 6,630 ancient works and more than 100,000 dissertations, with contributions from 35,000 authors.