Research Guides: HIST/ EALC 347: WWII in East Asia ca. 1900-1950 (HC): Background Information

Chinese View of the Opium Problem

Elias Sassoon, Chinese civilians at a Japanese checkpoint, Shanghai, 1937, DeGolyer Library, Southern Methodist University (Source: flickr)

Background Information- Countries

The following sources provide overviews of Asian history. They are a quick way to find out the basic facts and recent scholarly interpretations.

When using an article in an encyclopedia or handbook, always check the bibliography for further reading at the end of the article. It will provide a selective list of the books, articles, and, frequently, Web resources considered to be the most up-to-date and reliable.

Cambridge history of China
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This multiple-volume history provides detailed analyses of pertinent social, political, and economic issues. See:
Vol. 12 Republican China, 1912-1949, Part 1
Vol. 13 Republican China 1912–1949, Part 2
Chinese History: A New Manual
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This new edition features informed introductory essays, side bars and tables, and comments for nearly every title cited, those written in Chinese and other languages as well as English. See Chapter 67, Part 7 on Warfare, 1912-1949 pages 882-885, for information and resources.
A Companion to Chinese History
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This book offers a comprehensive overview of the latest intellectual developments in the study of China's history with scholarship by top historians from both China and around the globe. Essays present information on Chinese historiography while covering such topics as China's changing position in global and world history and the current state of the field from European, Chinese, and Japanese perspectives.
Also available in Tripod as an ebook.
Science and Civilisation in China
This scholarly set of 24 volumes publishes in-depth studies of many different aspects of science and technology in Chinese history. For the interests of this class, see in particular:
Vol. 5, Part 6 . Military Technology: Missiles and Sieges;
Vol. 5, Part 7 Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic
The Columbia Guide to Hiroshima and the Bomb
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Michael Kort describes the wartime circumstances and thinking that form the context for the decision to use nuclear weapons, surveys the major debates related to that decision, and provides a comprehensive collection of key primary source documents that illuminate the behavior of the United States and Japan during the closing days of World War II.
A Companion to Japanese History
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Includes multiple essays concerning the war period:
"Oligarchy, Democracy, and Fascism," "The Japanese Empire," and "The Fifteen-Year War."
Routledge Handbook of Modern Korean History
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See in particular these essays:
"Nationalist movements before 1945"
"The Division of Korea and the Rise of Two Koreas, 1945--1948"
State and Economy in Republican China: A Handbook for Scholars, (Volume 1)
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Two-volume Introduction to economic issues related to the war in China. Online copy of Volume 2 also available in Tripod.