Celebrating the Chinese New Year
with Cartography: China Maps Available
from Ball State University Libraries
The Ball State University
Libraries’ GIS Research and Map Collection (GRMC) on the second floor of
Bracken Library has a large collection of maps of China available for research
and learning. Cartographic resources can
be an excellent visual resource, and the maps and atlases in the collection
include both historic and new maps of China, its provinces, and cities.
The collection includes dozens of
cities in China, including new and historic maps of Beijing, Guangzhou,
Shanghai, Chengdu, Nanning, and Xi’an.
Many of the city maps are folded and easy to use for touring, but the
collection also includes large street and topographic maps.
The collection includes maps
showing precipitation, military regions, and even clothing recommendations for
travel in China. An illustrated Yangzi
River map includes the Three Gorges Dam.
The U.S. Central Intelligence
Agency publishes updated maps of countries, and these new maps (top map above,
click to enlarge) can be accessed digitally via the University Libraries’
Digital Media Repository in the Maps of
the World collection. Historic maps
of China are also available in the International
Historic Maps collection.
The Atlas Collection also
provides great resources for studying China. Environmental concerns like air
pollution, soil degradation, and water quality are shown on the map (above)
from the National Geographic Atlas of
China published in 2007 and available from the Atlas Collection. The
tourism map (above) is from the atlas, China: A Provincial Atlas published in
1995.
Atlases also offer charts and
graphs depicting various topics. Defense
spending and total armed forces in the People’s Liberation Army of China are
shown from the State of China Atlas
published in 2007. The second chart
(above) from the atlas shows the number of forces and military equipment in
China versus Taiwan.
Maps from the GRMC circulate for
two weeks or longer. Atlases from the
Atlas Collection circulate for 28 days or longer.
The complete collection of maps
of China has not yet been cataloged, so visit or contact the staff of the GRMC
at 765-285-1097 to discover maps not listed in the library CardCat system or
for more information about any of these cartographic resources.
