Transforming the Library
The SOAS Library houses the world's greatest concentration of scholarly works on Asia, Africa and the Middle East. It contains more than 1.5 million volumes, many of them rare, written in hundreds of languages. Library treasures include a 9th century Tibetan prayer book, priceless Japanese scrolls, original maps of Africa drawn by the 19th century explorer David Livingstone and the first known writings in the Aboriginal language.
One of only five designated National Research Libraries in England, the SOAS Library receives more than a million visits from researchers and students each year, nearly half of whom travel from around London, the country and the world specifically to conduct research there. It truly is a global resource.
But with more than 25,000 new books being added each year, the Library is running out of room. The collections are spilling over into researcher and reader spaces. With a growing SOAS student body and increasing demand from researchers both within and beyond the School, there is an urgent need to modernise the Library.
That is why the School of Oriental and African Studies has embarked on an ambitious plan to transform the Library. A major refurbishment will result in a bright, welcoming and more accessible space with new language laboratories, music studios, discussion and research rooms and other facilities. A state-of-the-art storage and retrieval system will allow the collections to continue to expand rapidly. And a sweeping digitisation effort across the collections, already begun, will make valuable works more widely available to users around the globe.
For information on how you can support the Library Transformation Project, please contact Krupali Patel:
020 7898 4486kp22@soas.ac.uk
