Special Collections is the library's rare book room. We also have strong collections in popular culture. Everyone is welcome to explore and learn in Special Collections!
You do not need to be an MSU student. However, all users age 15 and younger must visit with a parent or guardian. Your parent or guardian must remain present during the research visit.
Two more tips:
If the country you're looking for is not in this list, it means we don't currently have any English-language comic books from that country.
We have many African comic books in French and Portuguese, and a small number in traditional African languages such as Xhosa and Swahili.
To look for comics in a language other than English, do a keyword search for comic books and [name of language].
To find cookbooks from a specific country, search the Special Collections catalog like this:
Do include the parentheses around the words (cooking or cookbooks).
If you get too many titles that aren't in English:
We have hundreds of posters from African countries, especially southern Africa. Most are from political campaigns or have public health messages.
Search for all items in the Africana Poster collection.
Search only for posters in English (about 500 items)
You can narrow your results to posters from a specific country by doing a keyword search in the Special Collections catalog like this:
Note that the search term for the poster collection is africana, not african. The name comes from our Africana Library.
Chinese comic books translated into English
Indian comic books translated into English
Japanese comic books translated into English
Korean comic books translated into English
If the country you're looking for is not in this list, it means we don't currently have any English-language comic books from that country.
We have many Asian comics in their original languages. To look for comics in a language other than English, do a keyword search for comic books and [name of language].
To find cookbooks from a specific country, search the Special Collections catalog like this:
Do include the parentheses around the words (cooking or cookbooks).
If you get too many titles that aren't in English:
We have a great collection on Japanese animation, or manga.
Find English-language books on anime in Special Collections.
If the country you're looking for is not in this list, it means we don't currently have any English-language comic books from that country.
We have many South American comic books in Spanish and Portuguese. To look for comics in a language other than English, do a keyword search for comic books and [name of language].
To find cookbooks from a specific country, search the Special Collections catalog like this:
Do include the parentheses around the words (cooking or cookbooks).
If you get too many titles that aren't in English:
We currently have nine works from a small press in Mexico, Taller Leñateros, which is dedicated to preserving Mayan culture.
Many of their works have unusual features like pop-ups or paper sculptures of material objects in Mayan culture.
Their books are generally in Tzotzil, a traditional Mayan language, with translations in Spanish or English.