圖書館

      These documents were photocopied largely in the Meinong region, but also in other areas included in the Right Brigade (右堆) of the old south Taiwan Hakka Six Brigades community. This work was done over the course of more than 50 years, which included two major periods of fieldwork in 1963-5 and 1971-2, and many shorter visits. The major research interest motivating this accumulation was the Qing-period (清代) historical anthropology of what is now Meinong District in Kaohsiung City. While these documents were selected in the first instance due to their research value for understanding pre-Japanese Meinong culture and society, including state-community interconnections during Qing, many are also of significant use for research on the Japanese period and early Republican times. As far as Qing is concerned, these materials document a vibrantly active rural society, one demonstrating considerable managerial and economic sophistication, and a significant prevalence of functional literacy. The many account books of religious associations (hui 會) and ancestral associations (chang 嘗) testify to the importance in local society of these groups, which as corporate entities owned about one-third of the best wet rice land in Meinong.

      這批複印文獻大部分取自於美濃地區，但也包括部分來自六堆中的右堆其他地區。文獻蒐集歷時超過50年，主要集中在1963至1965年、1971至1972年這兩段時期的田野調查，以及歷年來多次的短期田野訪問。蒐集這批文獻的緣由是基於對現今高雄市美濃地區的清代歷史人類學的研究興趣。文獻蒐集的選擇，固然是因其對理解日治前的美濃文化及社會（包括清代的國家與社群連結）具有研究價值，但其實對日治時期和國府來台初期也同樣具有重要研究意義。以清代而論，這批材料記錄著一個活力豐沛的農村社會，展現出管理及經濟層面的精密純熟程度，以及相當普及的書寫能力。從諸多的嘗會（宗教和祭祀組織）帳簿可看出這些民間會社在地方上的重要性，他們擁有美濃約三分之一最好的水稻田。（劉紹華翻譯，並加註以下說明）

      孔邁隆教授在準備退休前，將其歷年來在美濃蒐集的各式文獻影本資料捐贈予哥倫比亞大學東亞圖書館。其原本蒐集的文獻即為複印本（當年正本複印完後即交還報導人），在捐贈予該校圖書館之前，孔邁隆教授將複印本掃描成電子檔，並分類整理檔案，於2016年將電子檔案捐贈給台灣相關機構，包括美濃文物館、高雄市立歷史博物館、中央研究院民族學研究所等。

 「美濃文字資料」由Prof. Myron L. Cohen （孔邁隆教授）提供，這些文件僅用於研究和保存目的。