Chinese Canadian Library Weblog

From Bob Sutton, a Stanford Prof.

“In short, although the rise of the web has changed what librarians do, it also means that we need them more than ever because there are so many facts out there now and they are so easy to get, and it is so hard to tell which ones to believe – and they actually care about facts and evidence, and know where to get them. “

on library collections in the world of Google. I especially like his comment on copyright. Now our Access China project is placed in a embarrassing position because of the copyright limitation. Prof. Courant said ” Something is deeply wrong when the tools for extended and easy collaboration are plausibly frustrated by excessive concern with intellectual property. The purpose of copyright, as we all know, was to make ideas available for human progress, not to lock them up.”

Hope we can find some time to read the whole article.

$15 per person, and discount price is $12 for adults and $5 for kids.

Jian has happily started his co-op with North Van.
Ying was offered a part-time position at VANOC after her summer co-op.

Heather has become a Systems Librarian at McGill U.
Ian is the Digitization Librarian now at SFU and a Burnaby resident. He is attending a conference in Beijing next month.

Beibei is the Acting Head at VPL Multilingual while Jan looks after the Fraserviews branch.

UBC CSSA is organizing a cruise celebration on Oct. 7th, Saturday. Shall we have a party on the cruise? Please comment.

Librarian for Chinese Studies

The Perkins Library System is seeking a librarian to develop, manage, and evaluate the collections from and about China and to provide specialized reference assistance and instruction to library users. The position reports to the Head of the International and Area Studies Department.Position requires an ALA-accredited MLS or the combination of an advanced degree in a relevant subject area and related experience, MA/MS in a relevant subject area, a plus. Experience as a Chinese studies librarian (including collection development responsibilities from a variety of sources) or comparable academic experience, knowledge of the history, politics, economics, literatures and cultures of China, especially contemporary China; familiarity with the Chinese publishing industry and book trades; familiarity with electronic resources and reference tools for Chinese Studies; knowledge of the principles and practices of collection development and management for both print and electronic resources; ability to manage multiple projects; must be service-oriented; ability to work effectively and creatively with faculty, students and other library staff in a highly collaborative, service-oriented environment. Must have a highly level of fluency, both spoken and written, in Chinese and good oral and written communication skills in English;

Preferred: Three years relevant library experience; familiarity with Chinese film and Chinese art history, as well as contemporary Chinese social sciences; familiarity with trends in academic and research libraries as well as knowledge of the issues confronting higher education; familiarity with best practices in bibliographic instruction
and the concepts of information literacy; demonstrated leadership in establishing and implementing successful new programs; working knowledge of the ExLibris Aleph system. Due to possible focus on Korea, knowledge of Korean; familiarity with the history, politics, economics, literatures and cultures of Korea; familiarity with Korean publishing and book trades, a plus.

Salary and librarian rank depend on qualifications and experience. The anticipated hiring range is $40,000 – $55,000

TO APPLY: Please send your cover letter, detailed resume and the names, addresses (mailing and e-mail), and telephone numbers of three references to: Teresa Tillman, Library Human Resources, at library-jobs@duke.edu. Please include CHINESE in the subject line. If you do not have access to e-mail, please mail your application materials to Box 90194, Duke University, Durham, NC 27708. Review of applications will begin in mid September and will continue until the position is filled.
Duke University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer.

What do you want to see on your library’s shelves? VPL wants to know!

Vancouver Public Library is holding a series of public focus group to ask you how we can provide a balanced collection of books and other materials to meet your diverse needs.

English Sessions:
September 19, 6:00pm, Britannia Branch, 1661 Napier St. 604-665-2222
September 21, 11:00am, Fraserview Branch, 1950 Argyle Dive, 604-665-3957
September 23, 11:00am, Joe Fortes Branch, 870 Denman Street, 604-665-3972
September 27, 2:00pm, Firehall Branch, 1455 West 10th Ave. 604-665-3970

Chinese Sessions: focus on Chinese collections
September 30, 10:30am, Level 7, Central Branch, 350 W. Georgia St. 604-331-3691, CANTONESE
September 30, 2:00pm, Level 7, Central Branch, 350 W. Georgia St. 604-331-3691, MANDARIAN

Admission is free, all are welcome.

If you have any specific questions regarding Chinese sessions, you can contact me at beibezha@vpl.ca . Thanks.

Chinese Materials Cataloger
$41,376–$71,916 per annum, depending upon qualifications
The East Asian Library
University of California, Berkeley

Consideration will be given to applications received by October 31, 2006. Responsibilities:

The Chinese Materials Cataloger performs original cataloging of books, serials, manuscripts, audio-visual materials, microfilms, maps, and other library materials in the Chinese language. All original cataloging is performed according to AACR2, LC classification, and LC subject headings. Records are given full MARC tagging by the cataloger, who is also responsible for preparing authority records for GLADIS (Berkeley’s online catalog) and NACO. In addition, the Chinese Materials Cataloger prepares in-house training materials and advises cataloging staff on cataloging-related issues, participates in the formulation of general cataloging policy and system design relating to Chinese materials, and conducts special cataloging projects. Occasionally, the Chinese Materials Cataloger provides reference service on questions related to the use of the catalogs and other finding tools.

Qualifications:

Required: MLS from an ALA-accredited institution. Knowledge of current cataloging standards: AACR2, LC classification, MARC bibliographic formats, and LC subject headings. Familiarity with pinyin romanization and OCLC-CJK required. Excellent oral and written skills in Chinese and English are necessary, as is the ability to work well with staff of diverse backgrounds. Strong commitment to excellence in service and demonstrated ability to work independently, as well as collaboratively, in a complex, changing environment.

Preferred: Knowledge of Chinese culture and scholarship. Two or more years’ cataloging experience in a research library working with Chinese materials is strongly desirable. The successful candidate will show evidence of project planning, management, and completion.

Candidate must have excellent analytical, interpersonal, and communication skills, initiative, and flexibility. Professional contributions beyond the primary job, e.g., publications, active participation in University and professional organizations, and other research and creative activities are required for advancement within the Librarian series. Candidates must show evidence or promise of such contribution.

DEADLINE: Consideration will be given to applications received by October 31, 2006.

The Library at the University of California, Berkeley is committed to the support and encouragement of a multicultural environment and seeks candidates who can make positive and imaginative contributions in a context of ethnic and cultural diversity.

An exclusive bargaining agent, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), represents librarians at the University of California. This position is included in the bargaining unit.

APPLICANTS SHOULD APPLY IN WRITING, INCLUDING WITH THEIR LETTER A COMPLETE STATEMENT OF QUALIFICATIONS, A FULL RESUME OF THEIR EDUCATION AND RELEVANT EXPERIENCE, AND THE NAMES, ADDRESSES, AND PHONE NUMBERS OF THREE REFERENCES WHO ARE KNOWLEDGEABLE ABOUT THEIR QUALIFICATIONS FOR THIS POSITION.

You may mail your application package to:

Barbara Kornstein
Academic Personnel Specialist
Library Human Resources Department
110 The Library
University of California
Berkeley CA 94720-6000

Or FAX to: 510-642-8675
Or EMAIL to: librec@library.berkeley.edu

APPLICATIONS RECEIVED VIA EMAIL PREFERRED.
The University of California is an Equal Opportunity, Affirmative Action Employer

For complete information, please visit http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/LHRD/librec.html

I took the shuttle to Seoul National University campus. After I got off the shuttle, I couldn’t find the library, or any sign in English. I asked several students who seemed to understand English and very polite. But nobody knew where the library was. Finally a handsome young guy waited with me for the next shuttle and asked the driver in Korean, then translated the direction for me.

Campus of Seoul National University

Yonsei University

72nd IFLA General Conference, East Asian Meeting

I believe most of us have encountered such a sad moment in our career path that when we told others about our professions, people would ask in a surprising manner “Really? Do we still need librarians nowadays?” or looked at us in such a sympathetic manner which you could understand the look meant something like “Are you going to spend the rest of your life stamping out books?” I usually take this kind of response as kind of ignorance and don’t bother to be upset with it. However, if this kind of attitude is held by your boss or your coworker, it is something that you cannot simply shrug off and walk away.

Two days ago, a volunteer brought over 200 student evaluation forms to the library asking me to enter the data to a database. She told me that the Academic Department Coordinator asked her to do so since “the library is so quite there”. Isn’t this typical that in most people’s eyes, the librarian is ONLY responsible for checking out books, so if there are not many students in the library, the librarian must have nothing to do but sit there idling? Personally I don’t mind helping with other departments, but since they sent out the forms to me based on an assumption that the librarian doesn’t have much to do, I consider this an insult to the library work. Moreover, my workload didn’t allow me to help out either. As I mentioned in my previous post, the library where I’m working now is a solo-librarian library. Right now the librarian is away for a 3-week vacation and I have to run the whole library by myself. Due to the limited resources of the library, I have to spend quite a lot of time processing interlibrary loan requests everyday. None of the databases we have access to provides fulltext articles, so normally the students would email me long lists of journal articles/conference proceedings citations asking for help to locate the articles for them, either from the open web or from our ILL supply library.

I decided not to do this data entry job in the end. It was not an easy decision to make at the very beginning, for I was a little concerned that other staff might think me unhelpful or nonflexible. But finally I made the decision not to do, for I regarded this an issue with the image of the library, rather than a personal affair. I emailed the Coordinator stating my willingness to help but due to my already full(if not over-full) workload, I felt sorry that I couldn’t help at this time. At the same time, I felt that I had the obligation to give a little bit ‘lesson’ to people like the coordinator who hold such a stereotypical notion of a librarian that we do have many important tasks to do other than checking out books. I wrote in my email about the amount of ILL requests I had to handle each day, and the backlog of cataloging we still had to catch up with in the library, etc.

Though I know it is an endless journey to fight against the stereotype of a librarian, and I know we cannot simply blame or angry with people for belittling our job, for we have our share of job in ‘educating’ people about the importance of our profession, still, from time to time, I feel frustrated when confronting with a situation like this….