APSIG newsletter no. 60: March 2006

A vision being realised: the National Islamic Library Centre, Canberra

A group of 25 Canberra librarians visited the National Islamic Library Centre on 21 February to see the embryo of their collection.

The library is part of the Canberra Islamic Centre, a four acre site in the southern Canberra suburb of Monash. The Great Hall, which serves as the main community space, is already built. With the Brindabella Mountains to the west, the centre is situated in a lovely valley setting. With a striking design of banded grey brick, with a high half-barrel roof, it is already a landmark. Building is continuing, with a courtyard being constructed at present. This will bound one side of the Library when it is built. Recently, a lovely piece of fine mosaic floor paving has been added to the main building next to the door to the future courtyard. The overall plan would include more buildings and perhaps an old people's village but all this is dependent on funding. There are 1400 members in the local area with Muslims from all countries participating.

Mr Ahmed Youssef, Canberra Islamic Centre President, showed us around. Mr Youssef arrived in Australia in the late 1960s with the intention of becoming a librarian here but that ambition did not eventuate. Instead, he worked in business.

The centre was opened a year ago by Sir William Dean, former Governor-General. At the opening, Sir William said : '[A] reason for pleasure is the knowledge of the contribution that the centre can make as a social, cultural and educational centre for Canberra's culturally and socially diverse Muslim community. The final reason for pleasure which I would mention lies in the centre's objective of acting as a catalyst for social contact and co-operation and understanding between Muslims and the other social groups and communities which are part of, and which make up, our national capital.'

The library is founded upon Mr Youssef's own personal collection which he commenced in 1969 to answer the many questions he was receiving concerning Islam. First concentrating upon the arts and architecture, he expanded it to meet more queries on history, religion and politics. He has found a great lack of knowledge in the community and commented to us on the regular waves of controversy concerning Islam which erupt.

The centre's website.This includes a link to their library catalogue. They are gradually adding entries for their collection which totals about 10 000 items. Volunteers and supporters are sought.

APSIG members and friends appreciated the hospitality offered to us during this visit and the time taken by Mr Youssef. Our convener, Deveni Temu, offered our warm thanks to him on our behalf.

APSIG members and friends with Mr Ahmad Youseff

Asia-Pacific Week 2006

Up and coming professionals with expertise in Asia and the Pacific met at the Australian National University in Canberra on 29 January - 2 February, 2006. The Asia Pacific Week summer school featured a program of intensive courses and workshops that brought together more than 300 scholars from Australia, the region, Europe and North America.

Over 200 honours students and postgraduate researchers joined prominent academics to undertake a week-long program designed to make available the considerable national research and teaching resources in Canberra. The combined holdings of the National Library of Australia and the ANU represent one of the world's major resources for the study of Asia and the Pacific and over 70 per cent of Australia's Asia-Pacific resource material. The depth of academic support in Asia-Pacific studies in the capital is unequalled in Australia.

Wollongong helps Books for Aceh Project

The National Library recently received a generous donation of $1340 for its Books for Aceh Project from the staff of Wollongong University Library. The funds were raised by library staff through a variety of social activities. NLA will use the funds to purchase further consignments of new Indonesian books, which are being sent regularly to Aceh from its Jakarta office.

Libraries Australia: new service open to all

Libraries Australia, a service that enables anyone with an Internet connection to select from more than 40 million items held in over 800 libraries across Australia, was launched in late February. This innovative service is an Australian first, opening up the collections of Australia's libraries. Developed by the National Library of Australia, it is an e-ticket to a world of information consisting of books, journals, newspapers, theses, pictures, music, manuscripts, maps and much more. Many online resources such as digitised images and full text government publications can also be accessed immediately online.

Underpinned by cutting edge technology and data contributed by the nation's libraries, Libraries Australia makes it easy to search for information across the collections of the national, state and university libraries and most public, research, government, health and other special libraries in Australia.

Some of the features of Libraries Australia are the ability to instantly access many digitised items; borrow from a local library or order from another library; copy selections of items at a small price; buy from online bookshops; and find library locations nationwide.

Libraries Australia can be used to further education or personal interests, advance research, obtain information to develop business opportunities or to facilitate lifelong learning. It is available here.

Secretariat of the Pacific Community Library moves ahead

Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) Library has initiated several projects for 2006. One of these projects is to digitize and mount online a collection of its historic photographs. SPC Library has approximately 8000 photographs, mostly black and white, from the early 1950s to date.

A second and very important project is to produce a system-wide OPAC. SPC library is actually a system of libraries: the main library is at the headquarters in Noumea, which serves the programs located in Noumea, corporate services and responds to regional demands; there a six small branch libraries in Suva, associated with the Suva campus of SPC and which relate to and serve the programs and projects based in Suva. The Suva libraries use a variety of cataloguing and classification systems and work on different software packages, most of which are not library catalogue software. The Noumea library is online and then by clicking on the 'Library Catalog' link. None of the catalogues of the Suva libraries are online. The task is to harmonize the catalogs by migrating all the various catalogs, which are currently on disparate systems, onto one unified integrated library database management system and to produce an OPAC for all of SPC various branch libraries.

A third project is the forthcoming PIRG (Pacific Islands Regional Group) section meeting of IAMSLIC (International Association of Marine Science Libraries and Information Centers). As a corporate library that serves its organisation's programmes, SPC library collection follows the work of the corporate divisions of SPC. One of the major areas of work is in fisheries, aquaculture and maritime issues. In order to provide information resources we depend heavily on information networks. SPC participates in PIMRIS, the Pacific Island Marine Resource Information System, based at the University of the South Pacific in Suva, and in IAMSLIC It provides a free ILL service via a Z39.50 catalogue, a Union List of Serials, a duplicate exchange service and a listserve. With the aim of promoting resource sharing among fisheries and marine science libraries and information centers in the Pacific region, SPC library and PIMRIS will host a Pacific Islands Regional Group of IAMSLIC meeting in conjunction with the SPC Heads of Fisheries meeting 3-7 April 2006. Contact SPC library (please remove '.nospam' from address), if you are interested in more information.

Rachele Oriente, Librarian, South Pacific Commission

Training in library advocacy in the Pacific

The Pacific Islands Association of Libraries and Archives (PIALA) recently learned that it had been awarded an IFLA ALP funded development grant for an advocacy workshop.

The proposal for a workshop to train library association leaders in the Pacific Islands in library advocacy and policy was submitted by Arlene Cohen, former IFLA MLAS Secretary and Mark Perkins, a Standing Committee member of the IFLA Regional Section on Asia and Oceania.

The Pacific Islands Association of Libraries and Archives (PIALA), established in 1991, is a Pacific regional association of librarians and archivists formed to address needs in the Pacific, with a special focus on Micronesia. Micronesia is composed of several island countries and entities, covering an expanse of water almost as big as the Australia. An executive board consisting of officers and representatives from each founding Micronesian island country or entity governs PIALA. These countries or entities are Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia consisting of the states of Yap, Chuuk, Kosrae and Pohnpei.

Government officials, educators and the public in the Pacific Islands do not appreciate the role of libraries in our society. Thus, many Pacific Island laws and government policies relating to information access, literacy and education, where they are even being written, are being developed with little or no library community or association input. To exert any influence on library development, library association leaders, activists and educators must understand the role of library associations as pressure groups for political action and policy decisions. They can then influence government decisions in both basic funding for libraries and new emerging areas of information literacy and telecommunications technology. To do this, these leaders, educators and activists must have the requisite skills in policy development and implementation; including developing government relations platforms, monitoring government proposals, effective advocacy campaigns and public relations.

This grant will provide funding to present a workshop at the PIALA 2006 Conference, 13 -17 November 2006 in Palau to address developing skills in library advocacy and policy development. Two participants from each Micronesian island entity represented on the PIALA Board and two other participants from other Pacific Islands in the region will be supported to attend the workshop.

During the workshop, participants will each identify at least two issues in their island (or country) for which advocacy work will be carried out systematically over the next year and develop a preliminary action plan for implementation during the workshop. They will then be expected to go back to their islands and utilize their new skills to promote, advocate and influence government policies relating to the identified issues.

The IFLA Management of Library Associations (MLAS) and other interested library associations on the MLAS Standing Committee will also provide supplemental funding.

New Australian Pacific Studies group set up

Associate Professor Clive Moore of the University of Queensland has been elected as the inaugural President of the Australian Association for the Advancement of Pacific Studies (AAAPS) at their first conference held recently in Brisbane.

130 delegates attended, representing the disciplines of history, anthropology, politics, health, museums and cultural heritage, theatre and dance, literature, cultural studies and archives.

Professor Margaret Jolly from ANU was elected as Vice President as well as an Executive representing Pacific organisations, disciplines and communities in Australia.

Dr Moore said that the AAAPS was the new peak body for all Pacific Studies organisations in Australia. He said the association was formed to promote the international excellence of Australian research and teaching in Pacific Studies, and its component disciplines at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. AAAPS also intended to play an advocacy role with Government, NGOs, schools, business, media and universities.

Another important aspect of AAAPS was to promote the role of Australian repositories in the collection, preservation and access to Pacific Island research, cultural and historical material. The Association also intended to promote public knowledge and study of Australia-Pacific Island relations, and liaise with Pacific communities in Australia, with outreach to Pacific Island nations and similar associations overseas. Dr Moore said that the formation of AAAPS was long overdue, as an equivalent organisation to the Asian Studies Association.

'Australia is a Pacific nation,' he said. 'Our future is bound by geographic proximity to the Pacific Islands. The nations around the Pacific Ocean, in the islands and on the Asian mainland, will be most important to Australia in the future, not our older links with Europe. The Australian government has shown its commitment through increasing aid funds and its recent activity in Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. AAAPS will coordinate our academic approach to Pacific Studies and our relationship with the Pacific Islands.'

Dr Moore said several major activities were planned, including producing a major report on the state of Pacific Studies in Australia.

The AAAPS grew out of an interim organisation which met in Canberra in October 2004 with delegates from all over Australia, representing the diversity of Pacific Studies. The impetus and seed funding came from the International Centre of Excellence in Asia Pacific Studies.

ASAA 2006: Asia Reconstructed

The 16th Biennial Conference of the Asian Studies Association of Australia (ASAA) 'Asia Reconstructed', will be held on 26-29 June 2006, at the University of Wollongong, New South Wales.

Themes of the conference include: the critique of development; governance and citizenship; labour and social transformation; the clash of fundamentalisms; national and transnational legal issues; the role of technology; new and old arts; Asia and world history; post-colonialism; Australia-South Asia links. It is hoped that there will be several library sessions. The program will be posted on the ASAA conference website shortly.

National Library collections on Asia : Andrew Gosling reports

TKondoh Seiichi Collection
Professor Peter Rimmer of the ANU and Inha University, Korea, has written 'Engineer Kondoh's collection lives on' in the February 2006 National Library of Australia news. The article covers the Kondoh Seiichi Collection of items published between 1900 to 1956 about Japanese transport (particularly railways). The late Kondoh Seiichi was a distinguished engineer with Japan National Railways. Professor Rimmer persuaded Kondoh Seiichi's son, Kondoh Rinnosuke, to give him the collection for donation to the National Library of Australia.

George Caiger Papers
Dr John Caiger, a distinguished historian of Japan and former lecturer at the ANU, is currently organising and providing annotations for his late father George Caiger's papers. John is donating these documents to the national library. The late George Caiger had a long and varied career in Australia and overseas. He was an educator in pre-Pacific War Japan and wrote important books about the country such as Japan : beyond the headlines; Tell me about Tokyo and Tojo say no. He also played an important role in the Australian Institute of International Affairs.

Documentary Heritage preservation register

Several years ago the National Library of Australia set up the documentary heritage preservation register to make available information about preservation projects underway in libraries and archives in Southeast Asia and the Pacific. There have been no updates to the data. We would like to make this register useful once again by adding information about current or proposed projects.

Contact will be made with the projects already listed to see if they are still underway or if the entries need to be deleted or updated.

If you are able to provide information about preservation projects please provide details using the form.

Projects of interest are:

• Basic preservation
• Bibliographic control
• Digitisation
• Disaster awareness
• Environmental management
• Facility design/assessment

General surveys:

• Policy or strategy development
• Preservation microfilming
• Preservation planning
• Storage
• Training

If you have any questions about the register, please send them to Sandra Henderson (please remove '.nospam' from address) ,National Library of Australia.

New Asian Studies Dean for ANU : from Leiden to Canberra

Professor Rikki Kersten will take up the position of Dean, Faculty of Asian Studies, Australian National University, in July. She is currently Professor of Modern Japan Studies at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, and has previously held positions at the University of Sydney, University of Tokyo, University of NSW and University of Oxford.

New look for Asian currents

The February 2006 issue heralds the consolidation of the Asian Studies Association of Australia's cooperation with the International Centre of Excellence in Asia Pacific Studies , which is lending generous support to Asian Currents. ICEAPS, a Federal Government initiative which aims to raise the profile of Asia-Pacific studies in Australia, is housed in the Menzies Library, Australian National University with Professor John Fitzgerald as its director. The centre draws upon the Asia-Pacific expertise of key research and teaching centres throughout Australia and in Asia, Europe and North America, as well as several national professional networks.

Asian Currents aims to connect Australia's academic experts on Asia with journalists, policy makers, business people, artists and other educators. Registration is free and open to all by simply registering your e-mail address. The e-bulletin normally appears in the third week of each month.

Crescent moon, Islamic art & civilisation In Southeast Asia

24 February to 28 May 2006, Canberra.
This outstanding exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia explores the Islamic heritage of Australia's neighbours. It shows developments in the arts of Islamic Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines, as well as the Muslim communities of Thailand, Burma, Cambodia and Vietnam.

The East Asian librarians let fly

The latest issue of the EALRGA Newsletter, no. 48, has just been published on the EALRGA website.

A bumper issue this time with a special feature, 'CJK Collections and Services around the country'. The few libraries with established Chinese Japanese and Korean collections have always enjoyed the privilege of publishing their news in a regular column. It is time we learned more about other libraries around the country which have CJK collections, some with a longer history than you'd think!

There are reports of various academic conferences where librarians took an active role in promoting library resources to our user community. There are also interesting reports on other meetings and librarians' training workshops.

Authors include young as well as established academics. Postgraduate students Niv Horesh and Alex English have written on the use of electronic resources in Chinese studies and the inaugural Chinese Studies Postgraduate Forum respectively. On the other hand, Prof Wong Shiu Hon, now retired in Perth, has kindly permitted us to reproduce his article on Chinese painting, which should be interesting to our readers.

Wan Wong, Editor, EALRGA newsletter

APSIG forthcoming events

Voices of the forgotten: the East Timor Living Memory project, Asia Bookroom 6:00pm - 7:30pm, Wednesday 29 March.

Local librarians Anya Dettman and Bob Legge will give an illustrated talk about their fieldwork in Dili, East Timor supporting a US-funded project to film and record oral histories of Timorese men and women imprisoned during the Indonesian occupation. Refreshments served. Asia Bookroom, Unit 2, 1-3 Lawry Place, Macquarie, ACT.