At the beginning of the year I attended the Second Training Program for Senior Japanese Studies Librarians which was sponsored by the Japan Foundation and the National Diet Library of Japan (NDL). The course gave me a superb opportunity to become acquainted with the resources and information available in Japan and at the same time to establish personal contact with Japanese studies librarians from various countries as well as many library-related people in Japan.
Since Toshio Takagi from the Australian National University (ANU) has written a report about the 1998 Training Program (EALRGA Newsletter, no. 37, July 1998), I do not intend to repeat the information about the course. Instead I would like to write about the resources which I obtained during the course.
Throughout the course, lectures, site visits and various official and non- official functions, I obtained an extensive amount of materials. They comprise hand-outs from lectures, manuals of hands-on training, brochures from institutions visited, text-books for librarianship, bibliographies, publishers' catalogues and many more.
With a big pile of materials on my desk, I am continually thinking about the best ways of utilising them, not only for myself but also for other subject specialists in Japanese studies. So I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to introduce some of the materials in my collection which I find useful and use quite often for my reference services and user education work.
I) Bibliographies of Reference Materials for Japanese Studies1)A guide to reference books for Japanese studies. (= Nihon kenkyu no tame no sanko tosho) Revised ed.
(Given by Ms Koide of International House of Japan Library, who is one of the compilers of this bibliography, to all the participants in the course) [Materials for Training Program for Senior Japanese Studies Librarians] 1998. Text in Japanese. Items mentioned here are a part of the materials which were prepared for the Second Training Program by the staff of National Diet Library and handed over to the participants in each session.
[National Diet Library: Series of teaching materials for librarishship] Text in Japanese. Items in this category were based on the lecture notes for staff training in librarianship at the National Diet Library and produced later as a series of teaching materials. Series no. 3: Sekai kakukoku no zenkoku shoshi. [National bibliographies throughout the world] 1983 69 p.
[A guide to Japanese biographies] 1985 62 p. no. 5: Zasshi shinbun shoshi kaidai. [A guide to Japanese periodicals and newspapers] 1986, 118 p. no. 10: Kagaku gijutsu bunken nyumon. [Introduction to scientific and technical information resources] 1993 p. i - v. no. 11: Sekai kakukoku no zenkoku shoshi. Kaitei zoho-ban. [National bibliographies throughout the world] 1994. 144p. no. 12: Chizu shiryo gaisetsu. [Introduction to cartographical materials] 1996 p.131-139 [Useful sites on the internet recommended by special librarians in Japan] Text in Japanese. Senmon Toshokan Kyogikai, 1997 86 p. This item for internet link sites was produced as the result of a recommendation by members of the Japan Special Libraries Association through a questionnaire. The strongest point of this book is that the sites chosen are all based on what subject specialists in Japanese libraries use often and find helpful in their daily work. However, one of the disadvantages of this item is that this is not for sale. This edition was produced as a preliminary edition for members only. However, I was told by the association that a revised edition would be appearing in their journal Senmon toshokan, no. 174 which will be published in March 1999. The contents are divided into 3 parts: 1) Osusume saito, 2) Kaiin kikan, oya kikan no saito, 3) Osusume saito besto-ten. Approximately 1000 sites are mentioned with brief annotations. It is very easy and convenient to use. Selected sites are able to be viewed as "Yakudatsu rinku"on their home page (http://www.tokyo-cci.or.jp/member/tbn0011) II) Materials for Librarianship in Japanese Studies.1) Kokuritsu Kokkai Toshokan Kenshu kyozai shiriizu. (No. 1-12)[National Diet Library: Series of teaching materials for librarianship] Text in Japanese. (A part of the series has already been mentioned in the bibliography section.) I was able to obtain the following items through Kenshu-ka of the National Diet Library. This series was compiled as teaching material for staff training in librarianship and published later by NDL. Although they are not for sale, the same series, which were published by Kinokuniya Shoten, are purchasable.
II) Text-books, Manuals etc.1) NACSIS (National Center for Science Information Systems) provided us with two days of training on NACSIS-CAT, NACSIS-ILL and NACSIS-IR including hands-on practice in their computer lab. Text in Japanese.
d) ILL shisutemu koshukai tekisuto. [ILL system textbook] 1997 113 p. e) Mokuroku shisutemu koshukai. Tekisuto toshohen. [Cataloguing system textbook] 1997 127 p. f) Mokuroku shozai joho sabisu riyo no tebiki. [Guide toUnion Catalogues] 4th ed. 1997 192 p. g) Introduction to NACSIS-IR (Videocassette) Colour recording system PAL (15 min.) Text and commentary in English.
REFERENCESOkuizumi, Eizaburo, (1998) "The Second Japan Foundation Senior Japanese Studies Librarians Workshop: Issues, Impacts and Impressions" [Prepared for the Committee on Japanese Materials AAS/CEAL Annual Meeting, Library Congress (Washington, DC, March 25, 1998)] Takagi, Toshio, (1998) "The 1998 Training Program for Senior Japanese Librarians" in East Asian Library Resources Group of Australia (EALRGA) Newsletter, no. 37, p. 6-17. |