No. 110 Journal of East Asian Libraries

              ORGANIZING FOR EAST ASIAN STUDIES IN THE UNITED STATES:
THE ORIGINS OF THE COUNCIL ON EAST ASIAN LIBRARIES,
ASSOCIATION FOR ASIAN STUDIES*
Eugene W. Wu Harvard University
The development of East Asian studies in the United States is basically a post- World War II
phenomenon. A lthough a few universitieso ffered somec ourseso n East Asia ( then referred to as the
Far East) before World War II, fXl- fledged study of East Asia, in all the disciplines in the humanities
and social sciences, did not develop until after the end of the Second World War. The war in the
Pacific, the transformation of Japan into a democracy, the communist revolution in China, and the
Korean War contributed to a heightening of the American awareness of the importance of East Asia
in a changing world, and of the need for better understanding of their histories and civilizations. The
universities, with generous foundation and government support, responded by expanding their
teaching and research programs on East Asia, and today, after fifty years, East Asian studies in the
United States is probably the largest and the most comprehensive in the Western world.
A concommitant development in this academic enterprise was the building of library resources.
Although some university libraries collected publications in the East Asian languages prior to World
War II ( Yale started in 1878, Harvard in 1879, UC- Berkeley in 1896, Cornell in 19 18, Columbia in
1920, Princeton in 1926, and Chicago in 1936), they experienced their greatest growth after 1945;
and a number of today   s major collections, such as those at Michigan, Hoover, and UCLA came into
being only in the late 1940s; and others, such as Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin, in the 1960s. At
present, some 80 libraries, the largest being the Library of Congress which began collecting Chinese
materials in 1869, are collecting publications in the Chinese, J apanesea, nd Korean languages, a nd
had, as of June 1995, a combined holding of over 12 million volumes of books, more than 156,000
periodicals, 3 350 newspapersa, nd 562,000r eels of microfilm.    Their total acquisitions expenditures
for fiscal year 1994 exceeded $ 10 million, according to the latest information available. 2
* This paper was presented August 28,1996, as part of the Special Conference     The Evolving Research Library and East
Asian Studies    held in conjunction with the 1996 IFLA meeting in Beijing, China.
1
While collection development, technical and public services are the responsibility of individual
libraries, it was felt from the very beginning that a degree of coordination and planning would be
necessary on the national level in order to promote an orderly development of East Asian libraries
in the United States ( Canada was included at a later date). This paper is an attempt to recount the
efforts that eventually led to the formation in 1967 of the Committee on East Asian Libraries ( CEAL)
of the Association for Asian Studies ( AAS) which became the de facto association of East Asian
libraries and librarians in North America.
As early as 1948 a group of scholars and librarians got together to organize an informal National
Committee on Oriental Collections in the U. S. A. and Abroad to discuss library matters of mutual
concem. 3T he problemst hey discussed-- acquisitionsc, ataloging, and training of personnel-- weret o
occupy much of the time of the various successor committees in later years. This group existed for
just one year and was replaced in 1949 by the Joint Committee on Oriental Collections, sponsored
by the Far Eastern Association ( the precursor of the Association for Asian Studies) and the American
Library Association ( ALA).    Thus an official body was established with the specific purpose of
dealing with the developmental problems of East Asian Collections in the United States. The Joint
Committee lasted for three years. Its principal accomplishment was the agreement by the Library of
Congress to reproduce for purchase unedited Chinese and Japanese catalog cards sent in by
cooperative libraries under LC   s Oriental Card Reproduction Project. The Joint Committee, for
reasons of poor attendance and the fact that the two sponsoring associations had few common
members, was abolished in 1952.5 But the recognition that any cooperative development of East
Asian libraries in the United States would be impossible without a satisfactory resolution of one of
the basic functions of a library, that of cataloging, prompted the ALA to appoint in 1954 a Special
Committee on Cataloging Oriental Materials, under its Cataloging and Classification Division. This
was a far- sighted decision because, in the early 195Os, even as LC was proceeding with its Oriental
Card Reproduction Project, there was no national standard for cataloging Chinese, Japanese, or
Korean materials. Every library was using its own format and following its own rules. Indeed, there
was even disagreement on such basic matters as the choice of main entry. The Special Committee
went about its work systematically, but since it spent most of its time on materials in the East Asian
languagesi, t droppedr esponsibiity for materialso ther then East Asian and was renamedi n 1957 the
Special Committee on Far Eastern Materials; in the following year, because of the importance of its
work, it was made a standing committee of the ALA under the name Far Eastern Materials
Committee. 6 Members of this committee were mostly heads of major East Asian libraries who had
cataloging experience. A parallel body, the Oriental Processing Committee, which had been in
existencea t the Library of Congresss ince 1953, worked closely with the ALA Committee to amend
the ALA Cataloging Rulesfor Author and Title Entries and the Rulesfor Descriptive Cataloging in
the Library of Congress, which together comprised at that time the American national standards for
cataloging, so that they could be more effectively applied to East Asian materials.    The two
committees worked through the ALA Rules and the LC RuZes in the most meticulous fashion, and
amended every rule that had implications for cataloging East Asian materials. Four years    continuous
work, from 1954 to 1958, involving an extremely voluminous correspondence between the two
committees and a number of compromises and adjustments, saw the completion of a major series of
amendments to the two sets of rules, which were then approved by both the ALA and LC and
2
adopted as national standards; and they remain so to this day, with modifications as incorporated in
the Anglo- American Cataloging Rules II ( AACRI . Shortly afterwards, the Far Eastern Materials
Committee and the Library of Congress also issued a     Manual of Romanization, Capitalization,
Punctuation, and Word Division for Chinese, J apanesea, nd Korean    which has since serveda s the
guide in catalogingE ast Asian materials. This developmenits a milestone in the history of East Asian
libraries in the United States and Canada, for the adoption of the amendments made possible for the
first time a cataloging standard which facilitated the exchange of bibliographical records and solved
a basic problem that had until that time inhibited the cooperative development of East Asian libraries.
With this task accomplishedE, ast Asian librariest urned their attention to the other pressingp roblems
of national resource development and bibliographical control. In 1958 the Association for Asian
Studies, at the urging of East Asian libraries, established the Committee on American Library
Resources on the Far East ( CALRFE).* CALRFE developed a list of desiderata that included the
compilation of a union list of East Asian language serials, a union list of East Asian series, a national
union catalog of East Asian books, and a series of priorities for the microfilming of Western and
Chinese language newspapers and Chinese and Korean archival materials. The proposal was
submitted to foundations and the U. S. Department of Education for funding, but it was unsuccessful
because of the size of the request, estimated at $ 200,000.    However, more modest funding was
received from other sources for some other projects. The Joint Committee on China, of the American
Council of Learned Societies and the Social Science Research Council, provided funds for the
cooperative acquisition of more than 1000 reels of microfilm, containing 100 Chinese national and
local newspapers, 200 periodical titles, and over one million newspaper clippings which had been
prepared by the Union Research Institute in Hong Kong, all from 1949. The microfilms were
deposited at the Center for Research Libraries ( CRL), the     libraries    library    in Chicago, and have
since been available on loan to CRL member libraries free of charge.    Funds were also received from
the National ScienceF oundationt o support the compilation and publication of ChineseP eriodicals,
International Holdings, 1949- 1960, and the researching and publication of Publishing in China.   
The National ScienceF oundation also supported the Union Card File of Oriental Vernacular Serials
Project at the Library of Congress, which was a union list of the holdings of 20 major East Asian
libraries in the United States.    Microfilm and photocopies of this list, in the form of the contributing
libraries    holding cards, were made available for purchase.
In 1963 CALRFE developed a proposal to establish a Chinese Materials and Research Aids Service
Center in Taipei, under AAS auspices, for the purpose of coordinating and reprinting out- of- print
editions of titles needed by American libraries. With AAS approval and with initial grants from it,
as well as from the American Council of Learned Societies and the Council on Library Resources,
the Taipei Center was set up and began operation in the fall of 1964. i3 Since then the Taipei Center,
now independenth, ass ucceededin filling a numbero f gapso n many library shelvesa round the world.
CALRFE also paid attention to personnel needs. Professor T. H. Tsien, then of the Graduate Library
School and Curator of the Far Eastern Library at the University of Chicago, undertook a survey of
this problem, and made a report in 1964 under the title     Present Status and Personnel Needs of Far
3
Eastern Collections in America    for CALRFE. He made two recommendations: establishing     a joint
program for Far Eastern librarianship between the library school and the Far Eastern language
department in each of a number of selected universities,    and establishing short- term summer
institutes for     Far Eastern personnel to supplement the long- term special program for advanced
degrees.    i4 The second was easier to implement, as evidenced by the three summer institutes that
have been held since then: one at the University of Wisconsin and another at the University of
Chicago, both in 1969 ( the latter was sponsored by CALRFE), and one at the University of
Washington in 1988. All three were funded by the U. S. Department ofEducation. The joint program
proposal, although endorsed by the AAS, proved much more difficult to carry out, as it would have
necessitateda n adjustmenti n the courser equirementsf or advancedd egreesa t most universities, and
those requirements were not easily amenable to change. The recruitment of a qualified faculty was
also not easy. The University of Chicago was probably the only university where a Joint Program on
Far EasternL ibrarianshipw as successfullyin troduced to its GraduateL ibrary School in cooperation
with its Department of Far Eastern Languages and Civilizations. From 1963 to 1981, over forty
students were graduated with a master   s or a doctoral degree under such a program, in addition to
a few with an advanced certificate.   
Prof. Tsien also began compiling, in 1957, an extremely useful survey of the growth of East Asian
collections in the United States and Canada since 1930, with analysis. The survey, which was later
repeated at 5- year intervals, contained information on libraries    holdings, current status of
acquisitions, a nd sourceso f financial support. The 1974/ 1975 survey was his last effort; the survey
for 1979/ 1980 was compiled by the CEAL Task Force on Library Resources and Access. r6 It has,
since 1987/ 1988, been continued by a simplified annual statistical compilation, also conducted by
CEAL. The compilation contains the same categories of information as collected by the earlier
surveys, b ut without analysis. I t hasb eena ppearinge achy ear in the February issue of CEAL Bulletin
( renamed Journal of East Asian Libraries with no. 107, Oct. 1995).
Another CALRFE concern was liaison with foreign libraries. In 1966 it initiated a library panel at the
27th Congress of International Orientalists to be held in Ann Arbor, Michigan, that year. Panelists
from a dozen countries were invited, with funds provided by the Council on Library Resources, to
present papers on the theme     Library Resources in Asian Studies.       The panel, the first of its kind
in the history of the Congressw, as a success. I t was at this meetingt hat the International Association
of Orientalist Librarians was established. The precedent having been set, similar library panels were
held at the later meetings of the Congress.
Notwithstanding its accomplishments, CALRFE for almost a decade operated without a charter
setting forth its functions, membership requirements, or voting procedures. The committee was run
almost singlehandedly by a chairperson, appointed by the board of directors of the Association for
Asian Studies, who also was responsible for putting out a newsletter. However, as the number of
librariesg rew, particularly in the 196Os, it was agreedt hat a more formal organization was needed.
In 1963 CALRFE was reorganized with an executive group of seven members, appointed by the
Association for Asian Studies, and a general committee of unspecified membership in addition to the
chairperson.   * But matters such as the nature of membership ( institutional vs. individual) and voting
4
procedures remained to be clarified.
The new Executive Group deliberated on these matters at length, and proposed in 1967 a set of
Procedures which was adopted at CALRFE   s annual meeting held in Chicago that year. lg It was at
this time that the name of the organization was changed from Committee on American Library
Resources on the Far East ( CALRFE) to Committee on East Asian Libraries ( CEAL) of the
Association for Asian Studies. The Procedures set forth the objectives of CEAL as follows:
( 1) to serve as a faculty- librarian   s forum for a discussion of problems
of common concern and to recommend programs for the improvement
of library facilities; ( 2) to promote the development of library
resourcesa nd bibliographicalc ontrols; a nd ( 3) to improve inter- library
and international cooperation and services.
Membership would be open to     institutions in America with library collections on East Asia and to
members of the Association for Asian Studies.    Under this two- tier membership, each institution
would be represented by one person with one vote on projects involving institutional cooperation.
Individual members would be     eligible to participate in all deliberations of the committee, and to be
nominated and appointed to the Executive Group and subcommittees,    but could vote only on
matters other than those requiring institutional approval, which right was reserved for institutional
members. The subcommitteesw ould be appointedb y the chairperson    for permanentp rojects or for
temporary assignments    to     investigate specific problems as assigned and present findings and
recommendations to the Executive Group for consideration and action.    The term of office of the
chairperson, members of the Executive Group ( three faculty members and six librarians), and the
subcommittees was fixed at not more than three years, with the stipulation that one- third of the
Executive Group membership would be replaced each year, and that     no chairperson or member of
the ExecutiveG roup may succeedh imselfb ut he may be re- elected after a period of three years,    but
the immediate past chairperson     shall serve ex officio in the Executive Group for one year.   
Members of subcommittees, however,     may be reappointed to serve more than one term, if
necessary,    and the chairperson of the Executive Group     shall serve as an ex ofJicio member on all
subcommittees.    With the exception of the subcommittee members, who were to be appointed by
the chairperson, all others-- the chairperson and members of the Executive Group-- would be
appointed by the board of directors of the Association for Asian Studies.
It is important to note that the objectives of CEAL, as stated in the Procedures, were exactly those
which had guided the work of CALRFE, but were now officially pronounced in a written document.
The Procedures also clarified the question of membership, fixed the terms of office of officers, and
institutionalizedt he subcommittees. 2I0t was a clearo utline of how CEAL should conduct its business
as a professionaol rganization. It was realized at the time, however, that the Procedures should not
remain static, a nd that revisions would be necessaryfr om time to time in order to keep it up to date
to meet CEAL   s needs. That is what happened in the following years. A series of revisions and
amendmentsw ere adobtedi n 1976,1980,1984,199 1, and 1994, of which the 1980 amendmentsa re
of the utmost importance. 21 The most significant provision in the 1980 revision was the change of
5
method in selecting the CEAL chairperson, members of the Executive Group, and the chairpersons
of subcommittees. Up to that time, the CEAL chairperson was elected by the Executive Group from
among its own members, who were appointed by the board of directors of the Association for Asian
Studies, a nd the chairpersonso f the subcommitteesw ere in turn appointed by the CEAL chairperson.
This method of selection was not satisfactory to the increasingly large CEAL membership, who
wanted a change. A Subcommittee on Procedures was appointed in 1979 to study the problem and
conduct a full- scale review of the existing Procedures. Following a full year   s work examining
various options, the Subcommittee recommended that the CEAL and subcommittee chairs and the
librarian members of the Executive Group be popularly elected by the membership ( the faculty
members of the Executive Group would continue to be nomianted by the China and Inner Asia
Council and the Northeast Asia Council of the AAS from among their own members, and to be
appointed by the board of directors of AAS), that the category of institutional membership be
abolished, and that any AAS member might become a CEAL member by subscribing to the CEAL
Bulletin, with the option of not becoming one ifthe person so desired. A subscriber who had elected
to join CEAL would be considered a CEAL member in good standing and with voting rights. The
adoption of these revisions, which transformed CEAI fi- om an appointive to an elective organization,
marked another milestone in the history of CEAL. And elections have been held to this day, making
possiblea much wider participationi n the managemenot f CEAL affairs by librarians from East Asian
libraries of all sizes and from all parts of North America.
CEAL hass inceh ad a long list of accomplishmentsb, u t that is not the focus of this paper. However,
a few highlights may be mentioned here. Some of these were under direct CEAL auspices, and some
were facilitated and supported by CEAL with the active participation of its members. The CEAL
Subcommitteeo n TechnicalP rocessingh asb eenw orking closely, s iice even before CEAL days, with
the Library of Congress on problems of cataloging East Asian materials. The 1958 amendments to
the ALA Rules and LC Rules, as mentioned earlier in this paper, made the rules more applicable to
East Asian publications. However, minor problems remain, and the adoption of on- line cataloging
usingt he MARC format hasp resentedn ew problemst hat must also be dealt with. The Subcommittee
and the Library of Congress have devoted a great deal of time to addressing these problems, with
benefit to the entire East Asian library community. This cooperative work is continuing. The
Subcommittee also compiled and in 1983 published the AACR II Workbook for East Asian
Publications, which contains all the rules, selected from AACR II, which are relevant to cataloging
East Asian materials. In 1987 it issued a List of Library of Congress Subject Headings Related to
Japan, and in 1989 a List of Libray of Congress Subject Headings ReZated to China, and Library
of C0ngre. wS ubjectH eadingsR eZatedto Korea and East Asia in General. These publications have
provent o be very handyr eferencesw, hose usefulnessw ill endure for many years to come. Another
service CEAL provides, which has served as an excellent medium of communication among East
Asian libraries and librarians and has made a unique contribution to East Asian librarianship in North
America, is the publication of the CEAL Bulletin. 22 This publication was begun in 1963 by Edwin
G. Beal, Jr., formerly heado f the JapaneseS ection and later head of the Chinesea nd Korean Section
of the Orientalia Division of the Library of Congress, as the Committee on American Library
Resourceso n the FarEast ( CALRFE) Newsletter, when Dr. Beal was the chairpersono f CALRFE.
The Newsletter reported on ongoing CALRFE projects and activities at individual libraries and in the
6
East Asian library community at large, and was, in the early years, compiled and distributed by
whoever was the chairperson at the time. When CAIRFE became CEAL in 1967, the name of the
Newsletter was changed to Committee on E& t Asian Libraries Newsletter accordingly. The increase
in copy for each issue, with the addition of articles to reports on activities, prompted CEAL in 1976
to appoint a Subcommittee on Publications to be responsible for the editing and distribution of the
publication, and the name was changed to Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin ( C& IL
Bulletin). Again, when CEAL was renamed the Council on East Asian Libraries in 1995, the
publication adopted a new name Journal of hst Asian Libraries, but continued with the numbering
system, as no. 107. The history of the publication reflects the growth of East Asian libraries in North
America, and its importance will undoubtedly grow as the field develops further.
As the national organization of East Asian libraries and librarians, CEAL has been consulted by other
organizations on a range of problems concerning East Asian library matters. In 1975 officers of
CEAL met with representatives of the Ford Foundation to discuss possible support of East Asian
libraries, and submitted a statement on the     Priorities for the Development and Funding of Library
Programs in Support of East Asian Studies.    23 Following that, in the same year, the American
Council of Learned Societies ( ACLS) appointed the Steering Committee for a Study of the Problems
of East Asian Libraries, composedo f scholarsl, i brarians, a ndu niversity offrcials. 24 Warren Tsuneishi
( then Chief Orientalia Division, Library of Congress) and Eugene Wu ( Librarian, Harvard- Yenching
Library, Harvard University) were the two CEAL members invited to join the Steering Committee.
As a guide to its work, the Steering Committee commissioned a series of papers, a number of them
written by members of CEAL, including Karl Lo, ( then at the University of Washington), T. H. Tsien
( then at the University of Chicago), Warren Tsuneishi, Weiying Wan ( University of Michigan),
Raymond Tang ( then at the University of California, Berkeley), Eugene Wu, Thomas Kuo ( then at
the University of Pittsburgh), Thomas Lee ( then at the University of Wisconsin) and Richard Howard
( then at the Library of Congress) The Steering Committee made a report in 1977 on     East Asian
Libraries: Problems and Prospects    with recommendations for bibliographical control, collection
development and access, and technical and personnel matters.     The report attracted significant
attention in library and academic circles. In the following year the American Council of Learned
Societies, together with the Social Science Research Council and the Association of Research
Libraries, co- sponsored the Joint Advisory Committee to the East Asian Library Program in order
to continue the work begun by the Steering Committee. Two CEAL members were again invited to
join this new committee: Hideo Kaneko ( Curator, East Asian Collection, Yale University) and Eugene
Wu. It was the work of this Committee that led to online cataloging in East Asian libraries at a later
date. In its report on     Automation, Cooperation, and Scholarship: East Asian Libraries in the
1980    s,    the Joint Advisory committee stated that     after a decade of unprecedented growth along a
course linked primarily to foreign area studies programs rather than to the development of research
libraries in general. . . East Asian libraries were at a crossroad.    26 With the lessening of federal and
foundation funding, they ought to embark upon a new course of sharing work, materials, and access,
and of relying     on automation as a principal planning and management tool.    The keystone to this,
according to the report,     is the capability to input, manage, store, transmit, display and output
bibliographic records- containing East Asian vernacular characters in exactly the same automated
systems already created to perform similar fimctions for Western language material and general
7
- ,. : .- 
researchli braries.    n This basic reorientation of the course of developmento f East Asian libraries in
North America, as advocatedin the report, would tindamentally changet he way East Asian libraries
operate, but it was welcomed by all concerned.
The immediate result of the Joint Advisory Committee   s recommendation was the decision by the
ResearchL ibraries Group ( RLG) to introduce in 1983, with foundation support, the CJK ( Chinese,
Japanese, K orean) enhancementsto the ResearchL ibraries Information Network ( RLIN), RLG   s
operating arm. This move made possible for the first time the creation of cataloging records at one
library which could then be copied by other libraries and also viewed by researchersa nywhere. 28I n
1986 the Online Computer Library Center ( OCLC) also established a CJK program, a similar
bibliographicu tility for catalogingC hinese, J apanesea, ndK orean materials online. These are the two
systemsin uset oday ( 40 libraries use RLIN; 47 libraries use OCLC). As of March 1996, the RLIN
CJK database contains 1,460,574 unique records; and, as of April 1996, the OCLC CJK database
contains1 ,042,283r ecords. 29T here is a CJK records exchangea greementb etween the two, and the
records are accessible on the Internet with the appropriate RLIN CJK or OCLC CJK softwares.
Another project in which CEAL was actively involved was the establishment by the Center for
ResearchL ibraries ( CRL) of an Expanded East Asian Acquisitions Program in 1980. The program
was recommendedb y CRL   s East Asian Subcommitteeo f the International Studies Committee; two
of its members were CEAL members, Warren Tsuneishi and Eugene Wu. The purpose of the
program was to acquire, with a substantial Ford Foundation grant, research materials that would
supplementh e holdingso f the major East Asian collections in the United States. An advisory panel
was appointed to implement the program; the eight panel members were all members of CEAL.
Still another project to which CEAL lent its support was the founding of the Center for Chinese
Research Materials ( CCRM) in 1968 under the auspices of the Association of Research Libraries
( ARL) with a Ford Foundation grant. The establishment of CCRM was the principal
recommendationin a report madeb y Eugene Wu in 1965 for the Joint Committee on Contemporary
China, of the American Council of Learned Societies and the Social Science Research Council,
following his world- wide surveyo f the availabilityo f researchm aterials on contemporary China. The
purposeo f the Centerw as to identify, assemblea, nd distribute important researchm aterials on 20th-century
China, which were either unavailable or available in a few American libraries. This not- for-profit
enterprise, n ow independentlyin corporated, w as generously supported by foundations and the
National Endowment for the Humanities ( NEH), and has been singularly responsible for making
available to libraries world- wide a great quantity of rare and difficult- to- obtain publications during
the last twenty- eight years. Many CEAL members have served on CCRM   s Advisory Board; and its
current board members are all CEAL members.
A more recent development in which CEAL was directly involved was the Foreign Acquisitions
Project of the Association of Research Libraries ( ARL). This was an effort to assess the current
strengths and weaknesses of the major research libraries    foreign acquisitions, to determine their
needs and priorities, and to offer concrete action proposals to address the identified problems. In
1992 the ARL asked CEAL to participate in the project, with the specific request that CEAL present
8
a report eacho n Chinesea nd Japanesem aterials. Two Task Forcesw ere appointed by CEAL for this
purpose. The task force on China was chaired by Tai- loi Ma ( University of Chicago), and the one
on Japan by Yasuko Matsudo ( University of Michigan). Their reports, together with a state- of- the-field
survey, titled     East Asian Collections,    by the CEAL Executive Croup ( Maureen Donovan,
Chair), were submitted to ARL and subsequently published in the Ceal Bulletin and in APL   s final
report on its Foreign Acquisitions Project. 30
These highlights illustrate the vibrant nature of CEAL as a professional organization. During the
almost halfa century since an informal group of interested parties got together to discuss East Asian
library problems in 1948, East Asian libraries in North America have developed by leaps and bounds.
In this development CEAL has played a pivotal role as a catalyst in national planning and
coordination. As already mentioned in this paper, it has worked successfully on national standards,
and encouraged and supported national and regional cooperative projects, training institutes, and
resource sharing programs ( the printed catalogs of the East Asian libraries at the University of
California at Berkeley, University of Chicago, Cornell, Harvard- Yenching Library, Hoover Institute,
University ofMichigan, and the Library of Congress, as well as the current online catalogs of all the
libraries, serve quite adequately as a national union catalog for this purpose). It has contributed to
scholarshipb y the panelsi t organized at the annual meetings of the Association for Asian Studies to
bring librarians, scholars, and information specialists together to discuss matters of mutual concern
and it also has been the organization to which others have turned for expert advice on problems
concerning East Asian library issues. In short, as the only professional organization of East Asian
libraries and librarians in North America, CEAL has played, and will continue to play, a crucial role
in the development ofEast Asian studies in the United States and Canada. The fact that East Asian
libraries no longer find themselves in a backwater, but in the mainstream of North American library
developmenits the result not only of the indefatigablew ork of the libraries and librarians themselves,
but, equally important, also of the existence of a national organization through which national
planning and interlibrary cooperation can be effected through voluntary efforts.
APPENDIX
Chairpersons of the Council on East Asian Libraries and its predecessor committees:
1948- 1949
1949- 1952
1954- 1956
1957
1958- 1970
1958- 1967
1967- 1995
National Committee on Oriental Collections in the U. S. A. and Abroad
Charles H. Brown ( University of Iowa)
Joint Committee of the Far Eastern Association and the American Library Association
on Oriental Collections
Charles H. Brown ( University of Iowa)
Special Committee on Cataloging Oriental Materials, American Library Association
Maud L. Moseley ( University of Washington)
G. Raymond Nunn ( University of Michigan)
Special Committee on Far Eastern Materials, American Library Association
G. Raymond Nunn ( University of Michigan)
Committee on Far Eastern Materials, American Library Association
Charles E. Hamilton ( University of California, Berkeley)
Committee on American Library Resources on the Far East, Association for Asian
Studies
G. Raymond Nunn ( University of Michigan), 1958- 1963
Edwin G. Beal, Jr. ( Library of Congress), 1963- 1966
Tsuen- Hsuin Tsien ( University of Chicago), 1966- 1967
Committee on East Asian Libraries, Association for Asian Studies
Tsuen- Hsuin Tsien ( University of Chicago), 1967- 1968
Yukihisa Suzuki ( University of Michigan), 1968- 1969
Weiying Wan ( University of Michigan), 1970- 197 1
Raymond N. Tang ( University of California, Berkeley), 1971- 1972
. Shih- kang Tung ( Princeton University), 1973- 1974
Thomas C. Kuo ( University of Pittsburgh), 1974- 1976
.
10
Eugene W. Wu ( Harvard University), 1976- 1979
Hideo Kaneko ( Yale University), 1979- 1982
Richard C. Howard ( Library of Congress), 1982- 1985
Karl Lo ( University of Washington), 1985- 1988
Thomas H. Lee ( Indiana University), 1988- 199 1
Maureen Donovan ( Ohio State University), 199 l- 1994
Kenneth Klein ( University of Southern California), 1994- l 995
1995- Council on East Asian Libraries, Association for Asian Studies
Kenneth Klein ( University of Southern California), 1995- 1997
Tai- loi Ma ( University of Chicago), 1997- 2000
NOTES
1.     Current Status of East Asian Collections in American Libraries, 1994/ 1995,    Journal of East
Asian Libraries, no. 108 ( Feb. 1996), pp. 38- 47.
2. Ibid., p. A45. The figure does not include expenditures by the Library of Congress, which
were not reported.
3. Elizabeth Huff,     The National Committee on Oriental Collections, 1948- 1952,    Library
Resources on East Asia: Reports and Working Papers for the Tenth Annual Meeting of the
Committee on American Library Resources on the Far East, Association for Asian Studies, Inc.,
at the Palmer House, Chicago, March 21, 1967 ( Zug, Switzerland: Inter Documentation
Company AG, 1968), pp. 16- 17. Also, Edwin G. Beal, Jr.,     The Committee on East Asian
Libraries: A Brief History,    Committee on East Asian Libraries Newsletter, no. 41 ( Sept. 1973),
Appendix I, pp. 42- 43.
4. Huff, op. cit. p. 42.
5. Ibid.
6. G. Raymond NUM,     Development of Cooperative Cataloging and Resources for East Asian
Collections, 1954- 1963,    Library Resources on East Asia: Reports and Working Papersfor the
Tenth AnnuaZMeetin  of the Committee on American Library Resources on the Far East. . ., p.
18. Dr. NUM, then head of the Asia Library, University of Michigan, was appointed chair of the
11
committee; he was succeeded by Charles E. Hamilton of the East Asiatic Library ( now East Asian
Library) of the University of California in Berkeley.
7. Edwin G. Beal, Jr.,     Discussion of Tsuen- Hsuin Tsien   s paper,     East Asian Collections in
America,    in Tsuen- Hsuin Tsien and Howard W. Winger, ed., Area Studies and the Library, The
Thirtieth Annual Conference of the Graduate Library School, May 2- 22, 196.5 ( Chicago &
London: The University of Chicago Press, 1965), pp. 75- 76.
8. NUM, op. cit., p. 19, Beal,     The Committee on East Asian Libraries: A Brief History,    p. 46.
9. Nunn, op. cit., pp. 19- 20.
10. Tsuen- Hsuin Tsien,     East Asian Collections in America,    pp. 65- 66.
11. Nunn, op. cit., p. 20.
12. Beal,     A Brief History,    p. 47.
13. Ibid Also, Committee on American Library Resources on the Far East Newsletter, no. 6
( Sept. 1964), p. 4.
14. Beal,     A Brief History,    p. 47.
15. Tsuen- hsuin Tsien,     Education for Far Eastern Librarianship,    International Co- operation in
Oriental Librarianship ( Canberra: National Library of Australia, 1972), pp. 108- l 15.
16. The first survey was published in the Library Quarterly vol. 32, no. 1 ( Jan. 1959); this was
updated in vol. 35, no. 4 ( Oct. 1965), and subsequently in the Committee on East Asian Libraries
Newsletter no. 16 ( Oct. 1966); 22 ( Dec. 1967); 29 ( May 1969); 33 ( Dec. 1970); 41 ( Sept. 1973);
and 48 ( Mar. 1976). The last, for 1974/ 1975, was also published as a separate volume titled
Current Status of East Asian Collections in American Libraries 1974/ 1975 ( Washington, D. C.:
Center for Chinese Research Materials, Association of Research Libraries, 1976), with an
appendix which includes, among other things,     Rarities and Specialities of East Asian Materials in
American Libraries,    and     Publications by or About East Asian Collections in American
Libraries.    A simplified version appeared, under the same title, also with a listing of     rarities and
specialities,    in the Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 36, no. 3 ( May 1977), pp. 499- 5 14.
For three other useful guides to East Asian libraries, see Teresa S. Yang, Thomas C. Kuo, and
Frank J. Shulman, East Asian Resources in American Libraries ( New York: Paragon Book
Gallery, 1977); Naomi Fukuda, Survey of Japanese Collections in the United States, 1979- 1980
( Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, the University of Michigan, 1980); and Thomas H. Lee,
A Guide to East Asian Collections in North America ( New York: Greenwood Press, 1992).
17. Beal,     A Brief History,    p. 48.
12
18. Tsuen- Hsuin Tsien,     Report of CALRFE Programs and Activities for 1966- 1967,    Library
Resources on East Asia: Reports and Working Papers for the Tenth Annual Meeting of the
Committee on American Library Resources on the Far East. . ., p. 28.
19. For the full text of the Procedures, see Committee on East Asian Libraries Newsletter, no.
40 ( June 1973), pp, 35- 37, reprinted in no. 49 ( Mar. 1976), pp. 53- 54.
20. CEAL has since then established a number of subcommittees and task forces that existed for
various lengths of time. When the Committee on East Asian Libraries was renamed the Council
on East Asian Libraries in 1995, the designation of     subcommittee    was replaced by that of
    committee.    At present, there are seven standing committees: Committee on Chinese Materials;
Committee on JapaneseM aterials; Committee on Korean Materials; Committee on Technical
Processing; Committee on Library Technology; Committee on Public Services; and Committee on
Publications.
21. The fit11t ext of the Procedures, as amendedi n 1984, is reproduced in Committee on East
Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 74( June 1984), pp. 81- 83. A report on the discussion of the revised
Procedures at the 1980 CEAL Plenary Session held in Washington, D. C. before its adoption, is
available in the Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 82 ( June 1980), p. 3.
22. See Edward Martinique,     A Short History of the Committee on East Asian Libraries
Bulletin,    Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 101 ( Dec. 1993), pp. vii- viii. Mr.
Martinique was the editor of the Bulletin from 1987 to 1996.
23. Committee on East Asian Libraries Newsletter, no. 48 ( Nov. 1975), p. 3.
24. Ibid.
25. East Asian Libraries: Problems and Prospects, A Report and Recommendations, prepared
by the Steering Committee for a Study of the Problems of East Asian Libraries ( Washington,
D. C.: The American Council of Learned Societies, 1977).
26. Automation, Cooperation and Scholarship: East Asian Libraries in the 1980    s, Final Report
of the Joint Advisory Committee to the East Asian Library Program ( Washington, D. C.: The
American Council of Learned Societies, 1977).
27. Ibid For a detailed description of the work of the two committees see Hideo Kaneko,
    RLIN CJK: A Historical Perspective,    Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 101
( Dec. 1993), pp. 37- 42.
28. See also Hideo Kaneko,     RLIN CJK and the East Asian Library Community,    Information
Technology a& Libraries v. 12, no. 4 ( Dec. 1993), pp. 423- 426.
29. Information from   RLIN and OCLC. It is expectedt hat the size of theset wo databasesw ill
increase rapidly in the next few years as a number of larger libraries complete their retrospective
13
conversion work.
30. For the     Report of the Task Force for ARL Foreign Acquisitions Project for Japanese
Materials,    see Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 99 ( June 1993), pp. 97- 127; for
the     ARL Foreign Acquisitions Project Report on Chinese Materials,    see Committee on East
Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 104 ( Oct. 1994), pp. 101- l 18. The report by the CEAL Executive
Group was published in Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 100 ( Oct. 1993), pp.
88- 100. For the ARL report, see Jutta Reed- Scott, Scholarship, Research Libraries and Global
PubZishing ( Washington, D. C.: Association of Research Libraries, 1996).
Yoon- whan Choe of the East Asian Library, University of Washington, wrote another paper,
independent of the ARL project, titled     The Condition of the Korean Collections in U. S.
Libraries,    which was published in Committee on East Asian Libraries Bulletin, no. 99 ( June
1993), pp. 32- 54. Ms. Choe   s paper is also included in Reed- Scott   s ARL report.
14