Dr. Kristina Troost, Duke University Library’s own Japanese studies librarian and the head of its East Asian Collections, is the inaugural recipient of the Council of East Asian Libraries (CEAL) Distinguished Service Award. This prestigious award honors an individual who has made significant contributions to East Asian libraries/East Asian Studies and to CEAL. Please see the official announcement: https://www.eastasianlib.org/newsite/kristina-troost-is-inaugural-ceal-distinguished-service-award-recipient/
Duke University Library’s collection of materials on East Asia began with a gift from James A. Thomas in the late 1920s. In the 1930s, when Duke faculty first started teaching courses on East Asia , the library systematically began to build an East Asian collection in English only. The postwar growth of area studies served as the initial impetus for acquiring materials in Japanese and Chinese languages. In 1981, the Asian/Pacific Studies Institute (APSI) was founded at Duke, and new faculty were hired to teach additional courses on the region. To meet the growing needs of APSI faculty and students, Dr. Kristina Troost was hired in 1990, first as Japanese studies bibliographer, and then, in 1992, as the East Asian librarian responsible for building collections in Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. In 1996, Dr. Troost invited an external consultant to review the Chinese collection, which resulted in the hiring of the first full-time Chinese studies librarian at Duke in 2000. Duke’s Korean studies program expanded as well, and in 2006, Dr. Troost invited an external review of the Korean collection, as a result of which Duke hired its first Korean studies librarian in 2007. Under Dr. Troost’s leadership, Duke‘s East Asian collection has grown rapidly. Today, Duke University Library’s East Asian Collection is one of the major East Asian Collections in North America.
The Hong Kong publishing market may be smaller than that of mainland China or Taiwan, but its annual book fair— which is organized by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council and held every summer at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center—is definitely a must-see travel destination. And not just for the East Asian library specialist. Book lovers of any subject can find something of interest at this yearly event.
I first started attending the Hong Kong book fair out of a sense of professional necessity. For several years, political events in Hong Kong had been having serious repercussions on the book trade (and, thereby, on Duke University Libraries’ acquisitions of Chinese books published in Hong Kong). Following the 2014 “Umbrella Movement” – so named because the protesters who occupied the city for 79 days while calling for electoral reform had used umbrellas to protect themselves from the pepper spray employed against them by the police – it became increasingly more difficult for bookstores to conduct business as usual. In 2015, one of the Hong Kong-based book vendors with whom Duke Libraries had worked for a long time was forced to close its doors. Later that same year came the shocking news of the disappearance of the manager of Causeway Bay Books, an upstairs bookstore in Hong Kong that is famous for selling works on topics considered politically-sensitive (and therefore banned) in mainland China. It was later confirmed that the manager, along with four other staff members from the same bookstore, were being held in police custody in Guangdong, China. The Library has another book vendor in Hong Kong, but after evaluating their catalogs for one year, I was concerned that many books that we would have liked to purchase for our Chinese collection were not included in their list of offerings. I felt that I needed to be on the ground in order to see how I could rectify the situation.
Selected books acquired from the fair on display on top of EAC microfilm cabinet East Asian Collection, second floor of Bostock Library
During my first visit to the Hong Kong book fair, in 2017, I made contact with publishers with whom I was barely familiar or did not know at all and asked for their catalogs. It was mostly a study trip and I purchased only a small number of books. I also visited a few upstairs or “second floor” bookstores: smaller shops, packed with shelf-after-shelf of books, from floor to ceiling, and usually located on the second or third floor of a building, where the rent is much cheaper.
In 2018, I visited the fair in the company of the Assistant Fung Ping Shan Library Librarian for Collections of the University of Hong Kong Libraries (UHKL), who attends the Hong Kong book fair every year and regularly acquires books there. With the guidance of this local expert, I gained more knowledge about the publishers and vendors at the fair. I also learned that for many independent and/or small publishers, the fair is the most important place to distribute their books, which are often printed in small numbers and difficult to acquire outside the fair.
My latest trip to the Hong Kong book fair occurred in the summer of 2019. That year’s event was especially festive because it marked the 30th anniversary of the Hong Kong book fair. The theme of this fair was “Sci-Fi and Mystery”, but the tagline “Reading the World” http://hkbookfair.hktdc.com/tc/About-Book-Fair/Previous-Fair/Theme-Of-The-Year.html, pointed to more global aspirations. There were a total of 686 exhibitors and close to one million visitors. Besides the usual plethora of seminars by local and international authors and scholars, the fair had its own Art Gallery, which exhibited photos from the archives of past fairs. Other highlights included the distribution of limited-edition bookmarks created for Hong Kong author Xi Xi’s The Teddy Bear Chronicles; and photographs of Louis Cha, one of the giants of martial arts literature, visiting the Book Fair. I managed to purchase a good number of books (that we would never have acquired otherwise) at the fair. I also visited a mini fair organized by several independent bookstores outside the grounds of the convention center, and held on two floors of an old, narrow building in Wai Chai, Hong Kong. The building’s small and shaky elevator could only take about three to four people up at a time. There was a good number of people at each of the two floors and payment was by cash only. And yet, the sense of being at an exclusive book store, one not frequented by many Chinese booklovers, much less other US-based East Asian library specialists, was priceless.
An Indie Bookstore Poster
To get some sense of the variety of books purchased at the 2019 Hong Kong book fair, check out selected items on display on top of the microfilm cabinet at the East Asian Collection on the second floor of Bostock library. As the brief annotations written by me and two of my Chinese-speaking student assistants show, these books encompass numerous topics, themes, and media. This sample display demonstrates the vibrancy of the Hong Kong book market and the value of collecting materials from this part of the world.
Hundred Year of Colonial Impressions
A Hundred Years of Colonial Impressions by Otto C.C. Lam. 300 black and white photographs documenting Hong Kong from 1860 to 1960 in 13 chapters. The baby on the cover is Ian Kreft, 18 months old, at Southampton, England, waiting for the ship to take him and his mother to Hong Kong to reunite with his father, who served at Royal Engineers.
Umbrella Movement
Umbrella Chronicle by Simon Chow: 248 black and white drawings documenting and chronologizing incidents in the “Umbrella Movement.”
Wakened by 1989 Tiananmen Square Incident
Awakened by 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests by Liu Ruishao. As a witness of June 4th Incident and a Hong Kong citizen in the face of impending pressure from the Mainland, the author shares his immersive experience of the turning point in Modern China’s history. This book offers an opportunity to look into the dynamics of democratic movement and political struggles across 30 years in Greater China from Hong Kong’s perspective.”
No Trump No New China (US-China) Trade WarXi Dada
Dark Soy Sauce China by Zunzi. Bo Yang a Chinese historian and poet, describes Chinese culture as a “soy sauce vat”—in contrast to the organic fluidity of a river, with thousands of years of precipitation, China, and especially Chinese politics, has become as dark and stinky as a soy sauce vat. The book’s author, Zun Zi, one of the most famous comic artists in Hong Kong, ironically names his two newly published comic books as Dark Soy Sauce China and Soy Sauce Hong Kong to unveil the genealogy of Chinese politics.
Katie Odhner was an intern in the International and Area Studies Department in the Duke Libraries. She has a B.A. in Chinese Studies and History from the University of Pennsylvania. She recently graduated from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill with a Master’s of Science in Library Science. The following post is written by her.
Over the course of this summer, I have been working with Luo Zhou, Duke’s Chinese Studies Librarian, and Will Shaw, our Digital Humanities Consultant, to create on a website showcasing the Memory Project digital collection, which went up on the Duke Digital Repository in July. Launched in 2010 by documentary filmmaker Wu Wenguang, the ongoing project has collected hundreds of oral history interviews from elderly Chinese villagers. The initiative was originally intended to document individual stories of the Great Famine, which caused the death of 20 to 43 million people between 1958 and 1961. It has since expanded to cover other movements in the early history of the People’s Republic of China, including the Great Leap Forward of 1958-1960, the Land Reform and the Collectivization of 1949-1953, and the Cultural Revolution of 1966-1976.
We had a number of reasons for wanting to create a website to feature this collection. Firstly, a website can provide additional context. Luo used TimelineJS, an interactive, open-source software to create a visual timeline of the period covered in the interviews. This allows users of the collection to examine the events and policies that underpin the personal experiences found in the oral histories.
Secondly, the website helps promote the collection. With more than 200 interviews, it can be difficult to find an entry point. We asked students and filmmakers who had worked on the collection to recommend one or two of their favorites. I created a tile lay-out on our WordPress page to feature these interviews, along with comments from the recommenders. One of my favorite parts of working on this project was looking through the featured interviews. They contain many tales of devastating tragedy and incredible courage that bring the bleak events in history books to vivid life. The website also provides a platform for advertising events about the project. Stay tuned for the visit of a number of the filmmakers in October!
Finally, the website provides new access points for the collection and a way of quantitatively visualizing the interviews via a map. The map was the most challenging element of the website to design. There is an abundance of mapping tools, both free and proprietary, so part of the difficulty was selecting the one that fit our needs best. Once this was accomplished, it took a great deal of time just to understand the capabilities of our chosen tool (ArcGIS Web Maps). Shout-out to Drew Keener and Mark Thomas, members of the library’s Data and Visualization Services Department who gave great GIS tips along the way. It was a fun design challenge to come up with a method that could allow the user to filter the interviews by topic, as well as link out to interviews for a given village in the Digital Repository.
After reflecting on the overall experience of building the website, here are some of my major take-aways for future digital humanities endeavors:
Decide on your priorities. I found that the tools I was using could not always achieve what I envisioned. Sometimes finding a solution was just around the corner, and sometimes it could mean getting sucked down the rabbit-hole for hours. Having an understanding of what is important in the long-run helps prevent wasted time.
Consult with colleagues. The excellent members of the Digital Scholarship and Data Visualization Departments provided lots of good advice and saved me from wandering around in the aforementioned rabbit-hole on several occasions.
Give yourself time to play around. I discovered some of the cooler mapping features just through experimenting with ArcGIS. Sometimes no amount of guide-reading can replace trying things out for yourself.
Working with digital tools was great, but the best part of the project for me was the opportunity to reflect on the aspects of the collection that are most valuable and how best to highlight them. The tools stand in service to providing alternative means of access to the collection, visualizing its scope, and bringing the human stories contained in it to a broader audience.
Each year the UNC/Duke Consortium for Latin American &Caribbean Studies offers competitive fellowships for scholars who want to use our library resources. Priority goes to researchers from officially recognized Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Predominately Black Institutions, Minority Serving Institutions, and community colleges. Holly Ackerman talked with the two fellows selected by the Duke Libraries for 2019-2020. Below is the interview with Prof. Rachel Chrane. See the interview with Dr. Shearon Roberts at https://blogs.library.duke.edu/blog/2019/08/22/a-interview-with-shearon-roberts/
Prof. Chrane (L) and Cong. Norma Torres (D-CA 35th District), Washington, D.C., July 2019
Tell us a little bit about yourself. Walk us through your CV.
I grew up in Texas, but I’ve spent most of my adult life teaching Spanish and English as a Second Language at Lees-McRae College in the mountains of North Carolina. I lived in Paris, France for a year, thanks to a Rotary International Scholarship that allowed me to study French literature, culture and language at the Sorbonne. I also taught Spanish at The Hebrew Academy of Greater Washington, DC, an Orthodox Jewish prep school. I enjoy learning languages and connecting with other cultures, and I believe the United States is a stronger nation because of our diversity.
When I see the people from Central America in the migrant caravan walking to the United States, I see people who will make our country stronger and more vibrant. But, when I see how they are treated at the border and portrayed on the news, I realize that it’s time for me to get out of my comfort zone and discuss the United States’ role in creating the caravan crisis.
As I shared my uncomfortable research with my Spanish students last year, we realized that we had to share this information with anyone who would listen. In March, I took students to the bipartisan Unrig Summit in Nashville, where we made a presentation about U.S. Involvement in the Caravan Crisis. People in the audience were shocked by the information we shared and they wondered why this information isn’t discussed on the news. It is sometimes difficult to believe information that doesn’t match the version of reality that is portrayed on television. The quote attributed to Mark Twain is often true: “It’s easier to fool someone than to convince them that they have been fooled.”
Prof. Chrane with students from her Spanish class at the Unrig Summit
What was your research project this summer?
My research project focuses on U.S. involvement in the Northern Triangle: Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. I want to know as much as I can about why the people in the migrant caravan are willing to leave their homes, their culture and their ancestral burial grounds to walk more than two thousand miles to the United States. And, now that so many Central American people are here seeking asylum, I want information on what we should be doing to honor the asylum process?
How will the information you gathered at the Duke Libraries be used?
The information I am gathering at the Duke Libraries will be the basis for a spring course at Lees-McRae College: Spanish for Social Justice. In this course, we will spend the first half of the semester looking at the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) and U.S. involvement in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.
We won’t be content to learn about the Central American crisis simply for knowledge’s sake. So the second half of the semester will focus on getting involved in our communities to help spread a deeper understanding of the crisis in Central America.
I cannot thank The Consortium enough for their generous research grant and the opportunity to consult with scholars at Duke University and at UNC Chapel Hill. I am truly humbled by this amazing opportunity.
What interested you most during your stay?
I was most interested in the people I met and how genuinely kind and helpful they are. Dr. Corin Zaragoza Estrera started working with me before I arrived; helping me navigate the wealth of resources at Duke and UNC Chapel Hill. Dr. Holly Ackerman has helped me tremendously as I explored Duke’s vast library, and she continues to help me find valuable resources for my research.
I also had the honor of talking with the former Ambassador to Venezuela, Patrick Duddy, who is the Director of the Duke Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies. Natalie Hartman, the Associate Director, and Ambassador Duddy made it possible for me to attend the First Annual Conference on Security, Migration, and Rule of Law in the Northern Triangle of Central America while I was in Washington, D.C. in June. At the conference, I met Norma Torres (D-California) and I was grateful to get to ask her questions about her perspective on CAFTA.
The experience has simply been amazing, and it is not over! I look forward to returning September 19 to hear the Conversation with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi.
News, Events, and Exhibits from Duke University Libraries
Duke University Library’s collection of materials on East Asia began with a gift from James A. Thomas in the late 1920s. In the 1930s, when Duke faculty first started teaching courses on East Asia , the library systematically began to build an East Asian collection in English only. The postwar growth of area studies served as the initial impetus for acquiring materials in Japanese and Chinese languages. In 1981, the Asian/Pacific Studies Institute (APSI) was founded at Duke, and new faculty were hired to teach additional courses on the region. To meet the growing needs of APSI faculty and students, Dr. Kristina Troost was hired in 1990, first as Japanese studies bibliographer, and then, in 1992, as the East Asian librarian responsible for building collections in Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. In 1996, Dr. Troost invited an external consultant to review the Chinese collection, which resulted in the hiring of the first full-time Chinese studies librarian at Duke in 2000. Duke’s Korean studies program expanded as well, and in 2006, Dr. Troost invited an external review of the Korean collection, as a result of which Duke hired its first Korean studies librarian in 2007. Under Dr. Troost’s leadership, Duke‘s East Asian collection has grown rapidly. Today, Duke University Library’s East Asian Collection is one of the major East Asian Collections in North America.
