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.