SPEC Kit 324: Collecting Global Resources · 79
Much of these questions are not applicable to my center, although we are considered a major repository of Slavic/
Eastern European, Central European, Finnish-American, Mediterranean and to a lesser extent near eastern archival (and
print) materials. While our collections are of intense interest to scholars in homelands (from those areas of emigration),
the definition of “global resources” in this survey does not include our materials, generally speaking. It is interesting that
“global resources” is used in this survey from an American perspective, rather than in a manner that describes materials
used globally.
New programs have been added at the university without additional funding for the library. At times, we have not been
informed of their creation until after the fact. The increased strain on our budget means that global resources aren’t
given any more emphasis (funding or staffing) than any other subject that we support.
Our “East Asian Law Department” has a staff of only one, but various staff of the Law Library provide assistance. The
Law Library is administratively separate from the University of Washington Libraries. Our tradition of collecting East
Asian legal materials goes back to the 1930s and ‘40s.
Our global collecting has historically been quite limited to Western Europe, with a strong and longstanding commitment
to Latin American collections. A historically small Russian program is becoming smaller, but new and growing programs
covering the Middle East, East/South/Southeast Asia have been added in the past five years.
Our global resources collections and services cross over several of our branch libraries and most at our main library. We
have a separate Islamic Studies Library.
Our responses were influenced by our organizational structure. We do not organize our library staff along the lines of
global studies, but we do have an African Studies Library.
Our selectors are organized by subject, not geography (which we stopped doing in 1996), and we do not treat
purchases from foreign vendors, or in support of areas studies, differently than our English language acquisitions. Most
of our selectors choose materials in their subject area from all relevant countries. Our fund codes and other data are not
structured so that we can group monographs, electronic, microforms, etc., by geographic area. Thus our answers are
educated guesses, not hard data.
Please refer to the following article on the Modern Greek Collection: Jacquelene W. Riley. “Research Opportunities
in the Modern Greek Collection in the Classics Library at the University of Cincinnati.” Journal of Modern Greek
Studies 26, no. 1 (2008): 29–62. http://muse.jhu.edu/ (accessed January 21, 2011). This article relates the collection
development history and discusses its strengths and use by scholars. Additionally, it includes a table that shows the
collection’s breakdown by Library of Congress classifications and two tables that list older journals in the collection by
publication inception dates: 1800–1899 and 1900–1950. The Modern Greek journal collection is particularly strong in
early Greek journals and we continue to have standing orders or exchange programs for Greek journals.
Regarding question 11 about the structure of global resources units, our response will be accurate but its reporting
will render it meaningless. As we do not have one single area studies service point or processing unit, we are reading
the question as an exploration of how our individual area studies units work. Each of our area studies operations has
its own peculiar responsibilities and functions, and so we pretty much check on every “Distinct Unit(s)” box. There are
several things holding us back from actively collecting in several areas: lack of money lack of resources available for
certain world areas lack of staffing (we have two area studies librarian positions open and a third soon to open, and all
but one of our Western European positions are interims).
Slavic &East European Studies: One of the oldest and largest Russian and, to a lesser degree, East European studies
collections in the country. In the past has served a graduate population, but for the moment principally undergrad
(with a notable exception in the east central European area). The related programs are in a generational transition, and
presently are being reimagined to reflect 21st century needs and realities.
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