Currently, I'm working on a research project with Dickson Chiu and Patrick Lo on
Journey to the East. We examine the rise of the “LAM,” an acronym that stands for libraries, archives, and museums and in doing so, we profile leading experts -- librarians, archivists, and museum curators -- who specialize in East Asian collections from across the world. In examining the dynamically shifting role of the cultural institution in the context of managing information and collections, this book provides important themes offered by these cultural experts in understanding the necessary professional skills, knowledge, and personalities that are required for working in such environments of varying size, scope, and composition in LAMs.
By interviewing practicing librarians, archivists, and museum curators across the world who specialize in East Asian collections, our research examines the shifting role of the cultural institution in the context of managing information, cultural and knowledge exchanges, and collaboration on a global scale and ultimately challenges the notion of what constitutes “Asia’s collections.”
These managers of East Asia collection not only refers to library, archive, and museum (LAM) professionals who are ethnically of East Asian descent, but also their North American and European colleagues, who have devoted their careers to safeguarding cultural heritage collections of immeasurable values that are housed in different world’ s leading LAMs, located all over the globe. So that is why we went on a journey to interview experts from Berlin State Library, Bavarian State Library, the British Library, the British Museum, the National Library of France, the Vatican Library, the National Library of Denmark, the National Archives of Japan, the National Taiwan Library – just to name a few. We have three purposes for the project:
(1) Our research project ultimately serves as a reference guide for students, scholars, researchers, and LAM professionals, enabling them to gain a glimpse of the vast amount of treasures available for their research and other scholarly activities. To survive on their own for future generations, LAMS must be organized, researched, talked about, promoted, and taught to the young generations - otherwise they risk extinction, physically as an entity and institutionally relevant to their audiences and users.
(2) We conducted our research using a mixed-methods approach using semi-structure surveys through face-to-face meetings, Skype, and also by email depending on preferred mode of access by our interviewees. Upon completion of transcribing our interviews, we followed up with our interviewees for clarification and approval for publication of the text.
(3) We argue that the present convergence is actually a return to traditional unity. These three institutions share epistemological links dating from the “Museum” of Alexandria and continuing through the cabinets of curiosities gathered in early modern Europe. But over time, as these collections expanded, they became more specialized and their storage was separated according to the form of information and kinds of users and after the nineteenth and century, these institutions professionalized and intellectual societies and educational programs materialized that crystallized the formal separation. So in many ways, LAMs have come full circle.
I'd be more than happy to answer any questions and feedback you may have about our project. I've written about LAMs in the past, and this is a really exciting project to continue my research in this area.
