Bibliography Committee of the Africana Librarians Council
Minutes, Gainesville, Florida, April 3, 1998.
Present: Helene Baumann (Duke U.), Julianne Beall (Library of Congress), Ruby Bell-Gam (UCLA), Phyllis Bischof (U.C. Berkeley), Joseph Caruso (Columbia U.), Jill Coelho (Harvard U.), Moore Crossey (Yale U.), Gregory Finnegan (Harvard U.), Karen Fung (Stanford U.), Miki Goral (UCLA), Beverly Gray (Library of Congress), Maria Grosz-Ngate (U. of Florida), Dennis Hyde (U. of Pennsylvania), Al Kagan (U. of Illinois), Deborah LaFond (SUNY-Albany), Louise Leonard (U. of Florida), Peter Malanchuk (U. of Florida), Pamphil D. Mwainu (Dar-es-Salaam U.), Razia Nanji (U. of Florida), Loumona Petroff (Boston U.), Dan Reboussin (U. of Florida), Lenny Rhine (U. of Florida), Mette Shayne (Northwestern U.), Elisabeth Sinnott (New York U.), David Tuffs (Michigan State U.), Gretchen Walsh (Boston U.), David Westley (Boston U.) and Joanne Zellers (Library of Congress).
Welcome and introductions. The meeting was called to order by Mette Shayne, chair. Minutes from the November meeting in Ohio were approved. Agenda was rearranged, nos. 2 and 4 combined and no.3 moved to the end of the agenda.
Indexing of journals. Mette Shayne presented her survey of indexing services and after a discussion someone suggested that it be put on the web page of the Committee. It had been sent to Hans Zell, John McIlwaine and Hans Panofsky for comments. Hans Zell was pessimistic of the chances of cooperation between the services and emphasized the small market for these products. We have to try to convince publishers that there is a real market for a good product, even if we know the market is limited. We should pursue the thrust of the 40th anniversary idea of cooperation and approach our colleagues in England to get help for a cooperative product. Caruso agreed to write John McIlwaine and John Pinfold on this subject.
We should also respond to NISC which asked ALC for desiderata re such a product and tell them this is the product we want. Caruso reported on behalf of the Electronic indexing task force that he had written to producers of the most important indexes, but only had had a report back from the African Studies Abstracts editors in Leiden. They had plans to put their library catalog on the web, but not their database at this point. We decided to request information from the LC Nairobi office for the possibility of web access to its excellent periodical index as well as CODESRIA to find out if any progress has been made towards further issues of their index. CODESRIA is tied to CDS /ISIS for political reasons, but Shayne had been in contact with UNESCO in Paris, and it is possible to import citations from this software to Procite which is the software used by LC Nairobi. The Committee would like to know if Ruth Thomas in Nairobi has had contact with NISC. Zellers did not know of any discussion about putting the Nairobi index on the web. Walsh suggested as an addition to the comparative list of indexing services, a list be prepared of the journals published in Africa that are not being indexed. Shayne had prepared such a list a year ago, and it would need updating. Many of the journals on Shayne's list suffer from the one issue syndrome. It would not be an insurmountable project to divide the list of African journals not indexed and add them as an addendum to the Nairobi index. Zellers reported that Ruth Thomas in Nairobi had tried to recruit librarians in East and Southern Africa to do cooperative indexing, but this experience had not been successful. Ruth Thomas had expressed the possibility of adding indexing of journals from West Africa as an addendum to the Nairobi index. David Tuffs agreed to check RLIN and OCLC for a survey of how many libraries subscribe to the major indexes surveyed by Shayne.
Bischof felt the survey could be a useful tool for Africana selectors as they argue for improved funds for serial collections. Walsh felt we also should pressure major indexes to add more Africa related material. Walsh was intrigued with the possibility of putting on the web the kind of material that one finds and forgets unless one stores it somewhere, a kind of serendipity list called finding aids. The Committee agreed that such lists as well as locally produced handouts and bibliographies should be added to the Bibliography Committee web page.
Database on African theses. Walsh reported on Joe Lauer's trip to Kenya and the discussion of a database of abstracts of African dissertations. It was an idea from the Title VI centers to collect dissertations from African universities and to have each center contact a different university to cover major universities in Africa. There was much concern in Africa about who owns the dissertations and the loss of control. Goral suggested that dissertations not be lent out without a signature sheet acknowledging the author and indicating who the reader was. It is important to state exactly what such an insert should contain. Dissertations are a gray area with questions of who has the right to copy or sell. Dar es Salaam University is looking into document delivery. The Ford Foundation and Liz Levey would want this database to become a viable commercial product which may be unrealistic with a small market. It is questionable whether African libraries could afford subscriptions and to have such a database if one cannot obtain the dissertations seems frustrating.
Electronic Journal of African Bibliography. Iowa University would like to keep this journal on the web. ALC is waiting to see who will succeed John Howell. We could not dictate to this person, but should indicate our interest and willingness to participate. It is important this be a refereed journal, and an editorial board is needed. We would wait to appoint a board till a person has been hired in Iowa. We should also wait to solicit manuscripts until a person is in place; then we could solicit from our web site and through listservs like H-Africa. Caruso agreed to write on behalf of the group to U. of Iowa to reconfirm our interest in keeping the journal alive and to keep in contact with ALC when a person is in place. A note on the web should indicate, we are in transition but will solicit manuscripts as soon as a person is in place.
World Bibliographical Series. We discussed the usefulness of a database and agreed that the bibliographies serve a very useful purpose, but that there would be less interest in a database. It would depend on whether it was possible to subscribe to a specific geographical area, how often it would be updated and what the pricing structure would be. We agreed that the Chair would write the publisher with the concerns of the group.
Conover report. A list of the nominations for the Conover award was distributed. Helene Baumann, Joe Caruso and Mette Shayne who sat in for the current Chair of ALC would meet later to work on the selection of the winner of this award. The result will be announced at the fall 1998 meeting. Walsh urged members to check their copies of her book The Media in Africa and Africa in the Media as many volumes had a defective index.
African Book Publishing Record . Shayne announced that the 1997 bibliography of reference works and bibliographies recently was sent to the publisher, and that more volunteers were needed. Jill Coelho agreed to edit next year's bibliography.
Newspaperlist. Shayne agreed to update the List of African Newspapers Currently Received in American Libraries and the deadline for reporting to her is July 31st. Members should give starting date for new titles and last date for titles no longer received. Caruso volunteered to talk to New York Public Library about participating in this project, and Beverly Gray to talk to Howard University. It was agreed that Shayne would contact Afro American listservs to announce the existence of this list on the web.
Scarecrow Press. The Chair distributed a letter from Scarecrow Press. The group agreed that the kind of communication we have had with this publisher is what is needed to force publishers to produce better products. For ideas for new and needed bibliographies Nancy Schmidt's list from 1995 would be revisited, and an updated list attached to this year's minutes to be available on the web. The Chair agreed to contact Schmidt for her advice and update.
Web page. Several ideas for the Bibliography Committee web page were: minutes, link to Newspaper list, aand Shayne's comparative indexing study as soon as an introduction and some editing werecompleted. Other links suggested: Berkeley has a new accessions list and several bibliographies, Columbia has the directory of Africanist scholars. Members would be solicited for other bibliographies and handouts available from their libraries, and it was suggested that handouts should be brought to the fall meeting for exchange of ideas.
Announcements. Malanchuk announced the recent arrival of latest edition of Magazines for Libraries. The publisher seeks new editors for next edition. David Tuffs asked about interest in new edition of the Student Africanist Handbook. David Easterbrook sent a report from Northwestern University especially talking about the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Program of African Studies and the exhibit about Herskovits that was opening this very day. Easterbrook played a very active role in the preparation of the exhibit and co-authored the introduction to a new edition of Herskovits Dahomean Narrative. Northwestern will implement Voyager, a web-based online catalog this summer. It will make it possible to offer accessionlists as well as make the content of the library's vertical file material searchable. The library has received from professor Ivor Wilks the Asante Collective Biography Project archives.
Meeting adjourned at 11.50.
Respectfully submitted,
Mette Shayne