In 1994, the State Library of South Australia reported
open and highly satisfactory communication with the Chair and
Chief Executive Officer of the SA. Multicultural and Ethnic Affairs
Commission (SAMEAC), Mr Paolo Nocella, and with the Arts Development
Officer of the Ethnic Communities Council of SA, Ms Isolde Davis.
Specific senior level consultation with key agencies and individuals
is also occurring on particular matters, such as:
- the establishment of the English Learning and Improvement
Service;
- general community consultation on services, with the Commonwealth
Office of Multicultural Affairs, which operates a consultation
service;
- a seminar with country specific chambers of commerce representatives
organised in association with SAMEAC.
The State Library of South Australia is committed to ensuring
there are mechanisms established to link the library with ethnic
community groups. Consultative links operate through several
teams within the Branch, in concert with the Cultural Diversity
Services team. Some of the major activities include:
- staff wrote to 104 state ethnic community organisations which
produce newsletters seeking donations/deposit of other material
for the Mortlock Library of South Australiana;
- a user survey of over 1500 library users in June 1994 to find
out the needs of clients of NESB background (results still being
tabulated);
- the library's draft Collection Development Policy has been
circulated to key service agencies in the multicultural area for
comment.
The Cultural Diversity Services team has been developing closer
links with community groups through joint projects, including
the following:
- collection of orally recorded folk-tales in community languages:
already collected are about 50 stories from 32 community groups;
- exhibitions in association with consulates and ethnic organisations;
- a Multicultural Writer's Conference, a joint project with
three multicultural organisations;
- liaising with community organisations for establishing collections
in languages other than English in public libraries e.g. Filipino,
Macedonian, Tamil, Hindi, Persian: this will be an ongoing role.
Projects such as these not only involve community groups but also
give the opportunity to gather their ideas towards State Library
of South Australia's future directions in relation to policies,
collections and programs.
The State Library of South Australia reported the following further
progress in 1995:
- Volunteer supported;
- English Language Learning and Improvement Service (ELLIS)
operating since mid-1994 with the endorsement of key ethnic agencies;
achieving a high level of satisfaction among NESB clients;
- Funding support provided to the National Library of Australia's
Easy to Read Bibliography project.
- Three private ethnic community libraries now attached to 3
public libraries as a result of advice through Cultural Diversity
Services team
- NESB User Survey Report completed and analysis of service
implications underway. Public report to be issued mid-1995.
- Advice on archival management to Latvian Archives, a collection
of national significance in SA
During 1996:
- Information sessions held with the Spanish and Vietnamese
communities to develop legal deposit and archival collections.
- Brochure on ELLIS (English Language Learning and Improvement
Service) produced and distributed.
- Multicultural libraries conference held in conjunction with
SAWGOMLS in 1995.
- Cooperating with a network of service organisations working
with new arrivals to South Australia.
- Worked with ethnic communities to record a collection of ethnic
folktales for the J.D. Somerville Oral History Collection. 20
tales were also produced as a quality children's book Ants
to elephants.
- Material from communities of non-English speaking backgrounds
is now a collecting priority for the Mortlock Library of South
Australiana, as recorded in SLSA's Collection development policy
published 1995.
- Conversion of the card catalogues 1884-1950 is providing an
online searchable language code, not possible previously.
- Cultural Diversity Services team also has responsibility for
services for people with disabilities. In 1996 prepared a Disability
Policy and three year Action Plan and produced a brochure on
disability services
Consultative mechanisms linking the State Library of Queensland
with State ethnic community organisations have been established.
The ACT Library Service has made no progress to date on
this Resolution. It is planned to collect the output of multicultural
organisations and individuals as part of the process of developing
the collections of the ACT Reference Library.
The Library and Information Service of Western Australia
maintains liaison with, and participation on the Advisory Council
on Library Services for a Multicultural Society.
At the State Library of Tasmania a review of Foreign Language
Service is in progress. A draft will be provided to ethnic community
organisations for comment. It is expected that the ethnic community
and current clients of the service will be consulted if the service
is changed. A proposal to put the previously closed access LOTE
collection into open access is under consideration. A collection
development policy for LOTE is to be developed. There are on-going
informal links with the Migrant Resource Centre and with Ethnic
Affairs.
Northern Territory Library is further developing its informal
links with ethnic organisations. Policies on multi-cultural collecting
and access are being reviewed. The Library is in contact with
all ethnic organisations in the Northern Territory regarding the
lodgment of appropriate material. Such links are enhanced by
formal collaborate ventures with ethnic organisations - within
the last nine months such joint ventures have been held in collaboration
with the Chinese, German and Greek communities.
At the State Library of New South Wales there is a good
and highly satisfactory communication with State and Federal bodies
such as EAC, Ethnic Communities Council of NSW, OMA (Office of
Multicultural Affairs), Dept. of Immigration & Ethnic Affairs,
Dept. of AMES, TAFE and other government departments. Communication
is also maintained at a high level with state and local community
organisations such as peak community groups and peak ethnic groups.
The State Library of New South Wales's Multicultural Service Consultant
liaises with a number of organisations including ethnic community
organisations.
In NSW some activities involving ethnic communities are organised
through public libraries. The State Library of New South Wales
has a consultative role and supports activities in public libraries
through its collection including 47 languages. Training for transliteration
and cross-cultural awareness training are also provided by State
Library of New South Wales.
The State Library has forged links with members of a number of
multicultural community groups, actively collecting original materials
to document the settlement of these groups in NSW, and providing
a range of publishing, exhibition and other related activities
to support those links.
The State Library of New South Wales has revised its policies
to bring them into line with the NSW charter of principles for
a culturally diverse society.
The State Library of Victoria has provided ongoing support
and advice to the Slovenian community for the collection and preservation
of ethnic heritage collections. It is updating its Directory
of ethnic community library collections accessible to the public,
which is due for publication in June/July 1995.
The State Library of Victoria has been involved in the
recent establishment of a State Advisory Committee to the Libraries
Board of Victoria on library services to people with languages
other than English. The committee involves both library representation
and ethnic community groups through the various umbrella organisations.
RJ3 That the ALIA Board of Education consult with Schools
of Library and Information Studies to examine ways in which
- cultural diversity issues may be most appropriately
handled in education and training programs
- more students with language skills and backgrounds may
obtain educational qualifications in library and information studies
- AUGUST 1994
-
The Australian Library and Information Association contacted all
schools of library and information studies in February 1994 requesting
comments on action relating to this Resolution. They were asked
to include examples of how the school's curriculum content and
course delivery allowed for cross cultural awareness, and/or recommendations
on how this may be best done in education and training programs.
This Resolution was referred to the Australian Library and Information
Association's Board of Education at its meeting of 6-7 June.
Major points regarding cultural awareness under RH5
are relevant to cultural diversity issues.
- JUNE 1996
-
For further action on this resolution, see RH5.
RJ4 That the National Library, in collaboration with
the Arts, Culture and Heritage Policy Network of the Federation
of Ethnic Communities Councils of Australia, seek funds to carry
out a survey aimed at identifying documentary heritage collections
held in community organisations.
- 1994 - 1996
There has been no progress by the National Library of Australia
on this Resolution.
The Working Group on High Priority Cross Sectoral Projects has
funded a project which will replace and expand upon the current
Guide to collections of manuscripts relating to Australia
with an on-line directory, mounted on the National Library's server.
It will provide summary information about holdings of manuscripts
and private archives in Australian repositories, including material
held in community organisations.
RJ5 That the National Library of Australia ensure, through
the National CJK Project and its National Document and Information
Service development, that the need to provide for the scripts
and complex diacritics of all major community languages in Australia
is addressed as a high priority; with advice from Standards Australia
Committee IT/19 on appropriate character sets.
- JUNE 1996
The National CJK Service was implemented in June 1996. It supports
Chinese, Japanese and Korean script. The software chosen for the
National CJK Service is capable of enhancement to cater for other
scripts such as Greek, Hebrew, Russian and Thai. In October 1996
funding was allocated for an enhancement to support Unicode, which
is the first technical step towards supporting additional scripts.
It is expected that Unicode support on the CJK Service will be
implemented during 1997. Policy on extending access to additional
scripts, for example via WORLD 1 or the National CJK Service,
has not yet been determined.
RJ6 That the National Library of Australia report to the
ABN Network Committee and ABN Users Meeting on the best ways to
extend coverage of records and locations for non-English language
materials in the National Bibliographic Database
- AUGUST 1994
A paper on this topic was presented to the ABN Network Committee
in August 1994. It will considered in November 1994 in context
of other data gaps on the NBD.
JUNE 1995
In August 1994 the Network Committee considered a paper by the
National Library of Australia on the Coverage of non-English
language materials on the NBD, and agreed that it is often
not practical for libraries to locate and extract particular categories
of data in order to contribute them to the NBD. The Network Committee
undertook to develop a single integrated set of guidelines identifying
records to be contributed to the NBD, and in November 1994 endorsed
a Strategy for improving NBD coverage by the addition of data
files. The highest priority initiative in this strategy was
the loading of two community language files from the City of Sydney
Library and the Moonee Valley Regional Library. Due to the requirement
to fund the development of World 1, the National Library of Australia
has not proposed to the Network Committee that funds be devoted
to special file loads in 1995/96.
JUNE 1996
The National Library is unable to supply funding for loading of
City of Sydney or Moonee Valley Regional Library files to the
NBD in 1996/97. They plan to await complete implementation of
WORLD 1 which will support the conversion and loading of some
non standard files to the NBD. This is unlikely before 1998.
Return to Section A: Final Progress Report on Resolutions