Minutes of the General Assembly of the 27th EAJRS conference, Bucharest

1. Approval minutes 26th EAJRS general assembly

Approval of the minutes of the general assembly of the 26th conference held at Leiden. See program booklet.

2. The EAJRS Conservation/Preservation Working Group

The EAJRS Conservation/Preservation Working Group asks the members to submit their questionnaire.

3. Mission statement

A change is suggested from formal statutes to a more flexible mission statement (in order to be clear in purpose but be flexible and adaptable to the changing world):
Preliminary (needs tweaking in specific wording):

The European Association of Japanese Resource Specialists (EAJRS) is an association of international character, formed with the purpose of promoting and fostering, by every available means, the development and dissemination of information and resources on Japan available to Europe. To fulfil these aims the EAJRS holds an annual conference, and performs, supports and promotes other related activities.

More determined provisions will be added for membership, board, elections, and so on, as seconded by the audience.

4. Membership of IFLA

Membership of IFLA (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions). Little benefit and little interest. The secretary notes that membership would require official registration of our association which will bring more work and scrutiny than benefits; our current status as de facto association is perfectly legal.

5. Next year’s venue

Naomi Yabe Magnussen, of the Japanese library at the University of Oslo is prepared to organize the 2017 conference in Oslo. Dates: 13-16 September 2017.

6. Funding

The EAJRS expresses its gratitude to the Japan Foundation for its generous funding, as well as to the Japanese Studies department who supported the conference. We are also very grateful to the vendors for their support.

7. Newsletter

As has become customary, the local organizer prepared a newsletter which also functioned as program booklet. The abstracts, the presentations and/or the text of each presentation will be uploaded on the EAJRS website, if and when the speaker agrees to do so. Many speakers have already given their permission. The speakers who did not deliver their file to the secretary and wish it to be uploaded on the EAJRS website, are kindly requested to send it in to him.

8. Information providers workshop

Format of the next conference: the information providers workshop this year was a great success. Hopefully we will be able to include a similar workshop in the program of next year. As for the timing, we would like to schedule the vendor workshop on Friday afternoon, after lunch. After the workshop we would like to hold a panel discussion, with a representative of the vendors, a representative of the public providers, a representative of the users, etc. to address a few topics in depth.

9. Deadline for applications for the 2017 Conference

The Board proposes mid-May 2017 as the deadline for the submission of applications and the abstract. At the end of May, screening of proposals will be completed, and the results will be notified beginning of June. Guidelines will be added to streamline the presentations. Power point presentations should normally not exceed 25 slides or too much text. Over the years we have noticed a tendency with some presenters to include far too much in their presentation.
Secretary: We must say that this year the presentations were pretty much compliant, both in number of slides and time limit

10. Theme 2017

The special topic we propose for Oslo is Digital strategies for Japanese Studies: Theories and Practices. All other topics related to resources are as always welcome.

11. Scholarships

Depending on funding, three scholarship will be offered.

12. Keynote speakers

At the 2017 conference there will be two keynote speakers, still to be decided.

13. Report from the local organizer/secretary

84 people registered this year, with 2 last-minute cancellations and 1 no show.
Bulgaria 1, Canada 1, China 1, Czech Republic 1, Denmark 1, Finland 1, Germany 1, Lithuania 1, Slovenia 1, Sweden 1, The Netherlands 1, Belgium 2, Norway 2, Russia 2, Switzerland 2, United Sates 6, Romania 8 (not including the multitude of volunteers, the choir, or the walk-in students), France 9, United Kingdom 13, Japan 27.
Meaning: North America 7, Asia 28, Europe 47.
Presentations: Apart from the Resource providers’ workshop, there were 34 presentation, with 21 in English and 13 in Japanese ; this year a clear tilt towards English while in previous years more or less a 50-50 ratio was the norm.

14. Discovery systems

Naomi Yabe Magnussen and Nobutake Kamiya: survey about librarians’ experience with the Discovery system. This did not materialize yet last year, but informal talks during the conference among members, showed that there is need for special attention for CJK issues that are not addressed by the providers of Library Management Systems (cataloguing software) and Discovery Systems (opacs).

15.Spin-offs and initiatives

The EAJRS will continue to support a number of initiatives it has been supporting in the past. We have requested the National Institute of Japanese Literature to extend the much appreciated kuzushiji workshops. The EAJRS conservation Working Group is continuing its activities in the new year.

16. words of gratitude

Our special gratitude to our keynote speakers, Mr. Noboru Koyama (Cambridge), Mr. Hideki Kikkawa (National Research Institute for Cultural Properties)
Thanks to Steluta Maxim and Silvia Olteanu for producing the handsome program booklet.
Thanks to Mr. Ioan Paul Colta from Complexul Muzeal Arad and the gallery Artmark, Bucharest, to the Romanian Academy Library, the Casa Universitarilor for the reception.
thanks to Arjan van der Werf our most alert and efficient secretary of the EAJRS.
The conference was also an occasion to get to know the situation in Romania itself much better, while, on a more personal level, it gave me the opportunity to meet again an old friend from my early days in Osaka, which gave the conference an additional touch of congeniality. This was a very musical conference: it started with the students choir Kimochi, who sang three songs in a marvelous way. Ue o muite arukō (Sukiyaki), by Sakamoto Kyū, I found particularly nostalgic. Anyway we were in the right mood from the start. Then came the traditional dinner at Caru’ cu bere, with some of our members showing their hidden talent as dancers.
Thanks to Professors Anca Focseneanu, Alexandra Gheorge and Ruxandra-Oana Raianu. But most of all we owe a tremendous gratitude to Ms Steluta Maxim. She has done everything in her power, has spared no efforts to make this conference a success. If this conference has turned out to be such success it is in the first place thanks to her, and the students. Organizing the welcoming committee, consisting of both staff and students, to meet us all at the airport, is something without precedent.

17. AOB

None

18. Closing of the general assembly and the conference.