Introduction
This libguide explains how and where to find different types of materials collected for the Asian American Resource Center (1972-2021) and records the most recent effort to reorganize materials for preservation and access from October 2024 to April 2025.
As the project lead and AAA coordinator, Yuji Kono '25 was involved in all aspects of processing ー surveying, catalog searching, sorting, digitizing, describing, as well as archival research ー and communicated processing decisions with current AAA members. He also put together a timeline of the collection and introduced serials in the collection for this guide.
EAS student assistant Dylan Kim '27 sorted books and checked serials with Yuji. From November to mid-December of 2024, he created and managed the LibraryThing catalog for the AAA book collection now shelved in the Asia House seminar room and concluded work for this project in February 2025.
DigiLAB student assistant Fae Ordaz '26 processed 4 VHS tapes and 15 audio cassettes for digital preservation from late February to April 2025. DMS student assistant Ava Schreier '25 processed 64 print reference and archival documents for digital preservation from late March to late April of 2025.
Please direct questions about processing to East Asian Studies Librarian Yilin La, who tied up loose ends and transferred materials for shelving.
A Timeline of the Collection
- 1972 -
The position of Asian American Counselor Coordinator (AACC) was created under Developmental Services with Thomas Hibino '69 as the first person to hold the position. The Asian American Alliance was also founded this year. From 1972 to 1989, seven AACCs were responsible for managing a reference collection of Asian American studies—Asian American Resource Center—in Peters Hall and serving as advisor to the Asian American Alliance.
The collection managers were Tom Hibino 72-73, Johann J. Lee 73-74, Donn Ginoza 74-75, Harvey H. Hayashida 75-77, Adeline Liu 78-79, Grant Din 79-82, and Tommy Woon, 82-89. The position was vacant 77-78 and Tommy Woon was promoted to Assistant Dean/Director of Asian American Affairs in 1987 (office relocated to Peters 110). Oberlin's last Asian American counselor coordinator was Valerie DeCruz (Peters 101). She was counselor/coordinator in Counseling Services under the Office of Student Support Services from 1989 to 1990, and then became one of the assistant deans in the same office. She left Oberlin in 1993. The collection was transferred to the main library in 1989 with an agreement titled "Oberlin College Library Guidelines for Student Resource Center."
- 1976-1977 -
Harvey H. Hayashida (AACC) reported to Dean Hal D. Payne in the 1976 self-evaluation that the Asian American Resource Center was composed of “about 80-100 books, magazines, newspapers, and newsletters from Asian American Community Organizations” and stated that he was working on acquiring audio-visual resources.
Hayashida further reported in the following year's annual report that the Asian American Resource Center was expanded to about 1,000 titles and supported by two student assistants, Wendy Lim and Tommy Lim, who helped order new materials as well as organize the collection. The resource center was widely used for student projects on Asian America, filling a gap in the knowledge available to students as no classes on Asian American subjects was taught through the College. The collection was also used to teach a Winter Term class and in the following decades it was almost always used to teach an ExCo, Winter Term, or both.
An AARC flyer from Hayashida's Memo:
- 1979 -
According to Addy Liu's 78-79 annual report, the Asian American Resource Center expanded from previously having materials almost exclusively focused on Asian American history to include materials on Asia and the relationship between Asia and (Asian) America.
From 1984, "curtailment of custodial care and management of the Asian American Resource Center" through delegation of the work to a student assistant was repeatedly mentioned in AACC's annual reports.
- 1987 -
Promoted to Assistant Dean of Asian American Affairs in 1987, Tommy Woon wrote an email to all Asian students on September 30 and announced the temporary location of AARC to be Room A on the third floor of Peters Hall.
Also mentioned in his report that December was that "The Asian American Resource Center services were disrupted severely by the changing of offices within Student Support Services. Students could not easily access materials for ExCo classes on the Asian American experience. Counseling was also affected because cultural counseling often relies upon library resources to illustrate points in identity development."
- 1989 -
In his Fall 1989 Asian American/Multicultural/International Student Affairs mid-annual report, Woon mentioned "successfully negotiated the transfer of the collection from storage rooms during the previous two years to a special collections room in Mudd library."
The 1989 Library Guidelines on Student Resource Centers clarifies that the collection was not library property unless donated to the library and must be well maintained and organized, with library support, to be open and accessible to all members of the Oberlin College community.
From 1989 to 2021, Mudd 315 housed the Asian American Resource Center
- 1992 -
Following a letter from AAA treasurer Gilbert Gee '93 to the main library about working on creating a filing system for AARC during Winter Term 1991 with 15 other students, Kang Won Mathew Choi '94 wrote to Head of Circulation Allison Gould on behalf of the Asian Resource Committee for library training on barcoding AARC books and journals in Fall 1992. The committee also decided to keep newspapers, magazines, and pamphlets for in-library use only.
In January 1995, the library migrated to a new online system. According to the minutes of a September 1996 meeting called by AARC supervisor and main library reference librarian Haipeng Li, pre-migration brief records were lost and the collection needed complete reorganization. Meeting attendees Collection Development Librarian Eric Carpenter, Assistant Dean to Student Life & Services Shilpa Dave, Asian American Intern Narges Kakalia, Main library Reference Librarian Haipeng Li, History Department Faculty Benson Tong, as well as Allison Gould discussed securing funding for a student worker supervised by Benson Tong and supported by library staff to reclassify the collection and put in brief records in OBIS to allow the collection to remain circulating.
From then to the next library systems migration in June 2025, 835 brief bibliographical and more item records (for multiple copies of the same title) labeled with the location AARC were created between 1995 and 2008. 21 titles had been checked out for use, mostly by students.
- 2021 -
Changes in library spaces happened in 2021. Losing the entire A-level of Mudd Center, the library reappropriated Mudd 315 to be the staff lounge and the collection was moved out in a rush. Temporary relocation to Mudd 203 is not well documented and in doubt, but boxes of books and AV materials, paper folders of documents, as well as stand file boxes of serials soon took a corner of the library receiving room behind two doors that made the materials inaccessible to all but library staff. As a result, even AAA students who arrived in or after 2021 don't know about the collection.
During fall 2022, AAA board members agreed to send archival records to the Archives, integrate the remainder of the collection into library research stacks, and add duplicate copies to the Asia House library. Board members asked to check the materials before integration could happen but the review was not completed before their graduation.
- 2024 -
In January 2024, Mia Brito '24 taught EXCO 190 - ArchivesCo. Students in the class identified materials in the collection that are of archival value and reorganized the AAA records, which were temporarily deposited the Archives.
- 2025 -
On Feb 6, at a meeting with Mia Brito as well as Archivists Ken Grossi and Emily Rebmann, AAA members Erin Koh '26, Yuji Kono '25, and Asha Agarwal '26 agreed that AAA records would be best taken care of by professional archivists. On April 5, Yuji Kono '25 updated current AAA members on processing progress since October 2024 and confirmed the decision to move forward with finding a space for materials that don't stay in the main library.
On April 24, Yuji Kono '25 and Yilin met with staff of the Office of Residence Life Mark Zeno and Jesse Fernandez for permission to shelve materials in the Asia House seminar room.
With assistance from ResLife staff Jesse Fernandez and Vedika Salunke, Yilin moved and shelved the collection in Asia House on April 29, May 6, and August 21.