(no subject)
Now I can die happy.
Kidding.
It's just this joy of finally finding something I've been looking for for such a long time, so overwhelming.
I'm talking books here (and trying to be sarcastic).
SOAS library is amazing in many regards. I can't really speak for all programmes, but for an undergraduate degree in Chinese Studies, you pretty much have all the essentials in your school library - which, after studying in a university where the dearth of study materials means the students' budgets are suffering heavily, looks downright impressive. For postgrads you do need to go outside, but that's natural: it's a school library, and you can't expect them to have everything. SOAS is unparalleled in original Asian language materials, at least. And I find the periodicals section very cool, too. I don't go there much, because we can access most of the stuff we need online, but if you can't, level A has the hugest collection of Asian studies periodicals you can imagine.
But that's where the magnificence stops, pretty much. There are so many quirks about how SOAS library works that students find themselves almost constantly in frustration with one thing or another. Some of the items have only one copy, some of the more popular ones have multiple copies, but that doesn't mean that you will necessarily have access to them. Ok, books being checked out - I understand. You see it on the catalogue, sigh, and go to hunt for them in other libraries. But the silliest thing is when the book is checked in, but it's not on the shelf. Now there might be several reasons for this: 1) they haven't been reshelved after someone used them 2) someone's using them, in the library, right now 3) people hid them on another shelf, or behind other books (trust me, it happens). Since it's open access for most of the materials, the books get carried around all the library, and the reshelvers can't keep up with the flow. As a result, there are always tons and tons of books on reshelving trolleys and reshelving shelves - like, right now, serious, most of the often-used classmark CC (China) books are on the trolleys, not on the shelves. Some of them might be downstairs in the copy room. Some of them might be downstairs in the general reshelving area... Some of them might be strewn across some random table on any level... You get the picture.
So, for instance, I've been looking for this one book. According to the catalogue, there were supposed to be 2 copies in the library - yey! Doesn't happen often for popular items. They were not on the shelve, so yesterday I spent an hour looking at all CC trolleys, in the copy room, in the reshelving area - no result. I was totally pissed off, but since I was in the library looking for other books today, I browsed around on the trolleys for the missing one as well. After half an hour or so I discovered a shelf I had missed the day before, and a long table with hundreds of unsorted books on it. A quick glance of a already well-trained eye, searching for classmark CC307.076, and voila! The book is there, on the table. So it took me at least 1.5 hours to find that bloody book, which in theory is in the library, but no one can really find it if they don't put extra effort and time into it. And it's not about not knowing how the classmarks are organized - it's about the understaffing and some of the reshelvers being, well, lazy?
Kidding.
It's just this joy of finally finding something I've been looking for for such a long time, so overwhelming.
I'm talking books here (and trying to be sarcastic).
SOAS library is amazing in many regards. I can't really speak for all programmes, but for an undergraduate degree in Chinese Studies, you pretty much have all the essentials in your school library - which, after studying in a university where the dearth of study materials means the students' budgets are suffering heavily, looks downright impressive. For postgrads you do need to go outside, but that's natural: it's a school library, and you can't expect them to have everything. SOAS is unparalleled in original Asian language materials, at least. And I find the periodicals section very cool, too. I don't go there much, because we can access most of the stuff we need online, but if you can't, level A has the hugest collection of Asian studies periodicals you can imagine.
But that's where the magnificence stops, pretty much. There are so many quirks about how SOAS library works that students find themselves almost constantly in frustration with one thing or another. Some of the items have only one copy, some of the more popular ones have multiple copies, but that doesn't mean that you will necessarily have access to them. Ok, books being checked out - I understand. You see it on the catalogue, sigh, and go to hunt for them in other libraries. But the silliest thing is when the book is checked in, but it's not on the shelf. Now there might be several reasons for this: 1) they haven't been reshelved after someone used them 2) someone's using them, in the library, right now 3) people hid them on another shelf, or behind other books (trust me, it happens). Since it's open access for most of the materials, the books get carried around all the library, and the reshelvers can't keep up with the flow. As a result, there are always tons and tons of books on reshelving trolleys and reshelving shelves - like, right now, serious, most of the often-used classmark CC (China) books are on the trolleys, not on the shelves. Some of them might be downstairs in the copy room. Some of them might be downstairs in the general reshelving area... Some of them might be strewn across some random table on any level... You get the picture.
So, for instance, I've been looking for this one book. According to the catalogue, there were supposed to be 2 copies in the library - yey! Doesn't happen often for popular items. They were not on the shelve, so yesterday I spent an hour looking at all CC trolleys, in the copy room, in the reshelving area - no result. I was totally pissed off, but since I was in the library looking for other books today, I browsed around on the trolleys for the missing one as well. After half an hour or so I discovered a shelf I had missed the day before, and a long table with hundreds of unsorted books on it. A quick glance of a already well-trained eye, searching for classmark CC307.076, and voila! The book is there, on the table. So it took me at least 1.5 hours to find that bloody book, which in theory is in the library, but no one can really find it if they don't put extra effort and time into it. And it's not about not knowing how the classmarks are organized - it's about the understaffing and some of the reshelvers being, well, lazy?