By Virginia Shih1
On the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the founding history of Southeast Asian studies at the University of California, Berkeley2 (1954-2024) and my 30 years of Southeast Asia curatorship at the South/Southeast Asia Library, I would like to take this opportunity to share my fond memories of working with Professor Jeffrey Hadler (1968-2017) for 15 years during his tenure at the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies of UC Berkeley.
I first met Jeff at Cornell University graduate school as classmate before we became colleagues at UCB in Fall 2001. He was one of the very rare faculty members who was always generous with his time and subject expertise for Southeast Asia library acquisitions or any Southeast Asia related library matters whenever and wherever I needed his consultation.
Throughout his life, Jeff established himself as an accomplished scholar in Southeast Asia/Indonesia studies. He selflessly dedicated his intellectual insight and guidance to the Berkeley academic community, enhancing the Library's Southeast Asia collection significantly.
The Hadler Gift Collection
In 2018, the Hadler family donated almost 4,000 volumes of books, journals, wall maps, and posters, and 16 linear feet of course readers, research files, and archival materials on Southeast Asia and beyond that Jeff had collected over three decades. The Hadler collection covers extensive holdings on core interdisciplinary Southeast Asian studies. The subject areas include cultural anthropology, political history of post-World War II, social and religious history, especially on Islam; Indonesian art, literature; travel literature; language studies; Minangkabau studies, and the colonial era of Dutch East Indies studies—all of which will augment Berkeley's globally renowned Southeast Asia collection.
About 80 percent of the Hadler Collection is in English and the rest is in Indonesian, Malay, Dutch, French, German, Chinese, Japanese, and Jawi. The bulk of the collection covers research and academic imprints and most of the materials were published in the United States, the Netherlands, and Indonesia, from the second half of the 20th century to 2016.
The Hadler Collection will offer an extraordinary resource for the scholarly community in Southeast Asian studies locally and globally through interlibrary loans. Ultimately, the collection will reinforce the University Library's mission to enhance public understanding of Southeast Asia. The entire Hadler collection has been cataloged for public access at UC Berkeley Library. It includes Jeff's papers, course syllabi, published articles, and any news coverage about him and his students.3
Processing the extensive Hadler Collection from start to finish was truly an insightful experience for me to understand how Jeff curated his very own Southeast Asia collection and why he cared so much about collecting certain types of primary and secondary sources. He certainly acquired everything that he could find on earth about Minangkabau studies, including a few children's books.
Highlights of Jeff's Impactful Library Contributions
Thanks to Jeff's enthusiastic support and encouragement, I was able to organize the "First International Colloquium of the Library of Congress Cooperative Acquisitions Program for Southeast Asia: Rethinking Southeast Asia Collection Development" at UC Berkeley in conjunction with the annual Association for Asian Studies Conference held in San Francisco in April 2006. I invited Jeff to deliver his keynote address on "The Future of Scholarly Research Trends in Southeast Asian Studies" to a national and international cohort of Southeast Asia librarians and administrators. It was a successful international forum that I organized to bring together all the primary stakeholders to share and discuss the landscape of international Southeast Asia collection development trends, challenges, and issues. Jeff's keynote address was published in the CORMOSEA Bulletin 29 (June 2006).
Given Jeff's longstanding interest in having UC Berkeley Library to build a strong collection of retrospective Southeast Asian newsfilm holdings, I invited Jeff to serve as the faculty representative on the Executive Committee of the Southeast Asia Materials Project (SEAM) under the governance of the Center for Research Libraries based in Chicago from 2011 to 2014. He offered recommendations to SEAM for acquiring or filming Southeast Asian newspapers as a national resource. Thanks to Jeff's advice, we have acquired a decent collection of retrospective newsfilm and microfiche holdings for Southeast Asian studies.
In March 2011, I co-chaired a roundtable on "Digital Access to Scholarly Resources on Southeast Asia: Trends and Challenges" for the joint conference of the Association for Asian Studies and International Convention of Asian Scholars at the Hawai'i Convention Center in Honolulu. Jeff was once again invited as the faculty speaker to share his perspective on "Anticipating the 22nd Century Historian's Needs: Archival Priorities Today." Here is his abstract:
"There are obvious and easy targets for digitization: existing state archives, books by leading publishers, and journals. These are all being digitized or are now edited and produced in digital format. For such sources, the question is now one of accessibility. I am more concerned with sources that are considered ephemeral--pamphlets, posters, recordings, zines, comic books, informal publications, personal and village archives, and so forth--texts that can be in fact far more widely-read than official books and journals but are often not collected because they fall outside the bailiwick of the Library of Congress and university libraries and not easily catalogued and stored categories. How do we identify such material, how do we collect it, and how do we digitize it and make it accessible?"
Jeff's insightful questions are ongoing challenges in the field of Southeast Asia collection development with no easy solutions other than keep trying to explore all possible venues in Southeast Asia and beyond. Upon Jeff's persistent request, I ended up taking several library acquisitions trips to Medan, Padang, and Solo in Indonesia and Leiden to search for roman picisan (Indonesian pulp literature) published between late 1930s and early 1940s to support his research project on Indonesian social history during the Dutch colonial era. Regardless of my comprehensive searching, I was unable to collect the original copies of roman picisan but I managed to reproduce photocopies of more than 20 titles (courtesy loan from Jeff's graduate student, Yusmarni Djalius) and cataloged them for public access. Thanks to Jeff's compelling letter of support, the Library of Congress approved the new subject heading "Pulp literature, Indonesian" for cataloging a small collection of UCB roman picisan for public access.
To celebrate the intellectual legacy of Jeffrey Hadler, an exhibition and reception was held at the South/Southeast Asia Library, University of California, Berkeley, on 9 March 2018.
Balinese offering dance performance by Ninik Lunde, Indonesian language lecturer in the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies of UC Berkeley during an event to celebrate Jeffrey Hadler's intellectual legacy in 2018. Photos of the Jeffrey Hadler Collection Memorial Exhibition and Reception Event were taken by J. Pierre Carrillo for the UC Berkeley Library.
Concluding Thoughts
Jeff served as an intellectual beacon and a bridge to the Southeast Asia world for my stewardship. His accumulated library recommendations and referrals, critical selection criteria in terms of contents and format, and constructive criticisms on certain types of library resources provided me with solid knowledge for making sound judgment and prudent decisions on Southeast Asia collection development and management for UC Berkeley Library. His words of wisdom along with a great sense of humor still echo in my heart every now and then: "Don't order this kind of crap, Virginia!" whenever I need to make tough decisions on what to purchase and what to pass.
I am deeply indebted to Jeff for everything he did to nurture my stewardship of building a user-centric Southeast Asia collection and serving the community locally and globally while I was coping with the ups and downs at the South/Southeast Asia Library during my tenure. His vision was to help me build a world-class Southeast Asia collection modeled after the John M. Echols Collection on Southeast Asia that we all cherish at Cornell University.
The South/Southeast Asia Library (S/SEAL), my second home, serves as an endless source of intellectual inspiration and a tranquil oasis for cultivating new minds for the future. I have been fortunate to serve Jeff's undergraduates and graduate students at S/SEAL over the years. I know that Jeff would be pleased to see S/SEAL continue to strive and thrive in the years to come. Jeff's legacy will live on in our hearts and minds timelessly.
Special Acknowledgements
I am forever grateful to the Hadler family for creating the Jeff Hadler Memorial Endowment Fund to support the Southeast Asia collection stewardship and donating the entire personal collection of Jeff to the South/Southeast Asia Library for public access.
Appendices
- Portrait of Professor Jeffrey Alan Hadler4,
- Chronology of Jeffrey Hadler
- Curriculum Vitae of Jeffrey Hadler
- Online Resources about Jeffrey Hadler
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