Wednesday, June 1, 2022

617 CALA (Chinese American Librarian Association and China and the Founding of the United States

Next year will be 50th anniversary of CALA. Chinese American Librarians Association (CALA) started March 31, 1973 by Dr. Tze-Chung Li and Dorothy Li, as Mid-West Chinese American Librarians Association, a regional organization in Illinois. A year later, Chinese Librarians Association was formed in California in 1974. In 1976, Mid-West Chinese American Librarians Association was expanded to a national organization as Chinese American Librarians Association. By 1979, CALA had five chapters in Northeast, Mid-West, Atlantic, Southwest and California respectively. Chinese American Librarians Association and Chinese Librarians Association were merged in 1983. The merged organization retains CALA's English name and Chinese Librarians Association's Chinese name 華人圖書館員協會. CALA is a registered nonprofit organization with 501(c)3 tax exempt status. Currently, CALA has eight chapters as follows: Greater Mid-Atlantic (GMA), Midwest Chapter (MW), Northeast Chapter (NE), Northern California Chapter (NCA), Southern California Chapter (SCA), Southeast Chapter (SE), Southwest Chapter (SW) and Canada Chapter. In its newsletter, fall 2021 a brief introduction to Dr. Dave Wang's book was published. Below is the snapshot of the article penned by Fu Zhuo, a wellknown teaching librarian in university of Missuri-Kansas.