Page 7 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2018 Vol. 43

FAN Bingsi / A review of the theory of Library Science in China: 1956-2016 007

Besides work studies, news reports contributed a fairly large proportion of academic papers in
journals, which is one of characteristics of the primary stage of theoretical development. In 1957
the Bulletin of the China Society of Library Science published papers introducing the United
Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and library activities in other countries.
In addition to socialist countries such as the Soviet Union and East European countries, other
countries included the United States (Testing on Book Circulation by Fax in America), the United
Kingdom (On Union Catalog of Periodicals in the United Kingdom), Denmark (Denmark Shoot
a Film on Open Shelves), Japan (Survey of Academic Libraries in Japan), India (News of Indian
Library Community), Indonesia (Public Libraries in Indonesia) and so on. Short as they were,
those papers were hard to come by considering historical environment. For example, in A summary
of revision of DDC—a translation of the paper from Cataloging & Classification Quarterly,
Zhang Zunjian introduced academic controversies over the fourteenth edition of Dewey Decimal
Classification and the Library of Congress became the editor of the sixteenth edition (Z.J. Zhang,
1957). This paper was of great value to keep abreast of theoretical progress of international library
classifications. It was regretful that introduction of overseas libraries were limited to socialist
countries in 1958.
Library Science was enjoying the theoretical boom in this period. Papers were abundant with
shining points and had been spoken highly of by later generations. Among papers published, except
those of criticism and those related to political issues (such as Marching towards Science and
Great Leap Forward), studies on five domains attracted attention, namely theoretic foundation of
Library Science, history of libraries, union catalog, library classification and classical literature. Of
the five domains, study on history of libraries was represented by Xie Zhuohua’s study on Guyue
Cang Shu Lou and study on classical literature was represented by Wang Zhongmin’s study on Qi
Lüe. Because of studies on the two domains often referred to by later generations and their lack of
comparable international context, this paper will not elaborate on them. Analyzing the other three
domains—theoretic foundation of Library Science, union catalog and library classification from
the perspectives of history of Chinese Library Science and development of international Library
Science, the Library Science during the years 1956-1966 remained for ten years at a standstill.

1.1 Theoretic foundation of Library Science

Discussion over the object of study falls within the category of theoretic foundation of Library
Science. The publication of Liu Guojun’s What’s Library Science in 1957 had provoked discussion
and made the study on what was Library Science highly approved in the history of Library Science.
In fact it had made quite limited contribution to theoretical progress. What’s Library Science puts
forward five elements which were born in the 1920s. Liu’s contribution lied in that he expanded
the number of elements to five. Progress as it was, it was not subversive. Furthermore, being
criticized over and over again, the insignificant progress the What’s Library Science had made was