Supply and
storing directorate
This directorate provides the library with all information materials whether
published printed or hand-written. It undertakes the task of making cultural
good relations with other scientific and cultural centers, so that the
directorate receives from them and sends to them cultural materials. It is a
relation of exchanging books and other written materials and offering
presents. This directorate keeps the legal deposits under the law of legal
deposits that the Syrian cultural productions subject to, every writer or
editor must deposit five copies of his work (immediately after publishing
it) in the Al-Assad national public library.
The library obtains books, materials containing
information, other cultural stuff by buying, exchanging getting presents
(awards) or by the legal deposits. The directorate have the following
departments:
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Supply departments with its sections:
a- Periodicals (papers, magazines).
b- Books.
c- Non printed materials.
-
Legal deposits department.
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Department of exchanging books with other centers and
offering, receiving presents.
This directorate undertakes the job of supervising the
reading halls which contain periodicals [newspapers, magazines, dailies,
weekly---].
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Scripts and
rare books directorate
This directorate collects materials of ancient Arabic legacy and rare books
and keeps them safe, then it prepares the necessary index for them for the
benefit of researchers and those who make studies.
Al-Assad library keeps great collection of scripts. It
obtains them from other public libraries, in addition to scripts written
materials it has received by buying or as rewards. In the early 1999, the
number of scripts amounted to 20000 volumes of written materials with 40000
titles, so its great collections are considered among the best collections
in the Arab world libraries. These scripts have been removed from the
following main libraries to Al-Assad national library as follows:
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From Al-Zahyria public library in Damascus.
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Al-Aoukaf ministry library and Al-Ahmadya library in
Aleppo.
-
Cultural centers libraries all around the country.
-
Museum and monument directorate library.
Other scripts have been came to the national Al-Assad
library by buying or as rewards (present) or by exchanging with other
libraries. There are a collection of rare Arabic and foreign books amounts
to (3000 books) in this directorate.
The directorate of scripts and rare books consists of two
departments:
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Department of studies and inspection which has the
following tasks:
a. Sorting out the scripts and preparing
indexes for them.
b. Preparing lists of those scripts and
archives and store these archives in the
computer to serve the researchers and facilitate the
scientific research.
c. The department produces printed indexes
for every subject of the scripts.
The library has brought out five indexes.
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Storing department: This department consists of four
warehouses to store scripts and rare books under best necessary storing
conditions, that is suitable light and heat, dampness in these warehouses
are adequate to keep scripts from decay.
The hall of reading scripts and rare books has got:
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Drawers containing card indexes of scripts existing in
the library. These indexes and cards are arranged according to subject
author and title.
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Books and indexes of scripts which are available in the
Arabic and the foreign libraries and centers.
In addition to that, if any researcher or any foreign or
Arabic scientific center ask for a script, the library will provide them
with a copy or a photo film of this script preserved in its warehouses.
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Sorting
out and indexing directorate
Its job is to classify and index all contents of the library making and
preparing indexes for them. This directorate implies the following
departments:
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Classification department.
-
Indexes department
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Preparing indexes department, and this department has
three other sections:
a- Printing, copying and photocopying
section.
b- Check and correct.
c- Arranging (labels).
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Borrowing
and lending directorate
Regulations dictate that the lending
to visitors and frequenters system is internal where readers use books
inside the halls of the library. There is no external borrowing system, but
Al-Assad library may borrow books from other libraries and lend to them
according to external borrowing system between Al-Assad library and other
libraries. If any reader wants a book not available, the library borrowing
directorate gets this book from other library and the applicant of the
stated book would bear the cost of posting the book and returning it and pay
(1000 sp) as a pawn.
This directorate
undertakes the task of lending to readers all cultural materials preserved
within the 21 specialized reading halls:
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Literature, languages and religion hall.
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The hall of social sciences, arts, general information.
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Theoretical and applied sciences hall.
-
General hall containing books an all academic subjects
for first year university students.
-
A hall containing the Syrian legislations and laws
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Arabic and foreign ancient journals, magazines, daily
and weekly.
-
The recently issued Arabic and foreign journals,
magazines hall.
-
The UN hall: This hall contains managerial and
scientific reports issued by "the United Nations" and its organizations.
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The computer hall: This hall contains many computer
sets to be used by visitors to the library.
-
The hall of the blind: It contains instruments for the
blind and those who have poor sight, besides instruments to help the
hearing sense, and materials recorded in Bril language for the blind.
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The hall of scripts and rare books, where there is a
special warehouses with specific physical conditions to protect them from
decay.
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The hall of audible and visible instruments (tape -
video tape - films --- etc). This hall is responsible for preserving the
Syrian legacy. Among the contents, there are the Syrian films in
video-tapes, scientific films on video tapes also, paintings, master
pieces of works of art of Syrian painters, films about paintings and
galleries. Various collections of Syrian coins and bank notes (ancient
Syrian currency), collections of various stamps, post cards showing Syrian
places of important value (land marks), in other words historical places
and natural landscape, lectures, folklore music tapes, musical notes by
Syrian musicians, language teaching books for all levels intermediate -
advanced ---, rolls of medical films of surgery. All contents of this hall
are put inside special storage conditions with physical conditions (heat -
damp - light) so that they are preserved from decay.
Concerning the contents of the first, second and third
halls, there are books on the shelves classified according to "Diwi" decimal
classification in alphabetical order. If the book which the reader wants is
not available inside the hall, the reader asks librarian in charge of the
hall to secure it, and he fills a form to get it. The librarian sends the
form to the man in charge of the warehouse who sends it at once. There are
three warehouses in Al-Assad library:
-
The general warehouse which contains:
- The Arabic and foreign books department.
- Arabic and foreign periodicals (monthly or weekly magazines
only) department.
- Academic seminars (studies) department.
-
A warehouse special for the Arabic and foreign
newspapers.
-
A warehouse special for the scripts and the rare books.
The borrowing and lending directorate supplies the
researchers with a special single room for short time to work in their
researches. Besides, the directorate gives a temporary visitor card to
visitors, so that, card holders coming from other countries can make use of
the library services by using this card.
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Directorate
of
Printing, bookbinding, maintenance
Its job is to supervising the works of bookbinding the cultural materials of
the library and make necessary maintenance for them, also supervising
production of the library publications (printing, publishing, copying and
photocopying cultural materials). This directorate has the following
departments:
-
The bookbinding and printing press department:
It stores information on the PC, then put them out in a suitable shape to
print them by using (RIZO) apparatus. In this way printing department
would issue all publications (books, indexes, other written materials) of
the library. The most important among the library publication are:
-
Identification and analysis of Syrian papers and
magazines.
-
Academic studies (seminars).
-
Syrian national bibliography.
-
Script indexes.
-
Al-Assad library
book exhibition guide.
All working staff in this department are trained very
well for doing all these works. Bookbinding department prepares the books
of the library and binds them, it does the job very well (technical
bookbinding). This department offers all things and materials that the
library needs to bind books and make boxes and covers.
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Photocopying department: Its job is to
photocopy, copy all scripts coming into the library from other sources
(script centers) inside and outside the country by exchange and storing
them in archives. Also this department makes photographic copies of
newspapers, magazines and periodical, then it makes copies of them, then
it keeps the copies in special archive (specific film). This department do
services for readers of three kinds [microfilm (16-35 mm) - microfiche
(105 mm) - photocopy] for scientific research. Photocopy services include
books and scripts also. There are single rooms belong to this department,
these rooms contain apparatus and sets to read document films of all
kinds.
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The maintenance department: The aim of this
department is to maintain the ancestor cultural legacy (scripts and rare
books) and historical documents for long as far as possible. For this
reason the people working here try to restore rare books and scripts
without doing any damage to their historic and artistic value or their
format. This process goes through three stages:
-
Sterilizing historical documents.
-
Supervising the warehouses, and making sure that
temperature, air, heat and other suitable storing conditions are
provided in the warehouses of scripts and documents by using the
thermometer.
-
The treatment of papers and covers of the scripts and
documents systematically by using technical methods to get them in best
condition without doing damage to their historical value.
These stages of work are archived by trained working
staff of specialists, technicians and those who do office works.
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Directorate
of media and documentation
Collection and documentation of materials concerning the national cultural
legacy and circulating them nationally and internationally is considered one
of the main tasks Al-Assad national library bears. For this reason, the
library management put a plan to document the intellectual production of
Syria and circulate it periodically to make it known very well around the
Arab world and all over the world also. Media and documentation directorate
issues the following publications:
-
Identification
and analysis of Syrian papers and magazines.
-
Syrian
national bibliography, current and past one.
-
Academic
studies (seminar) list.
This directorate prepares bibliographies, identifications
of written materials and makes necessary studies according to the library
work. The directorate issues a magazine which discusses documentation
matters and running libraries in accord with the library work. The
directorate consists of the following departments:
-
Documentation department: It has the section of
discovering/identification and bibliography section.
-
Media department: Which has two sections, the section
of issuing the magazine and the section of studies.
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Directorate
of management affair
This directorate does the job of planning and making statistics from
libraries, in addition to take over working staff and management staff
affairs taking care of the management and legal matters concerning them. It
supervises the various training courses. This directorate consists of the
following departments: working staff and management staff department - legal
affairs department - management department which consists of: services
section - correspondence office (Diwan) - planning and statistics section.
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Directorate of financial affairs
It does all financial works decided in the balance sheet of the library,
besides that this directorate has to secure all things required for the work
in the library. This directorate implies the following departments: contract
department - accounting and requirements department. The department of
accounting includes: balance sheet (budget) section - necessary things
section.
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Directorate
of cultural activities
This directorate has several tasks: it organizes cultural activities taking
place in the library. It has to organize visitations to the library and
reception for those visitors who want to look over and go sight seeing all
around the library and visitors who want to know something about services
and important places in it. This directorate consists of: cultural activity
and public relations.
The library does cultured activities continually; this
directorate holds scientific, cultural and intellectual forums, and arranges
giving lectures, poetic meetings, cinema shows. This directorate organizes
different art gallery and other artistic exhibition, musical concerts. It
organizes book exhibitions especially the Arabic book exhibition which the
library organizes on 15 the October every year. Many foreign Arabic
publication book centers and book agencies. This yearly book fair would be
accompanied by a distinctive cultural (forum meeting) of Arabic and Syrian
intellectuals and researchers lecturing in it.
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Directorate
of technical affairs
This directorate does all the maintenance and repairing works, whether
periodic or emergent, including the maintenance of electrical equipments,
heating, air-condition apparatus, electronic and computer sets, also the
maintenance of the buildings [painting, repairing, carpentry works---] of
the library and the furniture, maintenance of drainage. This directorate has
got five departments of all trades and specializations:
-
Electrical department.
-
Heating, air-conditioning department.
-
Construction works and other works of building
maintenance.
-
Sanitary fittings maintenance.
-
Electronic sets maintenance.
Men in office in this directorate make extension and
expansion in the buildings of the library and some necessary changes for the
necessities of work.
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Directorate of
the general manager office
This directorate pursues implementing the general manager's instructions by
other directorates, also pursuing implementing of other institution outside
and inside Syria there instructions. This directorate does the jobs the
general manager charges him to, these jobs want coordination between various
directorates in the library.
This directorate has the following departments:
-
The central computer: All computer sets and
equipments are connected with the central computer department. Technical
staff here do all maintenance and check services for all computer sets in
the library. The technical specialists copy (statements and information)
and other materials stored into computers to get spare copies. They also
conduct training courses for workers of the library to learn them to use
computer.
-
The storing information department: Its job is
to store information of books indexes and their cards and periodical cards
into computer by using terminals connecting with the central computer.
-
Information about the library book fair department:
In this department the officials store information about the yearly
organized book exhibition into computer. This information comprises of a
wide database containing book titles, publication centers, addresses of
the publication centers or companies and book prices.
-
The department of enquiry: It is required of
this department to help readers find what they want concerning books and
help them search in the book indexes automatically through computer
screens connected with the central computer.
-
Information technology service department: This
department offers services concerning internet. It enables researchers and
visitors to the library to make use of the world wide web (internet), so
that they can download information from the web through databases the
library has participated in (online service) besides, in the department
visitors and others can get help when they want to enquire about the
leader Al-Assad's speeches database, or laws and legislations issued since
1918 database. Here specialists help visitors make use of the library
software and get what they want from index database, script database.
There are many useful CDs contain geographic, historical, scientific,
cultural encyclopedia. Various CDs containing databases and software all
these have been being updated continuously.
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