Ambeth Ocampo, historian and chair of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts, writes the following in "Crime and punishment in Spanish times" (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 26 August 2005):
Students do not need to waste their time on memory work. The more important skill they should learn is to know where to find the answers to nagging questions in a library or the Internet...It's good to know that librarians have columnist-friends who understand the need for information literacy and what it is that librarians actually do.
Even professional Filipiniana librarians smile when I tell them how much I have enjoyed browsing through the basic references on the Spanish period: Wenceslao Emilio Retana's handsome three-volume "Aparato bibliografico de la historia general de Filipinas" (Barcelona, 1906), Trinidad H. Pardo de Tavera's "Biblioteca Filipina" (Washington, 1903) and last but not least Jose Toribio Medina's "Imprenta de Manila desde sus origenes hasta 1810" (Santiago de Chile 1896).
Incidentally, Ocampo will be one of the speakers at a symposium on "The State of Filipiniana Indigenous Materials," which will be held at the World Trade Center, Buendia cor. Roxas Boulevard, Pasay City, on August 31, 1:00 pm. Other speakers are: Fr. Angel Aparicio (Prefect of Libraries, UST), Prudenciana Cruz (Director, National Library) and Salvacion Arlante (University Librarian, UP Diliman). There is a registration fee of P100 for non-members, or P50 for members and library science students.
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