Be Prepared | Yasutake Miyashiro, Director of the Media Center / Associate Professor, Faculty of Policy Management
2025.03.18
The spirits of the written word whisper in the library night after night. Such a rumor spreads in the court of the ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh. Though called a library, it was from an era when cuneiform script was inscribed on clay tablets. At the command of King Ashurbanipal, an old scholar begins to study these spirits. Ever since writing became widespread, people have stopped using their heads. Our country is being corrupted by the spirits of the written word. If we do not reform our reckless worship of writing, we will surely come to regret it. The old scholar reports this, but he incurs the displeasure of the king, a man of high culture. While under house arrest, a great earthquake strikes the area around Nineveh, and the old scholar, who was in the archives, is crushed by hundreds of clay tablets amidst the echoing curses of the spirits of the written word (Atsushi Nakajima, "Mojika").
Clay tablets are certainly more fire-resistant than papyrus, but if a mass of them were to fall from above, most people would not stand a chance. However, this does not mean that paper books are safe. If a hardcover book slips from your hand and falls on the top of your foot, even a single volume can be quite painful. Even lightweight paperbacks become considerably heavy when their numbers increase. It is always better to be cautious.
During the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, although Keio University's various media centers were fortunate to have no injuries, the damage to materials, facilities, and systems was not insignificant. The damage to materials is said to have been particularly severe at the SFC Media Center. Despite the fact that considerable earthquake countermeasures had already been implemented, a massive number of materials (said to be approximately 200,000 volumes by one account) fell from the bookshelves on the second and third floors. Even with support from staff from other campuses, it was not until March 31 that all materials could be returned to their original positions, forcing the center to remain closed until then. Similarly, at the Library of Nursing and Medical Care, also on SFC, about half of all materials fell from the shelves 1 . Photographs remain of the fallen materials at the SFC Media Center (the "Mu Building") 2 .
At the SFC Media Center, some bookshelves are now equipped with anti-fall bars. The same is true for the Library of Nursing and Medical Care. When tremors of a certain magnitude are detected, these bars activate automatically to prevent materials from falling. In addition to the bars, several other preventive measures have been implemented. However, depending on the seismic intensity, it is difficult to completely prevent books and other items from falling. If you feel a tremor, there is no need to play the part of the old Assyrian scholar. The basic rule is to move away from the bookshelves immediately 3 .
Furthermore, the people inside the library are not necessarily SFC students, faculty, staff, or researchers. Since the fall of 1991, the SFC Media Center has maintained a mutual cooperation agreement with the Fujisawa City Library. Under specified conditions, we allow residents and employees of Fujisawa City to borrow from our collection and use the library on-site (conversely, SFC members can also use the Fujisawa City Library). The SFC Media Center is the only one within Keio University that engages in this form of community partnership. The annual number of visitors from neighboring areas is not small, and it is essential to also focus on disaster prevention and mitigation measures that take this into account.
Due to their nature, there are calls for public libraries to serve as community hubs for disaster prevention and recovery. As a university library, the SFC Media Center could also have other roles. Fortunately, SFC brings together faculty and students conducting a wide variety of research. Taking just the issue of safety within the library, matters that might go unnoticed by those inside the SFC Media Center will surely emerge when viewed from multiple perspectives. While actively leveraging the unique characteristics of SFC, we want to further advance our earthquake preparedness in this place of research and education.
1 Hideyuki Seki, "On the Damage to the Media Centers from the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Measures Taken," *MediaNet* 18 (2011), pp. 58-59 (downloadable from the webpage at the following URL: MediaNet >> No. 18 2011 >> Contents , accessed March 11, 2025). Keio University Library History II Editorial Committee, ed. (2023), *"History of the Keio University Library II"*, Keio University Media Center, pp. 172-173, p. 288 (downloadable from the Keio Associated Repository of Academic Resources (KOARA): Keio Associated Repository of Academic Resources (KOARA) - XooNIps , accessed March 11, 2025).
2 SFC Media Center X (@sfc_mediacenter), 3:15 p.m., March 10, 2023, (accessed March 11, 2025). Campus Photo Exhibition "30 Years of Shonan Fujisawa Campus in Photographs" and Materials Exhibition "SFC Collection" ("2010-2019") (accessed March 11, 2025).
3 SFC Media Center X (@sfc_mediacenter), 1:03 p.m., May 27, 2023, (accessed March 11, 2025).