Suzine Har Nicolescu

Suzine Har Nicolescu (March 21, 1931 – February 22, 2013) was an American librarian who was one of the founders of the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA). She served fourteen years as the chief librarian at Medgar Evers College and fought against discrimination in the library profession.

Early life and education Suzine Har was born in Seoul, Korea on March 21, 1931.

She earned a bachelor's degree at Ewha Womans University, as well as two master's degrees from the University of Denver: a Master of Library Science and a Master in Modern Languages/Literatures and Comparative Linguistics. She later went on to earn a Ph.D. in Library Information Systems from Simmons College.

Personal life Suzine Har arrived in the United States on October 3, 1954, arriving in Anchorage, Alaska, on a flight from Tokyo, Japan. She married Alexander Nicolescu on June 23, 1957, in Denver, Colorado.

Library career Nicolescu worked in the University of Denver library for two years as a cataloger/bibliographer. She worked as an associate librarian/senior cataloger at the library at SUNY at Stony Brook.

Along with fellow librarian Henry Chang, Nicolescu directed a needs assessment study for the National Commission on Libraries and Information Science Task Force on Improving Library and Information Services to Cultural Minorities. Focusing on the information needs of the Asian American community, they surveyed 240 public libraries in urban areas. Nicolescu also lectured in Korea and other Asian countries as part of her grant.

Nicolescu talked openly about librarianship as one of the lowest paid professions, and lamented the fact that the compensation of women librarians remained far below that of men with equal responsibility. She worked to call out discrimination where she saw it and confront it with patience, objectivity, and effort. She encouraged librarians from around the world to unite in pursuing common goals such as equal access to information.

Nicolescu died February 22, 2013, in Chevy Chase, Maryland.