Author Archives: Peter Lor

About Peter Lor

Peter Johan Lor is a Netherlands-born South African librarian and academic. In retirement he continues to pursue scholarly interests as a research fellow in the Department of Information Science at the University of Pretoria, South Africa.

La biblioteconomia comparata: New Italian contribution to comparative librarianship

Posted on 2024-05-02 by Peter Lor

Bilotta, Anna. 2022. Principi, approcci e applicazioni della biblioteconomia comparata. Florence: Firenze University Press. It’s difficult to keep up with all the topics I would like to blog about. Often interesting opportunities pass by uncommented. But better late than never, … Continue reading →

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Global Gleanings # 19: More disruption: perplexity and ‘burstiness’

Posted on 2024-04-01 by Peter Lor

This column of news, views and snippets from the international literature of books, libraries, and information, appeared in the March 2024 issue of LIASA-in-Touch, the quarterly newsletter of the Library and Information Association of South Africa. Since I wrote about … Continue reading →

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Sjoerd Koopman’s Library Postcard Collection

Posted on 2024-01-18 by Peter Lor

My friend and former colleague, Sjoerd Koopman, retired in 2010 as Director of Professional Programmes at the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA). A great communicator, throughout his career Sjoerd built up an extensive network of colleagues and … Continue reading →

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Global Gleanings #18: From Paris to King Louis I

Posted on 2023-12-20 by Peter Lor

This quarterly column of news, views and snippets from the international literature of books, libraries, and information, appeared in the December 2023 issue of LIASA-in-Touch, the newsletter of the Library and Information Association of South Africa.   It all happened … Continue reading →

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Global Gleanings #17: South African contributions to the international LIS literature

Posted on 2023-09-07 by Peter Lor

This quarterly column of news, views and snippets from the international literature of books, libraries, and information, appears in LIASA-in-Touch, the newsletter of the Library and Information Association of South Africa. Lost to local colleagues? Many scholars in the Global … Continue reading →

Posted in Research, South Africa, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Update on Satellite meeting of IFLA Library History SIG

Posted on 2023-07-24 by Peter Lor

The latest and final programme has been released at http://expositions.mundaneum.org/en/conference/preserving-our-origins-world-library-and-information-congress. A reduced student registration fee has been introduced. At EUR 60 it includes refreshments, coffee breaks and lunch on Thursday 17 August and Friday 18 August.    

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Satellite Meeting of IFLA’s Library History Special Interest Group

Posted on 2023-07-17 by Peter Lor

Are you interested in the Belle Époque, internationalism, and the history and archival sources of libraries, library associations, documentation and information science more generally?  Here is an update on an upcoming meeting, announced earlier, which you should not miss. From … Continue reading →

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A Milestone: Danton’s Dimensions of Comparative Librarianship published 50 years ago

Posted on 2023-06-15 by Peter Lor

The 1970s saw the publication of several noteworthy contributions to the theory and methodology of comparative librarianship. The first was Simsova and MacKee’s (1970) Handbook of comparative librarianship, a pioneering but ultimately disappointing work, of which a revised edition followed … Continue reading →

Posted in Comparative Librarianship, Library history | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Global Gleanings # 16: More disruption: chatbots in the news

Posted on 2023-06-10 by Peter Lor

This quarterly column of news, views and snippets from the international literature of books, libraries, and information, appears in LIASA-in-Touch, the newsletter of the Library and Information Association of South Africa. Generative artificial intelligence What is ChatGPT?At time of writing … Continue reading →

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IFLA Satellite Conference at the Mundaneum

Posted on 2023-05-31 by Peter Lor

I’m delighted to share that the IFLA Library History Special Interest Group has organized a Satellite Conference to be held from 17 to 19 August, in Mons, Belgium. The Satellite Conference will immediately precede IFLA’s 2023 World Library and Information … Continue reading →

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