Cool Libraries in a Melting World

23rd Polar Libraries Colloquy

Registration closed!

June 13 - 18, 2010
Bremerhaven, Germany

Willkommen in Bremerhaven! Welcome to Bremerhaven!

The 23rd Polar Libraries Colloquy will be held Sunday, 13 through Friday, 18 June 2010 in Bremerhaven. Germany.

The theme for the conference is "Cool Libraries in a Melting World".

We all know how the polar regions are both affected by Global Warming. In the Arctic, communities living in the permafrost regions are especially confronted with lots of problems and it would be interesting to have some 'close-up' reports from the 'melting front' there.

The theme also touches the financial crises, in which funds and grants for libraries (public and academic) are melting away - How are colleagues dealing with these cuts and constraints?

The Colloquy always has a wide range of topics and some suggested so far include:

• What about the preservation of the cultural heritage of the people living in the North? How do libraries manage their collections of photographs, films and oral recordings.
• Is Polar Science covered sufficiently well by the existing journals? How do specialised polar journals fare against the disciplinary ones?
• How are libraries and archives "reaching out" to others beyond their main constituencies? What is new technology doing for the libraries and how can collections be used in innovative ways for teaching and public interactions?
• 2010  is the centenary of the dash for the South Pole by Scott and Amundsen What are libraries doing to highlight  the heroic age of polar exploration and using the opportunity to explain modern conditions of polar explorations and its importance in global science?

Further possible topics may include adaptations to change, (which libraries have developed: innovative and customized services such as data publishing, data curation, repositories) the growing role of ebooks, the importance of collaborations and understanding the changing approach of researchers to libraries.

The Steering Committee would welcome other ideas and suggestions!

Conference sessions will include panel discussions of current topics, research presentations, and a conference field trip. There will be many opportunities for networking with fellow polar librarians and information specialists.

Our host is the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI).

Marcel Brannemann, conference convenor