By the time I arrived in Colombia’s capital for the 2013 Bogotá Book Fair ( Filbo) the book festival had already opened its doors to the public, with a group of SALAMistas among those in attendance. A la caza de los libros noted Wisconsin’s Paloma Celis Carbajal as she joined an eager weekend crowd of book enthusiasts. [...]

The month of February is shorter this year but it brought plenty of visual stimulation: from the Codex International Artist Book Fair right up to the California Antiquarian Book Fair , with several of the same exhibitors and librarians attending both events. On the Fair’s opening day private collectors are among the first to arrive looking for one (or [...]

When the first Codex Artist Book Fair opened in 2007 it was a bold move, probably questioned by those who saw the future of books in anything but the printed word, much less, those handmade, not matter how artistically crafted. Six years later, opening day for Codex IV experienced such a success that organizers ran out of [...]

At 26 you can claim a life of your own and Guadalajara’s 26th International Book Fair (FIL) has certainly lived up to that expectation, having been called the most important book event in the Spanish language by Spain’s leading daily El País, which carried a supplement dedicated to FIL events. This year Chile was the featured country (also [...]

For Chilean publishers this has been a hectic month with both the LIBER-Barcelona and Frankfurt book fairs in October, while preparing for the country’s most important cultural event of the year: the 32nd annual Santiago Book Fair (FILSA). The Fair opened to the public featuring Ecuador’s president not only as the main political figure of [...]

My first LASA conference was in September 1992 in Los Angeles and 20 years later the Latin American Studies Association came back to the Golden State. With over 5,000 attendees, the City by the Bay was to receive a good financial stimulus. These are, after all, tough times for California, where a tax increase is in [...]

In past years, when the Antiquarian Book Fair comes to San Francisco, the rainy weather has been a welcome incentive to spend a weekend indoors discovering the rare, unique, exotic and colorful. This time, a Spring-like sunny morning welcomed the 200 exhibitors from as far away as England. With names like “Cook Book Lady,” and “Vagabond Books,” [...]

The 2011 book fair cycle for Iberoamerica probably started with Havana, whose book festival celebrated its 20th anniversary in February and is often attended by SALALM librarians and book dealers. This year Teresa Chapa (North Carolina) and Eudora Loh (UCLA) were present and went to a satellite book fair in Matanzas, where they also visited Editorial Vigía (home [...]

Even before landing in Guadalajara for the 25th annual Feria Internacional del Libro (FIL) SALALM  was already present via virtual spaces.  On November 16th SALALM’s Webinar Pilot Project Working Group led a online orientation for new FIL attendees for more than  40 virtual participants.  A follow-up session was held in Guadalajara (Sunday November 26) with participation from [...]

More than 150 Spanish information professionals attended the panel discussion ¨Nuevas tecnologías y redes sociales en la labor de los profesionales de la información,¨ organized by Madrid´s SEDIC group (http://www.sedic.es/queessedic.asp) . Several SALALAM members shared their experiences in reaching out to library users both inside and outside library walls ( http://www.sedic.es/nuevas-tecnologias-redes-sociales-oct011.asp). The panel was very well received with [...]

A dozen SALALM members attended ALA’s annual conference in New Orleans this past June. The group’s presence was felt at an ideally located booth, which had a definite local flair with beads and other colorful adornments. The stand was ready for visitors on Friday (6/24) and closed on Monday (6/27). The day before (6/23) SALALM [...]

This morning at the opening ceremony for SALALM’s 56th annual conference Molly Molloy, librarian at New Mexico State University, was honored with the 2011 José Toribio Medina Award . The award recognizes Molly’s outstanding work with the Frontera-List. Victor Federico Torres, chair of the committee, noted that the list “has been hailed as the most comprehensive, up-to-date source of narco-related violence on [...]

Here in in the land of Facebook, Google and Twitter hardly a day goes by without a constant mention of ebooks, social networks or a super-wired generation awaiting the next digital technology. So, when I tried to explain to some friends that I was attending a fair for the book arts and another one for [...]

Some of the very productive discussion that have taken place at SALALM have already been posted by others, but I wanted to share with us all the remarks from SALALM’s president at yesterday’s opening session. “Good morning, bienvenidos, bemvindo, welcome to the 55th meeting of the Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials [...]

After a constant “vaiven” of back to back activities, the 2nd day of SALALM’s internal meetings seemed less hectic but with just as intense discussions on a variety of topics. The “libreros” gathering provided a forum for SALALM’s vendors to address issues like the constant reduction of library budgets (will it ever end?) and how [...]

More than 180 SALALM members (librarians,vendors and visitors) have gathered at Providence for the group’s annual meeting which started on Thursday (July 22nd) and is being hosted by Brown University. SALALM’s professional activities started with two pre-conferences: 1) An eclectic group of 22 SALAMistas enjoyed a unique experience: studying rare books dating back to the [...]

Sunday, April 19th. Not too much traffic on Avenida del Libertador yet. It is, after all, barely past noon on a Sunday. “ Lindo dia ,” I say to the taxi driver, “ es un domingo peronista ,” he replies. When I ask why, he proceeds to tell me how politicians used to gather after a typical Sunday “ asado” and some [...]

Image (http://www.crimethinc.com/blog/category/calling-all-anarchists/) I had almost forgotten about it until a friend asked if I had plans to go to the Anarchist Book Fair . I replied, half jokingly, that the last I time I had been to one, it was an unusually warm day and the not so pleasant smell of body odor, combined with all the [...]

Apple’s iPad was unveiled about 2 weeks before the San Francisco Antiquarian Book Fair . The latter event might almost look anachronistic at a time when e-readers seem to be the “ último alarido de la moda….tecnológica ,” certainly with more potent/newer technologies to come. And yet, for the avid collector/bibliophile, the bi-annual event held in the City by [...]