LLAS Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies

Michael Peto photographic collection

Michael Peto came to Britain from Hungary in 1939. He was a freelance journalist with the Observer newspaper, and travelled extensively, covering the work of the Save the Children Fund around the world. Other aspects of his work involved the arts, especially the London ballet scene. Major topics covered by the collection (which consists of some 130,000 items) thus include Eastern Europe, Israel, India, ballet and theatre and Scotland, as well as leading political, literary and entertainment figures.

Mapping the World: collaborative support for research on overseas mapping

The aim of this project is to open up a major under-used resource for research in a wide range of disciplines in the Humanities and Social Sciences by targeted series-level cataloguing of post-1850 overseas mapping. This will facilitate remote access to key materials by converting map library catalogue records, which at present are held on cards and accessible only to researchers visiting the libraries in person. The areas of coverage include Africa, North and South America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand as well as much of Asia and the Middle East. The individual countries covered range from the tiniest Pacific islands to the vast areas of British Antarctica, from Mediterranean islands such as Cyprus and Malta to countries the size of Nigeria and Canada. Initially, different areas of the world were allocated to each partner but now each institution can also derive CURL records for areas already covered. For example, six libraries have completed work on Australia, Iran, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.