Alliance Française and Goethe Institut, Glasgow

After a very long journey I finally managed to arrive in the Alliance Française and the Goethe Institut.

Both centres are held in the same building, on Park Circus, not that far from the University of Glasgow main campus.

The way the space are used there is great: it looks welcoming rather than scholarly and I think it is perfectly adapted to the public using both centres. Some spaces allow one to one conversation with presentation of the latest library purchases.

Some others, more traditional, are class settings, but with a very different feel, again, from a university class setting.

and of course, there are two libraries! :-)

I tried my best German with Silvia Harris, the lovely library assistant in the Goethe Institut library and I was very impressed with the tidiness of the place.

It was also nice to see that the Goethe Institut continues to have its own film and documentary collections.

Silvia and I spoke of the great chance of having ERASMUS helpers. Silvia started only in September this year but was working with a German ERASMUS who was fantastic.

Then I spend some time in the French library with Patrick Landri, Head of Library and we spoke about the library users interest, there is a desire to learn French with audio and Patrick invested in Michael Thomas and the like.

There is quite an impressive collection of magazines, provided by the Alliance Française network.

As I mentioned to Patrick that I was quite sure I heard some Russian earlier, he agreed that many foreigners are coming here to learn languages. The community of users is definitely international!

What I have found really lovely is that the space is shared nicely between the two institutions. When, for example, the assistant needs to take a break, she can tell the other assistant in the other library to look after the space for her.