LibGuides: MC 281: Immigrants, Minorities & American Pluralism: Selected Primary Source Collections

Selected Primary Source Collections

American Memory (Library of Congress)
American Memory provides free and open access through the Internet to written and spoken words, sound recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps, and sheet music that document the American experience.

Music Online: American Music
American Song is a history database that includes songs by and about American Indians, miners, immigrants, slaves, children, pioneers, and cowboys. Included in the database are the songs of Civil Rights, political campaigns, Prohibition, the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, anti-war protests, and more.
Black Thought and Culture
The Black Thought and Culture collection is intended for research in black studies, political science, American history, music, literature, and art. The collection begins with the works of Frederick Douglass and is targeted to include the works of W.E.B. Du Bois, Carter G. Woodson, Alain Locke, Mary McLeod Bethune, Booker T. Washington, Marcus Garvey, Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, Ralph Bunche, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., Angela Davis, Houston Baker, Jesse Jackson, Ida B. Wells, Bobby Seale, and many others.
LGBT Thought and Culture
LGBT Thought and Culture is an online resource hosting books, periodicals, and archival materials documenting LGBT political, social and cultural movements throughout the twentieth century and into the present day.
North American Indian Thought and Culture
This fifth release of North American Indian Thought and Culture contains over 119,000 pages of text and images. Included are biographies, auto-biographies, personal narratives, speeches, diaries, letters, and oral histories.

The Chinese in California, 1850-1925
Illustrates 19th and early 20th century Chinese immigration to California through about 8,000 images and pages of primary source materials. These documents describe the experiences of Chinese immigrants in California, including the nature of inter-ethnic tensions. They also document the specific contributions of Chinese immigrants to commerce and business, architecture and art, agriculture and other industries, and cultural and social life in California.
Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930
A web-based collection of historical materials from Harvard's libraries, archives, and museums that documents voluntary immigration to the United States from the signing of the Constitution to the onset of the Great Depression, concentrating heavily on the 19th century.
The Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers Project
Secondary sources on Marcus Garvey and primary documents written by Garvey during the period of the Harlem Renaissance.Provided by the UCLA African Studies Center.

North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories
North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries and Oral Histories includes 2,162 authors and approximately 100,000 pages of information, so providing a unique and personal view of what it meant to immigrate to America and Canada between 1800 and 1950.
Periodicals Archive Online
Periodicals Archive Online provides researchers with access to more than 200 years of scholarship, spread across a wide variety of subject areas.

Papers of the NAACP: Personal Correspondence of Selected NAACP Officials
Microfilm records of the NAACP, 1919-1939. Microfilm Number 17015a (2 West, Microforms Library)
The complete list of papers available can be found by searching the library catalog by title for "Papers of the NAACP". Use the reel guides to determine which reels are of most use: E185.5.N276 L473 Pt.2, (2 West, Microform Guides).

Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600 - 2000
Women and Social Movements is organized around the history of women in social movements in the U.S., and covers dates between 1700 and 2000.
Everyday Life and Women in America, 1800-1920
Comprises thousands of fully searchable images (alongside transcriptions) of monographs, pamphlets, periodicals and broadsides addressing political, social and gender issues, religion, race, education, employment, marriage, sexuality, home and family life, health, and pastimes.
ProQuest History Vault. Struggle for Women's Rights, Organizational Records, 1880-1990
Comprised of records of three important women’s rights organizations: the National Woman’s Party, the League of Women Voters, and the Women’s Action Alliance.

Nexis Uni
The LEXIS service contains major archives of federal and state case law, continuously updated statutes of all 50 states, state and federal regulations and public records from major U.S. states. The NEXIS service is a leading news and business information service which contains more than 7,100 sources, of which 3,700 provide their entire publications online.
ProQuest Congressional
A broad range of Congressional information is provided including bill tracking, Committee reports, House and Senate documents, Member financial disclosures, campaign finance data, and bill texts. MSU Access also includes the U.S. Serial Set, which contains an enormous number of reports and miscellaneous documents from government agencies that report to Congress.

HathiTrust Digital Library
Contains the books digitized by Google from the CIC/Big Ten university libraries, University of California system, many American East coast university libraries and others, Full texts with full text searchability for items published prior to 1923. Also contains a catalog of the works included. HT items are also present, individually, in the MSU LIbraries online catalog.
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, is building a digital library of Internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. Free access to all!