LibGuides: Anthropology Senior Seminar: Archival Research

Approaches to Finding Primary Sources

The "primaryness" of a source emerges in relation to the researcher's engagement with it. The UC Berkeley Libraries define primary sources as "either created during the time period being studied or...created at a later date by a participant in the events being studied (as in the case of memoirs)."

(source: Finding Historical Primary Sources: Getting Started, last updated 8/12/18, http://guides.lib.berkeley.edu/c.php?g=4409&p=15606)

When determining primary sources for your research, it's helpful to give yourself a historical context that defines your search. This could be a range of dates. It could also be determined by geographical sites of origin. It could further be specified by the kind of creator(s) or audience(s) you are interested in. You might also be interested in a specific type of source in terms of genre or format. Some examples include:

photographs
diaries
newspaper articles
advertisements
films
web sites
sound recordings
government documents
works of art

Databases and digital repositories can offer a multitude of paths to potential primary source material for your research. In addition, try searches for published works in CLIO, limited by date of publication. Finally, see below for tips on researching in archives and special collections.

Archives

According to the Barnard Archives Research Guide Archival Research at Barnard and Beyond, which I recommend for its resources and strong conceptual foundations for archival research, "Archives and archival collections are unique constellations of unpublished records made in the course of normal activities. Archives are comprised of primary sources, but not all primary sources are archival."

When doing research that involves primary sources, you might be interested in visiting an archival collection.

To explore what's available in archival collections at Barnard and Columbia, you can start with a CLIO Archives search. Use keywords that might map onto areas that interest you (including names of possible creators of records, subjects/themes, places).

Archive Grid lets you keyword search collection descriptions from archives around the world. Entries provide contact information and links to relevant web sites. You can narrow your search to archives in the New York City area.

Archivistas en Espanglish is a collective of transnational Latin American & Latinx archivists and cultural workers that aims to incubate and amplify spaces of memory-building within las Américas. From their website: "we center the lived and intersectional histories and experiences of nuestros pueblos & communities as they exist: past, present & future." AE's web site has an abundance of amazing resources related to Latin American and Latinx archives and memory work (in particular, look at the Recursos section!)

Digital Collections and Databases for Digitized Archival Sources

Barnard Archives Digital Collections
You can access the digital collections of Barnard Archives here. Our Digital Collections feature a small fraction of our collections, including the yearbook, the Barnard Bulletin, student publications, and some photographs, with more added daily.

Border and Migration Studies Online
This collection of primary source documents, archives, films, and ephemera relate to significant border areas and events from the 19th to 21st centuries. It offers historical context and resources, from both personal and institutional perspectives, to the growing fields of border(land) studies and migration studies, as well as history, law, politics, diplomacy, area and global studies, anthropology, medicine, the arts, and more. Includes text, video, and images. Materials in the collection are organized around fundamental themes of Border Identities, Border Enforcement and Control, Border Disputes, Border Criminologies, Maritime Borders, Human Trafficking, Sea Migration, Undocumented and Unauthorized Migration, and Global Governance of Migration.

British Library Digital Collections
Includes digitized historic manuscripts from the British Library, along with sound recordings, maps, and more.
Digital Public Library of America
A portal to the digitized collections of various institutions across the nation, including millions of photographs, documents, books, audio materials, and moving images.

HathiTrust Digital Library
As a digital repository for the nation's great research libraries, HathiTrust brings together the immense collections of partner institutions. It provides long-term preservation and access services for public domain and in copyright content from a variety of sources, including Google, the Internet Archive, Microsoft, and in-house partner institution initiatives.

Library of Congress, Digital Collections
The Library of Congress Digital Collections database offers a wide variety of public domain media materials created on behalf of, or collected by, the federal government. Items include historic maps, photographs, musical scores, oral histories, full text documents, and much more.

Periodicals Archive Online
Archive of hundreds of digitized journals published in the arts, humanities and social sciences.
Royal Anthropological Institute Archive
This collection of digitized primary sources provides access to more than 150 years of the longest-established association dedicated to the furtherance of anthropology in its broadest sense. Accessible through the Wiley Digital Archives platform, the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland's unique collection of association files, manuscripts, and photos, documents the history of the association, as well as the services it provided to contemporary anthropology and anthropologists.
Royal Geographical Society (with IBG)
This database offers the digitized archives of the Royal Geographical Society from 1478 to 1953, and contains a range of primary sources, searchable manuscripts, correspondence, reports, conference papers, proceedings, maps, charts, atlases, photographs, surveys, data and ephemera produced by the researchers and members of RGS. The history of geography throughout the British Empire in all its aspects is represented in this collection, which also focuses on environmental history, exploration, colonization and decolonization, anthropology, law, climate science, gender studies and cartography. The content is presented as digital images, with searchable text and metadata, on a platform which allows for visual and textual analyses
Sex & sexuality
"This resource explores changing attitudes towards human sexuality, gender and sexual behaviors, in America and beyond, throughout the Twentieth Century. Sex & Sexuality provides unprecedented access to a wealth of essential primary sources collated by prominent sex researchers and sexologists. This unique collaboration with the Kinsey Institute Library and Special Collections presents correspondence, research papers and records spanning the tenures of the first three Institute directors; Dr Alfred C. Kinsey (1947-1956), Dr Paul H. Gebhard (1956-1982) and Dr June Reinisch (1982-1993). Trace key Institutional developments, the research agendas of leading specialists in diverse fields such as criminology, medicine, anthropology and sexology and discover the evolving public interest in human sexuality and identity."