Research & Subject Guides: Asian American Studies: Primary Sources & Research Websites

General Primary Source Databases

America's Historical Newspapers 1755-1922. Fulltext. More than 135 historic newspapers from all 50 states. Titles include The Liberator, William Lloyd Garrison's anti-slavery newspaper; New Orleans Daily Creole, the first African-American newspaper in America; Siwinowe Kesibwi (Shawnee Star), the first newspaper printed wholly in a Native American language; and the Maryland Gazette, the oldest continuously published newspaper in America. Regional newspapers include The New York Herald, Irish World, and Jewish Daily News.
American Periodicals Fulltext. 1741-1930. Over 1,100 American magazines spanning 200 years and covering nearly every aspect of American culture, especially its history, science, literature, music, legal structures, agriculture, theater, and politics. Titles range from Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine (first published in 1741) and America's first scientific journals, Medical Repository, as well as Scientific American, to literary and professional journals, specialized titles, and such well-known popular magazines as Vanity Fair, Ladies' Home Journal and The Dial.
Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) Brings together the collections of America’s libraries, archives, and museums, and makes them freely available to the world. It strives to contain the full breadth of human expression, from the written word, to works of art and culture, to records of America’s heritage, to the efforts and data of science.
Gale Primary Sources Provides access and simultaneous cross searching of six Gale primary source databases: The 17th and 18th Century Burney Collection, Eighteenth Century Collections Online, The Making of the Modern World, The Times Digital Archive, Sabin Americana, 1500-1926, Eighteenth Century Collections Online, and Witchcraft in Europe and America (Archives Unbound). Gale Primary Sources also allows researchers to visualize search data by term frequency. Researchers can search all six databases at once using this portal, or access each individually by visiting the appropriate page in the A-Z list.
National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) NARA has preserved and provided access to the records of the United States of America for more than seven decades. Records help us claim our rights and entitlements, hold our elected officials accountable for their actions, & document our history as a nation. In short, NARA ensures continuing access to the essential documentation of the rights of American citizens and the actions of their Government. NARA is the keeper of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.
New York Times (Historical) Coverage: 1851-3 years ago. Online access to page images and fulltext articles from the New York Times as far back as the first issue.
North American Women's Letters and Diaries Colonial-1950. Fulltext primary sources. The experiences of 1,325 women in 150,000 pages of diaries and letters. Includes biographies and an extensive annotated bibliography of the sources.
Oral History Online Fulltext and citations. Indexes more than 2,700 collections of Oral History in English from around the world. Contains almost 281,000 pages of full-text by close to 10,000 individuals from all walks of life. Also has pointers to 4,100 audio and video files.

Stony Brook University Special Collections and University Archives Contains thousands of items including manuscripts, books, maps, photographs, and more.

Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000 1600-2000. Fulltext primary sources. Women's reform activities in the U.S. from colonial times to the present. Includes books, pamphlets, images, documents, scholarly essays, commentaries, and bibliographies.

World Digital Library The World Digital Library (WDL) is a project of the U.S. Library of Congress, carried out with the support of the United Nations Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (UNESCO), and in cooperation with libraries, archives, museums, educational institutions, and international organizations from around the world. The WDL makes it possible to discover, study, and enjoy cultural treasures and significant historical documents on one site, in a variety of ways. Content on the WDL includes books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, journals, prints and photographs, sound recordings, and films.

Asian American Research Websites

Archival Research: Japanese American Experiences during WWII National Archives records of primary sources.

artasiamerica Historical image and document archive specialized in Asian American visual culture from 1945 to the present.

Asian American Archival Collections List of Asian American archival collections by University of Southern California Libraries.

Chinese Railroad Workers in North America Project at Stanford University Primary and secondary sources, including bibliography, digitized documents, and oral history interviews.

Densho Digital Repository The Densho Digital Repository of Japanese American experiences, primary sources.

Japanese American National Museum Museum in Los Angeles with several primary source exhibits that can be explored online.

Interfaith Center of New York Religious issues surrounding current events in and beyond New York City.

Library of Congress Digital Collections Features wide array of primary sources on Asian Americans, including audio, video, photographs, documents, and more.

Museum of Chinese in America Museum in New York City preserving and presenting history, culture, and experiences of Americans born of Chinese descent. Features an array of digital primary resources, including photographs, oral history interviews, documents, and more.

Organization of Chinese Americans Advancing the social, political, and economical well-being of Asian Pacific Americans.

SEAAdoc: Documenting the Southeast Asian American Experience Primary sources on the post-1975 refugees and immigrants from Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam and the communities they have developed in the United States.

South Asian American Digital Archive Primary sources on the South Asian diaspora in the U.S.

USC Digital Library Several primary source collections, including the Chinese Historical Society of Southern California Collection, Filipino American Library Collection, Japanese American Incarceration Image Collection, and Korean American Digital Archive.

Welga Digital Archive - Bulosan Center for Filipino Studies Primary sources documenting the Filipino American experience.

Asian American Studies

General Primary Source Databases

Asian American Research Websites

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