HIST1050: The Modern World - Human Rights: Web-Based Digital Collections

This list contains over 250 libraries and archives that focus mainly on localized, regional, and U.S. history, but it also includes larger collections, eText and eBook repositories, and a short list of directories to help you continue your research efforts. The sites listed here are mainly open access, which means that the digital formats are viewable and usable by the general public.

AODL provides free universal access to cultural heritage materials from and about African countries and communities. It brings together tens of thousands of digitized photographs, videos, archival documents, maps, interviews and oral histories in numerous African languages, many of which are contained in curated thematic galleries and teaching resources.

A large and growing directory of links to historical documents on the web, organized chronologically. Maintained by by George Laughead Jr., manager of the World Wide Web Virtual Library for United States History.

The AAPB is an initiative to digitally preserve and make accessible public broadcasting radio and television programming, ensuring its collection, management, preservation, and access. Users can access the AAPB Online Reading Room, which provides online access to some of the digitized collection for private research, educational and informational purposes.

American Women: A Gateway to Library of Congress Resources for the Study of Women's History and Culture in the United States includes content presented in the book "American Women: A Library of Congress Guide for the Study of Women’s History and Culture in the United States" edited by Library of Congress staff members Sheridan Harvey, Janice Ruth, Barbara Natanson, Sara Day, and Evelyn Sinclair. The online presentation provides a gateway to the American Memory collections and other Library of Congress resources that relate to women’s history while also providing guidance to the non-digital women’s history resources found at the Library.

The CRDL features a collection of unedited news film from the WSB (Atlanta) and WALB (Albany, Ga.) television archives held by the Walter J. Brown Media Archives and Peabody Awards Collection at the University of Georgia Libraries. The CRDL provides educator resources and contextual materials, including Freedom on Film, relating instructive stories and discussion questions from the Civil Rights Movement in Georgia, and the New Georgia Encyclopedia, delivering engaging online articles and multimedia.

A substantial collection of oral history interviews with individuals who were involved in the twentieth-century civil rights movement in the United States. The activists interviewed for this project belong to a wide range of occupations, including lawyers, judges, doctors, farmers, journalists, professors, and musicians, among others. The video recordings of their recollections cover a wide range of topics within the freedom struggle, such as the influence of the labor movement, nonviolence and self-defense, religious faith, music, and the experiences of young activists. The collection contains more than 1200 items consisting of born-digital video files, digitized videocassettes, digital photographs and full-text transcripts for all interviews.

The digital collections of the Library of Congress contain a wide variety of material related to civil rights, including photographs, documents, and sound recordings. This guide compiles links to civil-rights resources throughout the Library of Congress Web site. In addition, it provides links to external Web sites focusing on civil rights and a bibliography containing selections for both general and younger readers.

This primary source collection focuses on the decision to drop the atomic bomb. It includes 76 documents totaling 632 pages covering the years 1945 through 1964. Supporting materials include an online version of “Truman and the Bomb: A Documentary History,” edited by Robert H. Ferrell.

The National World War II Museum is home to thousands of oral histories and hundreds of thousands of photographs, plus artifact and archival collections such as uniforms, weapons, souvenirs of war, and military and personal correspondence. This site features some of the collection items that have been digitized, particularly oral history recordings and photographs.

This site offers digitized materials from the collections at the New Jersey State Library. A wide variety of historical topics are covered pertaining to the history of New Jersey and local history. A separate portion of the site, the New Jersey State Publications Digital Library, features digitized state government publications.

The Digital Library of the Caribbean (dLOC) is a cooperative digital library for resources from and about the Caribbean and circum-Caribbean. The dLOC partner institutions are the core of dLOC. dLOC partners retain all rights to their materials and provide access to digitized versions of Caribbean cultural, historical and research materials currently held in archives, libraries, and private collections.

DPLA connects people to the riches held within America’s libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural heritage institutions. All of the materials found through DPLA—photographs, books, maps, news footage, oral histories, personal letters, museum objects, artwork, government documents, and so much more—are free and immediately available in digital format.

The Digital South Asia Library provides digital materials for reference and research on South Asia to scholars, students, and other users. This program builds upon a two-year pilot project funded by the Association of Research Libraries' Global Resources Program with support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Participants in the Digital South Asia Library include leading U.S. universities, the Center for Research Libraries, the South Asia Microform Project, the Committee on South Asian Libraries and Documentation, the Association for Asian Studies, the Library of Congress, the Asia Society, the British Library, the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge, MOZHI in India, the Sundarayya Vignana Kendram in India, Madan Puraskar Pustakalaya in Nepal, and other institutions in South Asia.

"These links connect to Western European primary historical documents that are transcribed, reproduced in facsimile, or translated. They shed light on key historical happenings within the respective countries and within the broadest sense of political, economic, social and cultural history. The order of documents is chronological wherever possible." Also sections on Medieval and Renaissance Europe; and Europe as a supranational region. Maintained by librarian Richard Hacken.

Europeana offers more than 14.6 million items, all from European libraries, museums, archives, and other collections. Europeana enables people to explore the digital resources of Europe's museums, libraries, archives and audio-visual collections. It promotes discovery and networking opportunities in a multilingual space where users can engage, share in and be inspired by the rich diversity of Europe's cultural and scientific heritage. Ideas and inspiration can be found within the millions of items on Europeana. These objects include: Images - paintings, drawings, maps, photos and pictures of museum objects; Texts - books, newspapers, letters, diaries and archival papers; Sounds - music and spoken word from cylinders, tapes, discs and radio broadcasts; and Videos - films, newsreels and TV broadcasts.

European History Primary Sources (EHPS) is a joint initiative of the Library and the Department of History and Civilization of the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. It is also part of the WWW Virtual Library History Central Catalogue that is hosted at the EUI. The purpose of EHPS is to provide an easily searchable index of scholarly digital repositories that contain primary sources for the history of Europe. As the number of digital archives on the internet continues to grow, finding and selecting digital repositories becomes increasingly difficult. EHPS strives to fill that gap by listing the most important collections of digital primary sources for the history of Europe, either as a whole or for single countries. EHPS is updated continuously and we invite all users to send us their suggestions for websites to include.

Designed to meet the needs of the research community worldwide, our online portal offers quick and easy access to the collections of the 48 National Libraries of Europe and leading European Research Libraries. Users can cross-search and reuse over 26 million digital items and 168 million bibliographic records.

A helpful directory of links to digitized collections about World War II available from the Library of Congress.

The Historic Government Publications from World War II collection contains 343 Informational pamphlets, government reports, instructions, regulations, declarations, speeches, and propaganda materials distributed by the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) during the Second World War. The documents, which reflect the thinking of the time, range widely in topics.

The Internet History Sourcebooks Project [IHSP] is a world wide web project designed to provide easy access to primary sources and other teaching materials in a non-commercial environment. It was developed and is edited by Paul Halsall with the aid of numerous other contributors. The project currently provides access to primary sources covering ancient, medieval, and modern history; Byzantine studies; African, East Asian, Indian, Islamic, Jewish, and lesbian and gay history; the history of science, and women's history.

The Bancroft Library's documentation of the Japanese American experience during World War II includes over 530,000 primary source materials drawn from an extensive collection of manuscripts and photographs. The materials in the Japanese American Evacuation and Resettlement Digital Archive include papers, maps, artworks, and photographs created by government agencies, advocacy groups, and personal works from authors, artists, and teachers whose documents reflect their experience during the war.

The Library of Congress makes available many multimedia collections of digitized documents, photographs, recorded sound, moving pictures, and text from the Library's Americana collections. Over 100 historical collections are now available through this site, including over seven million digitized items (e.g., maps, pamphlets, sheet music, photographs, broadsides, films, sound recordings, notebooks, periodicals and manuscripts). Among the many notable collections is Working in Paterson: Occupational Heritage in an Urban Setting.

Digitized collections on Latin American history from the University of Texas libraries.

Over 6.1 million video files uploaded by Archive users which range from classic full-length films, to daily alternative news broadcasts, to cartoons and concerts. Many of these videos are available for free download.

The New York Public Library Digital Collections portal provides free and open access to over 900,000 digitized items from the The New York Public Library's vast collections, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints, photographs, streaming video, and more.

Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) Primary Source Sets are designed to help students develop critical thinking skills by exploring topics in history, literature, and culture through primary sources. Drawing online materials from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States, the sets use letters, photographs, posters, oral histories, video clips, sheet music, and more. Each set includes a topic overview, ten to fifteen primary sources, links to related resources, and a teaching guide. These 120 sets were created and reviewed by the teachers on the DPLA's Education Advisory Committee.

The Prints and Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC) contains catalog records and digital images representing a rich cross-section of still pictures held by the Prints and Photographs Division and, in some cases, other units of the Library of Congress. The Library of Congress offers broad public access to these materials as a contribution to education and scholarship. The collections of the Prints and Photographs Division include photographs, fine and popular prints and drawings, posters, and architectural and engineering drawings. While international in scope, the collections are particularly rich in materials produced in, or documenting the history of, the United States and the lives, interests and achievements of the American people.

A collection of links to organizations and institutions; museums and historic sites; national libraries, archives and directories; and U.S. and world history primary sources online selected by the National History Day staff.

The World Digital Library (WDL) is a project of the U.S. Library of Congress, with the support of UNESCO, and contributions from libraries, archives, museums, educational institutions, and international organizations around the world. The WDL seeks to preserve and share some of the world’s most important cultural objects, increasing access to cultural treasures and significant historical documents to enable discovery, scholarship, and use.

A helpful directory of high-quality sites on the web related to the history of the Second World War, including both secondary and primary source materials.