Research Guides: HIST 158A: Race, Riot, and Backlash in Modern America: Digital Collections of Primary Sources

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Suggested resources

HistoryMakers Digital Archive This link opens in a new window
An African American video oral history archive. Provides access to oral history interviews with historically significant African Americans.
NAACP Papers This link opens in a new window
Covers records from the NAACP from 1909-1970. The papers include special reports on a wide range of issues including the Ku Klux Klan, discrimination in public employment, economic equality, the church and civil rights, equal access to education, voting, employment, and housing.
Black Freedom Struggle in the 20th Century This link opens in a new window
Includes records of major civil rights organizations and personal papers of leaders and observers of the 20th century Black freedom struggle, as well as federal government records. Includes the records of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE).
Civil Rights and Social Justice This link opens in a new window
Covers civil rights in the United States, including publications from the Commission on Civil Rights, legislative histories on landmark legislation, briefs from relevant U.S. Supreme Court cases, and more.
African Diaspora, 1860-present This link opens in a new window
Provides digitized primary source documents from African diasporic communities around the world, with a focus on communities in the Caribbean, Brazil, India, United Kingdom, and France. Also includes secondary sources and videos.
Documenting White Supremacy and its Opponents in the 1920s This link opens in a new window
Includes local, regional, and national newspapers published by Klan organizations and by sympathetic publishers across the U.S. during the 1920s.
Federal Surveillance of African Americans, 1920-1984 This link opens in a new window
Contains reproductions of hundreds of FBI files documenting the federal scrutiny, harassment, and prosecution to which black Americans of all political persuasions were subjected. Covers 1920-1984.
Black Thought and Culture This link opens in a new window
Covers the non-fiction published works by major American Black leaders. Where possible, the complete published non-fiction works are included, as well as interviews, journal articles, speeches, essays, pamphlets, and letters.
Database available through at least May 31, 2024, as part of ProQuest's Evidence-Based Acquisition Program.
Women and Social Movements in the United States (1600-2000) This link opens in a new window
A collection of document projects--comprised of essays with supporting documents, images, and web links--focused on the history of women in social movements in the U.S. between 1600 and 2000
Sixties: Primary Documents and Personal Narratives, 1960-1974 This link opens in a new window
Includes diaries, letters, autobiographies and other memoirs, written and oral histories, manifestos, government documents, memorabilia, newspapers, press, underground press, alternative publications, and scholarly commentary. This collection includes materials digitized from collections in Brandeis University Archives & Special Collections, including materials on student activism and radical politics.

The resources listed above are subscription-based databases. Examples of freely available and open resources are listed below:

Digital Public Library of America
Digitized materials from libraries, archives and museums around the country.
1964 Freedom Summer Project
Freedom Summer was an effort by civil rights activists to integrate Mississippi's segregated political system.
Black Panthers
Documents by and about the Black Panthers, 1968-1970s.
MLK Jr. Papers Project
African Activist Archive Project
Records of activism in the United States that support "the struggle of African peoples against colonialism, apartheid, and social injustice from the 1950s through the 1990s."
African American Women Writers
African American Women Writers of the 19th Century is a digital collection of some 52 published works by 19th-century black women writers. NYPL digital collections.