Research Guides: HIST/SOC 170b: Gender and Sexuality in South Asia: Find Primary Sources

Tips for Searching for Primary Sources

If you are using a database with an Advanced Search form, try using the Advanced Search features to refine your search.

Since these databases cover many decades, it can be helpful to limit your search to a specific date range.

Think about what terms that might have been used to in articles about your topic during the time period. For example: the name of a specific person or organization or even a term that wouldn't be used today.

Some databases allow you to limit your search to articles from a specific geographic area. Try doing this when researching events from a specific region.

These databases often sort results in chronological order. In some cases, it might be helpful to sort by relevance/best matches first.

In addition to searching, try browsing these collections to learn about sources that you wouldn't have necessarily thought of searching for.

Find News Articles

When looking for newspaper articles as primary sources, remember to look for articles published during the time period under study.

Historical News Articles

Times of India (ProQuest Historical Newspapers) This link opens in a new window
The worlds most widely circulated English daily newspaper was founded to serve British residents of West India. Covers 1838-2010.
British Periodicals This link opens in a new window
Searchable full text of hundreds of periodicals and magazines from the late seventeenth to the early twentieth centuries. Includes magisterial quarterlies and scholarly and professional organs through to coterie art periodicals, penny weeklies and illustrated family magazines.
Seventeenth and Eighteeenth Century Burney Collection Newspapers This link opens in a new window
Collection of 17th and 18th century English news media, including newspapers from India.

News Articles from 1980 - Present

International Newsstream (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
Includes newspapers and newswires from Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Australia. You can the facets to the left of your search results to limit to specific newspapers and/or by date. Covers 1980-present.

BBC Monitoring's Media Reports for different countries
Monitors TV, radio, press, web and news agency sources from different countries.

Recommended Databases

Artstor This link opens in a new window
Image database featuring images from some of the world's leading museums, photo archives, scholars, and artists; the most comprehensive image resource available for educational and scholarly use, with many rare and important collections available nowhere else. Advanced search options allow for limiting to images from specific geographic regions and time periods.
Women and Social Movements, International-- 1840 to Present This link opens in a new window
Focuses on women’s activism across the world, from 1840 to the present. Includes primary sources on topics related to peace, human trafficking, poverty, child labor, literacy, global inequality, and more.
Database available through at least May 31, 2024, as part of ProQuest's Evidence-Based Acquisition Program.
Women and Social Movements, Modern Empires since 1820 This link opens in a new window
Explores prominent themes related to conquest, colonization, settlement, resistance, and post-coloniality, as told through women’s voices. This archival database includes documents related to the Habsburg, Ottoman, British, French, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Japanese, and United States empires, and to settler societies in the United States and South Africa.
Database available through at least May 31, 2024, as part of ProQuest's Evidence-Based Acquisition Program.
Archives of Sexuality and Gender This link opens in a new window
Digitized primary sources for the historical study of sex, sexuality, and gender. Find a wide range of materials, such as: oral histories from the African Women's Life History Project; declassified FBI files detailing surveillance of gays and lesbians in the U.S. from 1950 to 1982; and erotica from the "Private Case" of the British Museum Library.
Our access includes: LGBTQ History and Culture Since 1940, Parts I and II; Sex and Sexuality, Sixteenth to Twentieth Century; International Perspectives on LGBTQ Activism and Culture; and Community and Identity in North America.
British and Irish Women's Letters and Diaries This link opens in a new window
Searchable and indexed pages of women's letters and diaries from England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. Complements North American Women's Letters and Diaries, Colonial-1950.

Women in World History: South Asia
Compiled by George Mason University's Center for History and New Media
Oral History Collection from the University of Cambridge's Centre of South Asian Studies
Includes 400 interviews with both Indian and British individuals describing life in British India and the early years of independent India and Pakistan. The interviews were done in the 1970s and 1980s.

Early English Books Online (EEBO) This link opens in a new window
Early English Books Online (EEBO) contains digital facsimile page images and some transcripts for works printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700.
Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO) This link opens in a new window
Eighteenth Century Collections Online contains images of pages of books published during the 18th Century. Uses full-text searching of millions of pages. Search for the fields of history, literature, religion, law, fine arts, science and more.
HathiTrust Digital Library This link opens in a new window
Digital repository of the immense collections of many universities and institutions, full text searchable. Example source: 1860 Indian Penal Code.
JSTOR 19th Century British Pamphlets This link opens in a new window
Contains the most significant British pamphlets from the 19th century held in UK research libraries.
U.K. Parliamentary Papers: House of Commons 19th Century (1801-1900) This link opens in a new window
Full text of U.K. Parliamentary papers issued by the House of Commons between 1801-1900. Also included is the full text backfile from Hansard, the Official Report of debates in Parliament, from both the House of Commons and House of Lords, covering 1803 to 2005. Hansard provides an edited record of parliamentary debates and questions, including written ministerial statements and answers to parliamentary questions as well as the transcripts of debates.
Database available through at least May 31, 2024, as part of ProQuest's Evidence-Based Acquisition Program.
Nineteenth Century Collections Online (NCCO) This link opens in a new window
Includes four collections of 19th century primary sources: Asia & the West; British Politics & Society; British Theatre, Music, & Literature; and European Literature, 1790-1840: The Corvey Collection. Sources include monographs, newspapers, pamphlets, manuscripts, ephemera, and photographs.

Primary Source Collections Available through the Catalog

This page includes suggestions for many digitized collections of primary source materials, but remember to consider sources that may not have been digitized. Try searching the Library Catalog. Search by an author from the time period or enter a subject in combination with any of the subject headings used to define primary sources:

Autobiographies
Correspondence
Diaries
Documents
Government documents
Interviews
Legal documents
Letters
Memoirs
Narratives
Sources
Speeches