LibGuides: Black American Literature: Primary Sources

About This Page

If you are looking for archival materials on a topic related to Black American Literature, this page provides resources. Primary sources include archived historical materials such as letters, original literary manuscripts, photographs, maps, news or magazine articles, and many others.

Read the descriptions of the linked resources below, to find materials that interest you. Once you've found material(s), use the Primary Sources Worksheet to ask key questions that will help you analyze and use the material.

Primary Sources Worksheet

Archival Databases @ the Library

Women's Studies Archive: Women's Issue and Identities This link opens in a new window
This database focuses on the 19th and 20th centuries, Women's Issues and Identities provides a history of the social, political, and professional aspects of women's lives and offers a look at the roles, experiences, and achievements of women in society.
Through a variety of documents such as diaries, letters, photographs, news clippings, organizational records, and journals, it presents a record of the issues that have affected women, societal contributions, social status, and women's movements. The Archive material list provides details about materials included.
Slavery and Anti-Slavery This link opens in a new window
Slavery and Anti-Slavery (SAS): A Transnational Archive, Parts 1, 2, 3 and 4 is a collection devoted to the scholarly study and understanding of slavery from a multinational perspective.
Part 1: Debates
Part 2: Slave Trade
Part 3: Institution
Part 4: Emancipation
Early American Imprints, Series 1: Evans 1693-1800 This link opens in a new window
Contains searchable books, pamphlets, broadsides, newspapers, government documents and ephemera printed in America over three centuries.

Archives on the Web (public)

American Slaves Narratives: An Online Anthology
A project of the University of Virginia, this website shares an anthology of slave narratives.
Behind the Veil: Documenting African American Life in the Jim Crow South
A selection of 410 recorded oral history interviews chronicling African-American life during the age of legal segregation in the American South, from the 1890s to the 1950s (Duke University).
Black Abolitionist Archive
A collection of over 800 speeches by antebellum blacks and approximately 1,000 editorials from 1890 to the civil war. These important documents provide a portrait of black involvement in the anti-slavery movement; scans of these documents are provided as images and PDF files.
Digital Schomburg
Relying on the expertise of distinguished curators and scholars, Digital Schomburg provides access to trusted information, interpretation, and scholarship on the global black experience 24/7 (Digital Schomburg). Created by the New York Public Library.
Black Freedom Struggle in the United States
A collection of primary sources from the 1790s-2000s including images, writings, news, government and court documents, and more.
Civil Rights Digital Library
materials from libraries, archives, museums, public broadcasters, and others on a national scale. 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.
Trans-Atlantic Slave Voyages
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database has information on almost 36,000 slaving voyages that forcibly embarked over 10 million Africans for transport to the Americas between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. Covers Africa, Europe, North America, the Caribbean, and Brazil.
Digital Public Library of America
A vast project that works with many cultural heritage institutions to bring together the riches of America’s libraries, archives, and museums, 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. The portal provides innovative ways to search and scan through the united collection of millions of items, including by timeline, map, virtual bookshelf, format, subject, and partner.

News & Periodical Archives

American Antiquarian Society Historical Periodicals Collection - Five Series
The collection documents the life of America's people from the Colonial Era through the Civil War and Reconstruction. It provides access to American periodicals published between 1684 and 1912 in five series.
Series 1 (1691-1820)
Series 2 (1821-1837)
Series 3 (1838-1852)
Series 4 (1853-1865)
Series 5 (1866-1877)
Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers This link opens in a new window
Includes digital facsimile images of both full pages and clipped articles for hundreds of 19th century U.S. newspapers. For each issue, the newspaper is captured from cover-to-cover, providing access to every article, advertisement and illustration.
Click the link for a list of Newspapers included in the collection.
Historical New York Times (1851-2019) This link opens in a new window
The New York Times (1851-2019) offers full page and article images with searchable full text back to the first issue. The collection includes digital reproductions providing access to every page from every available issue.
Every issue of each title includes the complete paper, cover-to-cover, with full-page and article images in easily downloadable PDF format.
Historical Los Angeles Times (1881-1994) This link opens in a new window
Historical Los Angeles Times offers completely searchable full text and full image coverage from 1881-1994. It gives quick and accurate Web access to articles, editorials, classified ads, comics, cartoons, photos, maps, and graphics. The collection provides access to every page from every available issue. For electronic access to current Los Angeles Times from 1985 to present, use Los Angeles Times (1985-present).

Literature

African American Poetry This link opens in a new window
Contains the early history of African American poetry, from the first recorded poem by an African American (Lucy Terry's 'Bars Fights', c.1746) to the major poets of the nineteenth century, including Paul Laurence Dunbar and Frances Ellen Watkins Harper.
20th Century African American Poetry This link opens in a new window
Features almost 9,000 poems by 62 of the most important African American poets of the last century, including Langston Hughes, Jean Toomer, Imamu Amiri Baraka, Audre Lorde and Rita Dove.

Frederick Douglas Papers
The U.S. Library of Congress makes the digitized papers and essays about them freely available to the public.
Zora Neale Hurston Plays
The U.S. Library of Congress shares annotated and original copies of her plays.

Litfinder This link opens in a new window
Provides access to more than 150,000 full-text poems and over 800,000 poetry citations, as well as short stories, speeches, and plays. biographies, work summaries, photographs, and a glossary are also included

Art and Media

ArtStor Digital Library This link opens in a new window
Provides over 1.6 million digital images with new image collections added several times a year. It covers many time periods and subjects including architecture, painting, sculpture, photography, decorative arts, design, anthropology, ethnographic and women's studies, as well as many other forms of visual culture.
The database can be searched by Keyword, Creator, Title, Location, Repository, Subject, Material, Style or Period, Work Type, Culture, Description, Technique, and Number.

More Primary Sources

Primary Sources
by Kendall Faulkner Last Updated Apr 16, 2024 742 views this year

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Black American Literature