Oxford LibGuides: Latin American History: Primary sources

Understanding sources

A primary source is any source, be it written, visual, oral or material, that comes from the time period being studied. Primary sources can include government documents, speeches, diaries, letters and newspapers, which tend to reflect official views of events that occurred.

Although it can be more difficult to find sources from ordinary members of the population, interviews and testimonies as well as folklore, popular tales and songs, and fictional works can also be considered in that they reflect aspects of the time they were created. All sources contain some kind of bias, so must be viewed critically whether they are official reports or firsthand oral accounts.

Supporting material

The History Faculty Library produces a pdf guide to primary sources. Although it does not include specific Latin American sources, it does contain useful tools for researching colonial history, U.S. history, government papers and news sources.

If you are particularly interested in consulting official papers, the dedicated guide below will show you how to get started.

Official Papers
by Hannah Chandler Last Updated Dec 21, 2023 703 views this year

Primary sources online

Libraries across the world are digitising their collections, and a wealth of primary source material can now be found online. The following links are gateways to a wide variety of resources for the study of Latin American history.

SALALM Digital Primary Resources
This page at this link provides access to digitized collections of primary material (in a variety of formats) related to Latin America. The materials available listed are freely available to the public and were created or hosted at an academic institution associated with SALALM, the Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials. Under each title and link you will see an introductory note that briefly describes content and scope.
Bibllioteca Digital del Patrimonio Iberoamericano
BDPI is a project of the Asociación de Bibliotecas Nacionales de Iberoamérica (ABINIA). Its objective is the creation of a portal which provides access, from a single search point, to the digital resources of all the participating libraries. This currently includes material from the national libraries of Argentina, Bolivia, Brasil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, España, Guatemala, Honduras, México, Nicaragua, República Dominicana, Panamá, Paraguay, Perú, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Uruguay y Venezuela. Sources include documents, books, maps, pictures, newspapers and music.
Digital Archive of Latin American and Caribbean Ephemera
The bulk of the ephemera currently found in the Digital Archive of Latin American and Caribbean Ephemera was originally created around the turn of the 20th century and after, with some originating as recently as within the last year. The formats or genre most commonly included are pamphlets, flyers, leaflets, brochures, posters, stickers, and postcards. These items were originally created by a wide array of social activists, non-governmental organizations, government agencies, political parties, public policy think tanks, and other types of organizations in order to publicize their views, positions, agendas, policies, events, and activities. The vast majority are rare, hard-to-find primary sources unavailable elsewhere.
Documentos Revelados
New online resource for the Brazilian military dictatorship, 1964-85. Includes documents and press cuttings on censorship, trials, police activity, left-wing groups and much more. There are also links to relevant archives.
Early Americas Digital Archive
A collection of electronic texts written in or about the Americas from 1492 to approximately 1820.
HOSLAC
A database of primary sources on the history of science in Latin America and the Caribbean. The site, launched in January 2010, provides a virtual archive of over 200 primary sources along with introductions based on the latest scholarly findings.
LANIC e-text collection
This collection is designed to facilitate access to the hundreds of thousands of pages of full-text resources that are hosted by LANIC. These resources include research papers written by Latin American studies scholars; theses and dissertations; e-text versions of books; conference proceedings; speeches by Latin American leaders; periodical publications; and official documents.
LANIC Latin American Network Information Center
LANIC's mission is to facilitate access to Internet-based information to, from, or on Latin America. LANIC's editorially reviewed directories contain over 10,000 unique URLs, one of the largest guides for Latin American content on the Internet.
Latin American Newspapers 1805-1922
This important online collection provides more than 30 fully searchable Latin American newspapers published in the 19th and 20th centuries. Featuring titles from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, Venezuela and elsewhere, the collection offers unprecedented coverage of the people, issues and events that shaped the region between 1805 and 1922. Through eyewitness reporting, editorials, legislative information, letters, poetry, advertisements, matrimony notices and obituaries, this unique collection chronicles the evolution of Latin American culture and daily life over two centuries.
Liberalism in the Americas - Digital Archive
This is a unique scholarly resource of materials to help the UK and international academic community to trace the rise, consolidation and development of liberal ideology and practice in Latin America during the long nineteenth century. This has been achieved through the digitisation of key texts that shaped liberal thought and practice in the region since the late eighteenth century. Archival materials have been carefully selected – such as political pamphlets, judicial records, and political ephemera – to provide researchers, educators and policy makers around the world with the tools to develop historical studies that will enhance our understanding of the liberal tradition in Latin America. The digital library traces the development of liberal ideology and practice through key themes: church and state, economic development, political culture, women and gender, and race and ethnicity. The resources primarily focus on the cases of Argentina, Mexico, and Peru, c. 1780-1930.
Library of Congress Hispanic Collections Online
Links to the digitised collections of Luso-Hispanic interest in the Library of Congress
POLARCH - Commonwealth & Latin American Archives Project
This website is the product of a project sponsored jointly by the Institute of Commonwealth Studies (ICS) and the Institute for the Study of the Americas (ISA) now ILAS aiming to improve access to and use of their extensive collections of political ephemera. These collections are now fully searchable, and in addition a selection of the items can be viewed online in the gallery.
World Digital Library - Latin America & the Caribbean
With over 300 items digitised for the Latin American region, this collection contains photographs, maps, books and manuscripts and is fully searchable.

Useful text

Consider the source : primary documents for the study of Latin America by Julie A. Charlip [editor].
Call Number: Bodleian bookstack
ISBN: 9780205708604
Designed as a companion to 'Latin America : an interpretive history', this reader contains translations of historical sources along with commentaries and suggestions for analyis. Includes documents from Columbus' first voyage through to speeches by Hugo Chavez.