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History of Gender and Sexuality: Global Approaches

Selected Library Databases

Library Sources

Archives of Sexuality and Gender  

British and Irish Women's Letters and Diaries

Defining Gender, 1450-1910

Gender: Identity and Social Change
This collection contains primary source documents and video interviews for the study of women's suffrage, the feminist movement, the men's movement, employment, education, the body, the family, government and politics. The material has been sourced from 9 institutions from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia, 1788 - present.

Independent Voices 
A set of digitized newspapers, journals, and magazines originally published by alternative presses during the 1960s, '70s and '80s. Independent Voices provides access to the powerful voices of feminists, dissident GIs, campus radicals, Native Americans, antiwar activists, Black Power advocates, Latinos, gays, lesbians and more.

Mass Observation British Social History 1937-1972

North American Women's Letters and Diaries

Women and Social Movements  in the United States, 1600-2000

Primary Sources on the Web

Digital Transgender Archive
The purpose of the Digital Transgender Archive (DTA) is to increase the accessibility of transgender history by providing an online hub for digitized historical materials, born-digital materials, and information on archival holdings throughout the world

Discovering American Women's History Online
Provides access to digital collections of primary sources (photos, letters, diaries, artifacts, etc.) that document the history of women in the United States,

Internet Medieval Sourcebook : Sex and Gender

Voice of the Shuttle: Gender and Sexuality Studies

Primary Sources

Primary sources are original sources, in which its witnesses or first recorders describe a time, person or event.

Some types of primary sources include:

  • diaries and journals
  • speeches, interviews, letters
  • memoirs and autobiographies
  • government documents
  • published materials,  e.g. magazine and newspapers articles written at the particular time

For more information, check the Primary Sources page.