Gender, Women's, and Sexuality Studies Portal : Primary Resources

Primary resources are original records created at the time of a specific historical event. These can include memoirs, letters, photos, oral histories, speeches, newspaper articles, diaries, scrapbooks, and more. Here you will find some suggested resources for learning about and finding GWS-related primary sources at UW-Madison, online, and beyond. 

If you are new to primary sources and want to learn more, see the Primary Sources for Humanities and Social Sciences research guide.

For more about women's history research in archives, see this guide. 

A sampling of UW-Madison GWS-related primary source collections is listed below. Other boxes on this page will highlight newspapers and digital collections in the areas of gender, women's, and sexuality studies.

• The Gender and Women’s Studies Collection brings together, in digital form, primary and secondary materials relating to the exploration of politics, history, and society from a transnational and multicultural women’s perspective. 
• UW-Madison's LGBTQ Archive contains oral histories, personal papers, photographs, ephemera, and organizational records related to LGBTQ life in Madison and Dane County from the 1940s to today.
  • See a summary of current holdings
  • See the inventory of oral histories
  • Individual collections can also be found using the library catalog
• History of Women at the University of Wisconsin -  Augments the general histories of the University by focusing on the roles and activities of women students, faculty, and staff and on the development of women's studies throughout the System.
• The South Asian Feminist Activism Archive (SAFAA) is dedicated to the digital preservation and public availability of rare feminist protest posters, original feminist street plays and protest songs, and photographs of grassroots activism from India. 
  • Olakh's Grassroots Feminist Political Posters in India
  • Sahiyar's Grassroots Feminist Political Posters in India
• See also: Archival Resources in Wisconsin: Descriptive Finding Aids presents archival finding aids describing collections held at 24 repositories throughout Wisconsin. 

19th Century U.S. Newspapers - Newspaper content from the nineteenth century, featuring a range of urban and rural regions throughout the United States.

African American Newspapers (1827-1998) - Searchable archive of U.S. newspapers documenting the African American experience from the early 19th century to the end of the 20th century.

American Prison Newspapers, 1800-present: Voices from the Inside - Digitized newspapers produced by people who have been incarcerated in the United States.

America's Historical Newspapers (1690-1922) - U.S. newspapers published between 1690 and 1922.

Caribbean Newspapers (1718-1876) - Largest collection of 18th- and 19th-century Caribbean published newspapers. Most of the papers are published in English, but a number of other languages are also provided.

Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers - U.S. newspapers from 1789-1963.

Ethnic Newspapers from the Balch Collection, 1799-1971 - Searchable collection of newspapers in ten languages published in the U.S., primarly focused on Czechs, French, German, Hungarian, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Jewish, Polish, and Slovak communities.

Hispanic American Newspapers, 1808-1980 - This collection of Spanish and English language newspapers stems from the Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage Project at the University of Houston.

History Commons: African American Newspapers (1827 - 1909) - Digital archive of African American newspapers, containing news stories, biographies, vital statistics, essays and editorials, poetry and prose, and advertisements.

History Commons: The Woman's Tribune (1883-1909) - Archive of the second-longest-running woman suffrage newspaper covering women's civil and political rights and international issues, published in Nebraska by Clara Bewick Colby from 1883 to 1909.

Indigenous Newspapers in North America - Digital archive of national, local, and student newspapers published in the US and Canada by Indigenous peoples between 1828 and 2016. Includes some bilingual and Indigenous-language editions.

NewspaperARCHIVE.com - Wisconsin - Wisconsin historical newspapers archive from the 1800s - 2000s containing thousands of well-known regional, state, and small local newspapers from around Wisconsin.

New York Times (1851 to present) - New York Times newspaper on nytimes.com; includes International, Spanish, and Chinese eds.; Requires registration with @wisc.edu email account.

ProQuest Historical Newspapers: Communist Historical Newspaper Collection (1919 - 2013) - Digital newspaper archive of the Communist Party USA, published from 1919 to 2013, available in downloadable PDF files.

ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Wall Street Journal (1889-2013) - Full text newspaper archive of the Wall Street Journal, from 1889 to 2013.

ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Washington Post (1877-2006) - Digital newspaper archive of various editions of the Washington Post, with coverage from 1877 to 2006.

Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Nichols Newspapers Collection - Digitized collection of newspapers, periodicals, pamphlets and broadsheets from 1672-1737 held at the Bodleian Library at Oxford University, UK.

South Asian Newspapers (1864-1922) - Historical newspaper archive of titles published in India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka dating from the 19th century to 1922.

For more newspapers, see: https://search.library.wisc.edu/search/database/browse/newspapers

Ada James Correspondence, 1912-1923 - This collection is comprised of selected folders from the larger Ada James Papers (Wis Mss OP) housed at the Wisconsin Historical Society. Ada James (1876-1952) was a leading social reformer, humanitarian, and pacifist from Richland Center, Wisconsin.

The Dovie Horvitz Collection consists of over 1,300 images and scanned texts representing objects and printed matter that reflect the lives of women from the mid-1800s through the mid-1900s. Mrs. Dovie Horvitz collected the items over almost two decades, and they are now housed at the Kenosha County Historical Society. 

Gay Peoples Union Collection - The Gay Peoples Union (GPU) was the most important gay and lesbian rights organization in Milwaukee during the 1970s; included here are selected digital copies of primary source materials documenting GPU and Milwaukee's gay liberation movement.

Home Economics to Human Ecology -  Digital collection of photographs and ephemera illustrates aspects of the past 100 years at the School of Human Ecology at the University of Wisconsin - Madison.

The Home Front: Manitowoc County in World War II - Collection of photographic images, oral histories, published sources and documents, artifacts, and other resources documenting and explaining the history of Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, from 1939 to 1947.

Olakh's Grassroots Feminist Political Posters in India - Digital archive of grassroots feminist posters from India, which are physically located in the offices of the feminist organization, Olakh (meaning Identity).

Sahiyar's Grassroots Feminist Political Posters in India - Digital archive of grassroots feminist posters from India, which are physically located in the offices of the feminist organization Sahiyar. 

Women's March, January 21, 2017 - Collection of photographs documenting posters from the Madison Women's March.