LibGuides: 21H.155: Modern Japan: 1868 to Present: Find Primary Sources

Books

To find book primary sources, use library catalogs like Barton and WorldCat.

Do subject searches for topic + genre:
- Subheadings such as "correspondence," "sources," "personal narratives," "biography," and "speeches" can point to primary sources.
- Pair these subheadings with keywords or topical subject headings in Barton to identify relevant sources in the MIT Libraries.
- See this table for other possible subheadings.
- For example, do this advanced search to get first-hand accounts of the Hiroshima bombing:
  - Keyword = Hiroshima
  - Subject words = "Personal narratives"

Do advanced searches in Barton for relevant subjects and keywords with publication date limits.
- For example, do this advanced search to find books about Japan and World War II that were published at that time:
  - Keywords = "Japan* war" [but without quotation marks]
  - Year from = 1939
  - Year to = 1945

Primary Sources at MIT

ARTstor
A subscription based digital library of over one million images related to art, architecture, the humanities and social sciences
more...less...
See ARTstor Terms and Conditions of Use handout on this page
Contemporary World Music
Steaming music can be browsed by place or cultural group.
Digital National Security Archive (1945-present)
A collection of primary documents central to US foreign and military policy since 1945. More than 35,000 declassified documents - totalling more than 200,000 pages - have been gathered through use of the US Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Includes following collections: Japan and the U.S., 1960-1976; Japan and the U.S., 1977-1992.
Illustrated London News Historical Archive 1842-2003
Digital archive of the world's first pictorial newspaper. Covers British and world events. Full-color facsimile and searchable text. 1842-2003.
JSTOR
A full-text scholarly journal archive, back to vol. 1, issue 1, in many fields.
NewspaperArchive.com
Thousands of newspapers, available in full-page facsimile, with searchable full text. Most are U.S. titles, with some international coverage, and most are fairly small-circulation newspapers. 1759-present.
[Includes Japan Advertiser, 1920-1922; Pacific Stars and Stripes, 1947-1999.]
Polling The Nations
Database of questions from public opinion polls around the world. Search question text and get poll results. 1986 - present.
Please click on 'logout' when finished to release access to another user, as only one user is allowed access at a time.
Poole's Index to Periodical Literature (1802-1902)
A print index that covers general periodical literature.
Humanities Reference AI3.P822 1893.
Proquest Historical Newspapers: Atlanta Constitution
1868-1942
Proquest Historical Newspapers: Chicago Tribune
1849-1986
Proquest Historical Newspapers: Los Angeles Times
1881-1986
Proquest Historical Newspapers: New York Times
1851-2006
Proquest Historical Newspapers: Wall Street Journal
1889-1992
Proquest Historical Newspapers: Washington Post
1877-1993
Reader's Guide Retrospective (1890-1982)
Indexing and abstracting for many general interest magazines. Great source for historical material on the 20th-century.
World News Connection
Full text and summaries of foreign newspaper and periodical articles and radio and television broadcasts in English translation. 1995 - present.

Primary Sources on the Internet

Botanical and Cultural Images of Eastern Asia, 1907-1927 (Harvard University)
Photographs from the Arnold Arboretum’s collection, taken by plant explorers in the early years of the 20th century. The online collection is organized into sections, including buildings, trees, daily life, and landscapes.
Brooks in Hokkaido (UMass-Amherst)
Collection of more than 100 letters written by William Penn Brooks while teaching at Sapporo Agricultural College in the 1870s and 1880s.
East Asia Image Collections (Lafayette College)
Photographs, negatives, postcards, and slides of imperial Japan (1868-1945), its Asian empire (1895-1945) and occupied Japan (1947-52), including images of Taiwan, Japan, China, Korea, Manchuria, and Indonesia.
Expeditions and Discoveries: Sponsored Exploration and Scientific Discovery in the Modern Age (Harvard)
Field notes, letters, maps, photographs, and published materials relating to a range of worldwide expeditions from 1626 to 1953. Browse by region to find material documenting Asia.
Fine Prints: Japanese, pre-1915 (Library of Congress)
Japanese woodblock prints and drawings, dating from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries, by such artists as Hiroshige, Kuniyoshi, Sadahide, and Yoshiiku. Subjects include actors, women, landscapes, scenes from Japanese literature and daily life, and Western foreigners.
Great Kanto Earthquake (Brown University)
Over 100 photographs taken in Yokohama, Kyoto, Shanghai, and Hawaii, as well as many photographs purchased in Japan that document the 1923 earthquake's devastation. Also includes newspaper clippings, telegrams, postcards, and travel keepsakes.
Internet East Asian History Sourcebook
Collection of primary sources gathered by Paul Halsall, Fordham University.
"Japan-in-America": The Russo-Japanese War in Political Cartoons
Images from an exhibit sponsored by the Department of Communication and Culture, Indiana University at Bloomington.
Japanese Old Photographs in Bakumatsu-Meiji Period
Collection of more than 5000 digitized photographs from the collection of Nagasaki University.
Joseph Berry Keenan Visual Materials Collection (Harvard University)
Personal photographs taken 1945-1947 by Joseph Berry Keenan, Chief of Council and Chief of Section of the International Prosecution Section during the Japanese War Crimes Trial. "Mostly personal in nature, the represented subjects include Keenan himself, military ceremonies and figures in Japan . . . banquets and celebrations, views of Japanese people and scenery, and aerial views of the Japanese landscape following the atomic bomb drops of 1945."
Museum of Fine Arts Boston: Russo-Japanese War
Images of the Russo-Japanese War from the MFA's collections.
Ohara Institute for Social Research Poster Exhibition
Collection of 400 digitized posters from the post-WWII Japanese labor movement.
Perry Visits Japan: A Visual History (Brown University)
A Japanese scroll that illustrates Commodore Matthew Perry's 1854 landing in Japan, the first official contact between Americans and Japanese, lithographs by the official artist of the Perry expedition, and student writings about these images.
Portraits of Modern Japanese Historical Figures (National Diet Library)
Photographs and biographical sketches of 350 statesmen, government officials, military officers, businessmen, scholars and artists. In English and Japanese.
Red-Haired Barbarians: The Dutch and Other Foreigners in Nagasaki and Yokohama, 1800-1865
A digital exhibition of a collection of 40 Japanese woodblock prints published between 1800 and 1865, depicting Dutch traders in Nagasaki. From the International Institute of Social History in the Netherlands.
Sidney D. Gamble Photographs (Duke University)
Photographs of Korea, Japan, Hawaii, San Francisco, and Russia taken between 1917 and 1932 by sociologist Sidney Gamble. Photographs depict urban and rural life, public events, architecture, religious statuary, and the countryside.
Time Archive (1923-present)
Back issues of the popular news magazine. (Hint: you can use the free online search to identify articles and then copy from the print version in Hayden or request through ILB to see the original article in context.)
Visual Resources for Japan (Duke University)
List of over 90 links to online images of Japan gathered by Duke University Libraries.
World's Transportation Commission Photograph Collection (Library of Congress)
Nearly 900 images by American photographer William Henry Jackson. In addition to railroads, elephants, camels, horses, sleds and sleighs, sedan chairs, rickshaws, and other types of transportation, Jackson photographed city views, street and harbor scenes, landscapes, local inhabitants, and Commission members as they traveled through North Africa, Asia, Australia, and Oceania.

Primary Sources at Nearby Libraries

Harvard Libraries E-Resources
Harvard has a trove of online databases of primary source material, including historical newspapers, government documents, letters and diaries, and much more. With your Harvard Special Borrower card, you can visit Harvard libraries and use these databases on the premises (sorry, you can't use them remotely). Take a look at the list of history databases for anything promising for your primary source research!
Harvard-Yenching Library
This is one of the top libraries in East Asian studies, and it's accessible to MIT students with a Harvard College Library Special Borrowers Card.
Boston Central Public Library - Copley Square
This page links to lists of BPL historical newspaper holdings on microfilm. Their holdings include papers from China and Hong Kong, but coverage is spotty.
Smithsonian Global Sound
Musical recordings in a diverse range of styles from around the world. Search or browse by country of origin, cultural group, instrument, artist, language and more.
Available online through the BPL. You'll need a BPL card or e-card to log in.

Subject Guide

Ece Turnator

Contact:

Ece (pronounced AJ)
turnator@mit.edu
Hayden Library Consultation Suite 14S - 2nd floor
617.253.4979
Make an appointment with me