LibGuides: History, Latin American: Primary Sources

Primary Sources

Brazilian Government Documents
The Latin American Microfilm Project (LAMP) at the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) has digitized executive branch serial documents issued by Brazil’s national government between 1821 and 1993, and by its provincial governments from the earliest available for each province to the end of the first Republic in 1930.
Brazilian Government Documents - Almanak Laemmert (1844–89)
[Digitized from t]he Almanak, published annually, reported on the Brazilian Royal Court. It listed officials of the Court and its Ministries. Also included were sections on provincial officials for Rio de Janeiro and a supplement including a variety of information such as legislation, census data, and commerical advertising.
Brazilian Government Documents - Provincial Presidential Reports (183-1930)
[Digitized from the microfilm, t]hese state-level messages, issued annually, summarize activities within each province. Access is by province and year, while subject access to selected quantitative information is provided through the Subject Guide to Statistics in the Presidential Reports of the Brazilian Provinces, 1830–89 compiled by Ann Hartness.
- Reports Listed by Province
- Statistical Subject Guide
Brazilian Government Documents -Ministerial Reports (1821–1960)
[Digitized from the microfilm.] Each federal ministry issues an annual report that recounts its activities. Access is by ministry, year, and table of contents (where available).
Brazilian Government Documents -Presidential Messages (1889-93)
[Digitized from t]he President’s annual message has summarized executive branch activities since Brazil became a republic in 1889. These documents are accessible by year and, where available, by the message’s table of contents.
Feminism in Cuba: Nineteenth through Twentieth Century Archival Documents
This collection, compiled from Cuban sources, spans the period from Cuban independence to the end of the Batista regime. The collection sheds light on Cuban feminism, women in politics, literature by Cuban women and the legal status of Cuban women. The documents in this collection, most of which are in Spanish, fall into three categories: works by feminists about feminists and their causes, works by men on the status of women, and literary works by feminist writers.
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The first group contains memoirs of feminist congresses, collections of essays by feminists, journals published by feminist organizations, and published speeches and radio broadcasts. Among the publications are Aspiraciones (1918), an early feminist journal published by the Partido Feminista Aspiraciones; La Mujer Moderno (1926), the journal for the Club Femenino de Cuba, the oldest Cuban feminist organization; and La Mujer (1929-1931), the journal of the Partido Demócrata Sufragista, focusing on the entire Cuban feminist movement.

The second group consists of assessments by politicians, jurists, and legislators about the condition of women in the cities and countryside. These materials provide an in-depth view of the ruling elite’s perception on the reform of laws to improve the status of women.

The third group contains excerpts from novels, essays and poetry written by women about women. Also included are literary anthologies of Cuban women writers in general as well as literary analysis of these women’s works.
Foreign Relations between Latin America and the Caribbean States, 1930-1944
Organized by country, this collection covers a wide range of viewpoints on political, social, and economic issues. It sheds light on the foreign relations interactions between Central American and South American countries. In the Caribbean, Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic are represented. This collection includes cables, memoranda, correspondence, reports and analyzes, and treaties.
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Originally microfilmed as Records of the Department of State relating to Political Relations, this collection provides unique perspectives for the study of Latin American and Caribbean international relations. The collection affords a country-by-country analyses utilizing the State Department’s decimal system to organize the voluminous correspondence and reporting on a variety of diverse topics, events, and people. In addition, it provides detail on the evolution of Latin American foreign policies, significance of inter-American cooperation in time of war, and the rise of totalitarian regimes.

This collection consists of materials pertaining to political relations of states, including diplomatic and consular representation and bilateral treaties, conventions, and agreements for the following countries/regions: Argentine Republic, Bolivia, Brazil, Central America, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela, and the West Indian Republics.
Latin American Newspapers Series 1
...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, Latin American Newspapers offers unprecedented coverage of the people, issues and events that shaped this vital region between 1805 and 1922.
Latin American Pamphlet Digital Collection
The Widener Library at Harvard University hosts this collection of over 5,000 pamphlets principally from Chile, Cuba, Bolivia and Mexico.
Presidential Messages
A collection of digital full-text presidential messages of Argentina and Mexico from the early 19th century to the present.
Confidential Print Latin America
The documents of Confidential Print: Latin America cover the whole of South and Central America, plus the non-British islands of the Caribbean, from just after the final Spanish withdrawal from mainland America in the 1820s to the height of the Cold War in the 1960s. Covering revolutions, territorial changes and political movements, foreign financial interests, industrial and infrastructural development (including the building of the Panama Canal), wars, slavery, immigration from Europe and relations with indigenous peoples, amongst other topics, the files in this title form a vital resource for any scholar of Latin American history in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. [Publisher]
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Confidential Print: Latin America includes the following file classes from The National Archives, Kew in their entirety:
FO 420/1-294: Central and South America general, 1833-1941
FO 467/1-5: Brazil, 1947-1951
FO 486/1-10: Mexico, 1947-1956
FO 495/1-10: River Plate countries (Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay), 1947-1956
FO 497/1-10: South America general, 1947-1956
FO 533/1-11: Central America and Caribbean general, 1946-1957

The following selected files are also included:
FO 118/276, 281, 287, 292, 305, 317, 331: South and Central America general, 1906-1913
FO 177/297: Chilean Revolution, 1891
FO 461/14-22: Americas general, 1958-1969
FO 508/8: South and Central America general, 1908-1909

History, Latin American: Primary Sources

Primary Sources

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