Women's Studies Section

Association of College & Research Libraries / American Library Association

1400s to the present

Description

American Memory is a gateway to the Library of Congress' vast resources of digitized American historical materials. Comprising more than 9 million items that document U.S. history and culture, American Memory is organized into more than 100 thematic collections, covering the social sciences, humanities, science, and technology. The collections have been organized based on original format, subject matter, or creator.

Women's Studies Content

American Memory materials on women are extensive, and there are several women's history specific collections:

• Zora Neale Hurston Plays
• Hannah Arendt Papers
• Quilts and Quiltmaking
• "Votes for Women" Suffrage Books and Pamphlets (1848-1921)
• "Votes for Women" Suffrage Pictures (1850-1920)
• Women of Protest: Photographs from the Records of the National Woman's Party (1875-1938)
• National American Woman Suffrage Assocation Scrapbooks (1897-1911)

More importantly, while the presence of material relating to women is less apparent when skimming the titles of other collections, women's experiences and perspectives are richly represented throughout American Memory. A very broad "women" keyword search produces results from most collections.

Searching

In approaching the entire archive, browsing will probably produce the best results and be most effective with regard to use of one's time and energy. One can browse by broad topical categories (including women's history), a list of collections, time period, format, and region. It’s also possible to keyword search all 100 plus collections at once (not recommended). Instead choose a collection related to your topic and search for women's studies material within that collection.

There is also a separate American Memory gateway for women's history material, Searching American Memory for Women’s History Materials.

The Library also has a detailed online gateway on how to approach researching women at the Library of Congress, not just within American Memory. The gateway is American Women: A Gateway to Library of Congress Resources for the Study of Women's History and Culture in the United States.

Archive Review:
Sherri Barnes
University of California, Santa Barbara