Research Guides: Native American and Indigenous Studies *: Archives

Native American Archives

American Indian Library Association
The AILA, a member group of the American Library Association, works to address the library-related needs of Native Americans.
American Indian Resource Center
Housed in the Huntington Park Branch of the County of Los Angeles Public Library system, this is the largest public library collection in the US that focuses on American Indians. AIRC materials include audiocassettes, books, compact discs, films, magazines, microfilm, newsletters, newspapers, and videocassettes
American Indian Studies Center
This UCLA research center serves as a resource for scholars as well as community members interested in a wide range of topics concerning Native American history and culture, from the national to a local level, and from "contemporary urban Indian experience to issues within tribal communities"
Index of Native American Resources on the Internet
This portal, compiled by an individual, provides links to primary and other resources.
Indigenous People's Literature
This site provides access to stories, songs, art, historical documents, and more.
National Museum of American Indian
This Smithsonian Institution museum provides some online information about Native American cultures, as well as information about its archives and other resources

California-Related Archival and Research Collections

Braun Research Library This Library of the Autrey Museum supports the activities of the Southwest Museum of the American Indian, a renowned collection that includes books, sound recordings, maps, photographs, works of art, and manuscripts

Huntington Library This website provides key information about the library as well as access to its online catalogue

LA as Subject Hosted by USC Libraries, LA as Subject is an alliance of research archives, libraries, and collections dedicated to preserving the rich history of the Los Angeles region

Online Archive of California The OAC brings together historical materials from a variety of California institutions, including museums, historical societies, and archives

Oral History Center (UC-Berkeley, Bancroft Library)

Seaver Center for Western History Research The purpose of the Seaver Center is to collect, preserve, and make accessible to the general public research materials documenting the history of the trans-Mississippi West, with special emphasis on Southern California and Los Angeles. The collection includes manuscripts, books, serials, pamphlets, broadsides, maps, posters, prints, and photographs

Southern California Library The SCL documents and preserves the histories of communities in struggle for justice and uses its collections to address the challenges of the present

USC's Special Collections USC's Special Collections offer access to a wide range of primary source material in all formats, including resources of interest to researchers in US History and American Studies and Ethnicity. Special Collections encompass rare books, manuscripts, and archival collections. In addition to housing a high proportion of rare and unique materials, Special Collections also contains many thematic special collections whose individual parts may not be 'valuable' or 'rare', but, as an aggregate, constitute a historically significant body of material. Search Special Collections

USC Digital Library The USC Digital Archive helps to fulfill the mission of the USC Libraries to select, collect, preserve, and make accessible high quality digital images of unique materials with metadata to support research, and provides a gateway to resources on Los Angeles and Southern California

Calisphere Digital Archive This link opens in a new window
Calisphere is the University of California's free public gateway to a world of primary sources. More than 150,000 digitized items, including photographs, documents, newspaper pages, political cartoons, works of art, diaries, transcribed oral histories, advertising, and other unique cultural artifacts, reveal the diverse history and culture of California and its role in national and world history.
Calisphere's content has been selected from the libraries and museums of the UC campuses, and from a variety of cultural heritage organizations across California. Calisphere is also a single point of access to over 300 UC web sites covering subjects ranging from history, math, literature, and anthropology to film, contemporary art, marine sciences, medical and health issues, and much more.