Primary Sources - Japanese Studies, a guide for undergraduate research

Finding Primary Sources

A primary source is a first-hand account of an event. Primary sources may include newspaper articles, letters, diaries, images, interviews, laws, reports of government commissions, and many other types of documents.

Use Subject Headings for your topic and words like "-diaries", "-personal narratives" and "sources" (e.g.Japan--Foreign relations--United States--Sources). Another useful heading is "Japan--Description and travel" although it will include scholarly analyses as well as primary sources.

Japanese Newspapers

Japan Times 1897-
Newpapers and Microforms: S134S
Search Archive, 1999-

Daily Yomiuri 1986-present

Underground Press Collection (microfilm S178)

Mushiro-bata
Libero International
Namazu
Ampo

Japan Echo 1974-

Gaikoku shinbun ni miru Nihon 1852-1922
Has articles in original languages on Japan from English, French, German and Russian newspapers as well as Japanese translations.

The Far East; an illustrated fortnightly newspaper 1870-78

Japan Weekly Mail 1870-1915

Archival Materials

Duke University's Rare Books and Special Collections Library has several collections with material focusing on Japan including reports from missionaries and early British diplomats to Japan, East India Company papers, and diaries and letters from merchants and seamen, as well as items in such collections as the stereographic card collection, the Hartman advertising collection and the postcard collection. The finding aid for these collections can be searched at http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/rbmscl/inv/. In addition,of particular note are:

Japan through western eyes [microform] : manuscript records of traders, travellers, missionaries and diplomats, 1853-1941. The originals are held in Special Collections. Includes a wide range of English language sources by writers, diplomats, tourists, businessmen, missionaries and others documenting the political, cultural and social history of Japan from 1853 to the present. Part 1 covers 11 individual collections of papers, including the letters of Sir Harry Parkes, British Minister to Japan between 1865 and 1883. Click here for a detailed description of the contents.
Robert L. Eichelberger Papers, 1728-1998 (bulk 1942-1949). The Eichelberger Papers span the period 1728 to 1998, with the bulk of the collection dating between 1942 and 1949. The papers contain diaries, correspondence, military papers, writings and speeches, pictures, scrapbooks, printed material, clippings, memorabilia, and audiovisual material chiefly relating to Eichelberger's military career. Prominently highlighted is his participation as a member of the American Expeditionary Forces in Siberia (1918-1920); the military campaigns he led in New Guinea and the Philippines during World War II (1942-1945); and the post-war period when he commanded all ground occupation troops in Japan (1945-1948).
Mary McMillan Papers, 1936-1997 and undated (bulk 1952-1991). The papers illuminate the personal life and professional work of McMillan, a United Methodist missionary and teacher at the Hiroshima Jo Gakuin College in Hiroshima, Japan. In addition to her work as a teacher, the collection documents McMillan's service to the Kyodan, a unifying organization for Christian missionaries in Japan, and to the hibakusha, the survivors of the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as her peace activism.
Picture File, 1600s-1979 and undated, bulk 1814-1950.
The Masaki Motoi Collection of Japanese Student Movement Materials, 1959-2003, bulk 1960-1979. The collection consists of Japanese books, periodicals and other printed materials relating to the Japanese student movement of the 1960s and later. The materials derive from the first confrontations of 1960 provoked by the Anpo treaty, through the protest movement's years of crisis and decay in the 1970s. It also includes books, journals and a video which are cataloged separately and housed in the East Asian Collection and Lilly.