Research Guides: HIST/ EALC 347: WWII in East Asia ca. 1900-1950 (HC): Primary Sources: Texts and Images

Primary Sources

Primary sources can take many different forms. Letters, accounts and other kinds of documents written at the time of an event or era allow a nuanced and detailed understanding of historical issues. Material below explains ways to locate primary sources in Tripod and Worldcat. To find additional primary sources, historical studies in books and journal articles will often offer the best recommendations. Check footnotes and bibliographies for references to material written in the period of time you are researching.

Primary Source Database

China Trade, Politics and Culture, 1793-1980
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This collection contains a wide range of materials documenting western interaction with China from the first embassy by Lord Macartney to trade negotiations for military aircraft in the 1970s. It includes papers regarding the Boxer Rebellion, Taiping Rebellion, the birth of the People's Republic, and strong collections relating to missionaries and their experiences. It contains maps, drawings and photographs, and personal accounts of life and work in China throughout the period.
Japan Center for Asian Historical Records
Online archive sponsored by the Japanese government. Includes material in English as well as Japanese. See the web exhibitions for examples of the documents and images available.

Finding Printed Copies of Primary Sources

Primary source translations that are in the Tricollege libraries will often be listed in Tripod under subject terms using the word "sources" or "early works." For example, the search (Keyword: (war OR soldier* OR military) AND Subject: sources AND (Subject: (china OR chinese) produces books including the first two listed below.

This search for sources, with differing literary forms specified, can provide additional titles:

(Subject: (sources OR memoir* OR diar* OR personal OR letter* OR correspondence) AND 20th AND (china OR japan OR korea)

Chinese Comfort Women: Testimonies from Imperial Japan's Sex Slaves
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During the Asia-Pacific War, the Japanese military forced hundreds of thousands of women across Asia into "comfort stations" where they were repeatedly raped and tortured. This book presents the oral histories of 12 Chinese women who were forced into "comfort stations".
Also available as an ebook in Tripod.
Documents on the Rape of Nanking
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The Japanese Army's conduct from December 1937 to February 1938 constitutes one of the most barbarous events not just of the war but of the century. The violence was documented at the time and then redocumented during the war crimes trial in Tokyo after the war. This book brings together materials from both moments to provide the first comprehensive dossier of primary sources on the Rape.
War and occupation in China : the letters of an American missionary from Hangzhou, 1937-1938
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A fresh eyewitness account of the Japanese invasion of mid-China in 1937-1938, these letters by an American missionary in Hangzhou provide a vividly detailed, first-hand account of the spread of war from Shanghai across the Yangzi valley and the subsequent ordeals of military occupation.
So lovely a country will never perish: wartime diaries of Japanese writers
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Until the shattering end of the war, many Japanese continued to believe in the invincibility of their country. But in the diaries of well-known writers including Nagai Kafu, Takami Jun, Yamada Futaru, Hirabayashi Taiko and the scholar Watanabe Kazuo, varying doubts were vividly, though privately, expressed.

Literary Texts

WorldCat
For Novels search by author's name and/or keywords to identify relevant works.
+ Limit Language to English for translations.
+ Under Any Content, limit to Fiction
WorldCat
For Letters Search for the subject Correspondence along with keywords and/or author's name to identify relevant works.
+ Limit Language to English for letters.
WorldCat
For Diaries Search for the subject Diaries along with keywords and/or author's name to identify relevant works.
+ Limit Language to English
For Memoirs Search for the keyword Memoir* along with keywords and/or author's name to identify relevant works.
+ Limit Language to English

Newspapers and Magazines

If you have the name of a newspaper or magazine, search for it first in Tripod. If not listed there, check Google for accessible digitized issues. If you are searching for articles but have no newspaper or magazine name, see the indexes below.

General Periodical Indexes

American Periodicals Series Online
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Search through 1,800 magazines and journals published in the United States between 1740-1940. Includes early scientific publications, trade journals, popular magazines such as Ladies' Home Journal, and journals such as Puck, The Dial, and McClure's.
Readers' Guide Retrospective
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Provides indexing of general-interest periodicals published in the United States and reflects the history of 20th century America.

Selected Individual Magazines and Newspapers

Chinese Repository
Missionary journal published 1832-1851. Note the print index volume available to search by subject.
Life Magazine
Covers the years 1936-1972. Notable for the many high-quality photographs included in articles.
Mission Periodicals Online
Yale University Library makes online access available for many newspapers including:
China's Millions, English Weekly, and the West China Missionary News.

New York Times
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Full-text access to news articles, blog posts, videos, images, and multimedia features. Coverage from 1851-present.
Time Magazine
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Time Magazine is the first weekly news magazine in the United States. Coverage - 1923 to the present.

Visual Resources

JSTOR Images (formerly Artstor)
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A digital library that provides access to thousands of digital images derived from a variety of museum, library and archival collections. Images support a variety of disciplines including architecture, painting, sculpture, photography, decorative arts, and design.

China and Japan at war 1937-1945 : rare photographsgraphs from wartime archives
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Features nearly 200 photographs drawn from archives. The focus is on military history.
Chinese Posters: Propaganda, Politics, History, Art
This is a continuation of the Stefan Landsberger's Chinese Propaganda Poster Pages. The site features over 5,000 posters searchable by keyword.
Maps of the Chinese Civil War
This site from Westpoint provides nine maps for different aspects of the Chinese Civil War.
Pacific War Karuta Collection
Karuta involves a set of cards, often used in Japanese children's school classes. These digitized cards from the 1930s and 1940s reflect themes of militarism and racism in depictions of war against the Chinese.