Exciting new additions to Library collections!
During 2023 the ANU Library acquired hundreds of amazing new resources to support students and academics in their research in disciplines across the humanities, arts and social sciences.
These new additions represent a major investment in the art and humanities and will enrich the Library collection, strengthen teaching and research at the University, and dramatically improve the range of offerings by blending digital access and physical items.
The range of electronic books and datasets available to the ANU community has grown hugely, supporting students and researchers to access library resources anytime, anywhere.
Subject areas covered by the new additions include Archaeology, Art, Asian Studies, Classical Studies, European Studies, History, Language & Linguistics, Literature, Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, Music, Philosophy, Political Science and International Relations, Religion and many more besides!
Below you can see a breakdown of major new collections we have access to across a range of formats, including databases, archives, primary source collections, journals, e-books and more.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of those who have made donations of books and financial contributions to help enhance the Library's collections. We are extremely grateful for your generosity.
You can recommend purchases to the ANU Library by completing an online form.
What’s new?
The listings below give details of some of the more significant resources recently purchased.
Archives and Primary Sources
Allied Propaganda in World War II and the British Political Warfare Executive (Archives Unbound series)
This collection presents the complete files of the Political Warfare Executive (PWE) kept at the U.K. National Archives as FO 898 from its instigation to closure in 1946, along with the secret minutes of the special 1944 War Cabinet Committee "Breaking the German Will to Resist." Included in the archive is all the correspondence, minutes, and agents' mission files along with a complete collection of all the airborne propaganda leaflets dropped over mainland Europe during the war by the British and American air forces. These leaflets, single sheets and miniature books are often highly illustrated, sometimes satirical, and sometimes intended to boost morale with speeches or addresses from exiled leaders. They were produced in all nine languages of the recipient countries.
Amnesty International Archives: A Global Movement for Human Rights (coverage: 1961-1991)
Sourced from the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam, this digital collection covers the first thirty years of Amnesty International after its foundation in 1961, charting the development of the organisation as it grew and as its evolving campaign mandate. A series of organisational records, including reports, meeting agendas and minutes, conference proceedings, and correspondence provide unparalleled insights into top-level policy decision-making and campaign strategies. Collection highlights include an image gallery of Amnesty campaign posters and around 50 hours of oral histories. Additional features such as a series of contextualising essays, an interactive chronology, map, and detailed document metadata make this a powerful and accessible resource for students of the global human rights movement.
This collection brings together hundreds of the most influential literary works from throughout Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Islands. Starting in the 1930s and spanning up to the present, the database allows in-copyright fictional, and poetry works to be cross-searchable for the first time. Primary-source literature is paired with supplementary materials—including author interviews, documentaries, scholarly writings, and other related multimedia. An incomparable resource for researchers in the fields of literature, creative writing, post-colonial studies, immigration studies, social studies, anthropology and more.
Chatham House Online Archive (coverage: 1920-2008)
This database contains the publications and archives of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House), the world-leading independent international affairs policy institute founded in 1920 following the Paris Peace Conference. The Institute's analysis and research, as well as debates and speeches it has hosted can be found in this subject-indexed and fully searchable online collection. Thousands of hours of audio recordings of Chatham House lectures and their fully searchable transcripts offer valuable insight into the experiences and opinions of key figures in international affairs, including Mahatma Gandhi and Winston Churchill. Users will also have access to the full text of two of Chatham House’s flagship periodicals, International Affairs and The World Today.
A compilation of over 4,000 rare China-related historical documents carefully selected from three series within the India Office Records now held at the British library: the Political and Secret Department Records, the Burma Office records, and the Records of the Military Department. These documents consist of manuscripts and monographs in the form of reports, memoranda, correspondence, pamphlets and official publications, intelligence diaries, accounts of political and scientific expeditions, travel diaries, handbooks, and maps. Together they reflect the security concerns of British India.
This collection of over 2,300 formerly classified U.S. government documents (most of them classified Top Secret or higher) provides readers for the first time with the declassified documentary record about the successes and failures of the U.S. intelligence community in its efforts to spy on the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
Conflict in Indochina: Foreign Office Files for Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia - Module 1: Crisis and Upheaval, 1959-1964 (File classes: FO 371 & FCO 15)
This collection of Foreign Office Files is part of the Archives Direct suite drawn from The National Archives, UK. It provides comprehensive coverage of the key events during the War in Vietnam, and the wider impact on Laos and Cambodia. Module 1 covers the growing conflict between North and South Vietnam, and the resulting political instability across the region.
East India Company – India Office Records E (Module 4 and 5)
These East India Company records offer access to a unique collection of India Office Records from the British Library. Containing royal charters, correspondence, trading diaries, minutes of council meetings and reports of expeditions, among other document types, this resource charts the history of British trade and rule in the Indian subcontinent and beyond from 1599 to 1947.
Module 4: Correspondence: Early Voyages, Formation and Conflict
This module includes correspondence between the East India Company, the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India, the Company’s various settlements, and European houses of agency. Date coverage: 1599-1947.
Module 5: Correspondence: Domestic Life, Governance and Territorial Expansion
This module features correspondence with the Bombay and Madras Presidencies and British government departments, interspersed with petitions, memorials and letters from individuals and lobby groups covering a diverse range of subjects. Date coverage: 1699-1858.
East View Global Census Archive PUBS Collection
The Global Census Archive (GCA) PUBS Collection include digitised census rounds from nearly 100 countries from the International Census Population (IPC) Collection that was published by Gale/Cengage over the last few decades on microfilm. GCA-PUBS provides a centralised platform for all available published content that accompanies the release of a census including official results (analytical and tabular), questionnaires, survey forms, maps, atlases, methodological and preparatory works, public campaign literature, newspaper and journal articles, conference materials, and legislative works.
Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO) (part 1 and 2)
This comprehensive digital collection includes every significant English-language and foreign-language title printed between 1701 and 1800 in the United Kingdom, along with thousands of important works from the Americas. From books and directories to bibles and sheet music to sermons and pamphlets, ECCO features a variety of works by many well-know and lesser-known authors. Most titles are in English, however scholars will also find material in French, German, Latin, Ancient Greek, Italian and Welsh. Included are works from women writers of the 18th Century, collections on the French Revolution, and numerous editions of the works of Shakespeare.
Evangelism in Thailand: Correspondence of the Board of Foreign Mission, 1840-1910 (Archives Unbound series)
Archive of correspondence of the American Presbyterian Church's Board of Foreign Missions relating to their Thailand Mission (formerly Siam) during the period of 1840 to 1910. The records offer primary source material of incoming correspondence from the mission field and outgoing correspondence from the Board headquarters. This collection provides invaluable information on efforts to spread the gospel during the nineteenth century documenting the church's educational, evangelical, and medical work.
Global Missions and Theology (Archives Unbound series)
This collection documents the broad range of Nineteenth Century religious missionary activities, practices and thought in the United States by reproducing pivotal personal narratives, organizational records, and biographies of the essential leaders, simple missionaries, and churches. In addition, it highlights activities in far-flung regions and countries, such as Africa, Fiji and Sandwich Islands, India, China, Southeast Asia, Japan, and Hawaii.
Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, 1941-1945 (Archives Unbound series)
Published originally as IstoriiaVelikoiOtechestvennoiVoinySovetskogoSoiuza 1941–1945 in Moscow in 1960 by the USSR Ministry of Defense, this collection includes over 9,000 pages of the official Soviet history of World War II. The work was translated by the U.S. Army Centre of Military History and the Foreign Technology Division, Air Force Systems Command, providing scholars with an opportunity to study what is considered one of the most significant historical documents produced in the Soviet Union. In addition to its importance in the war's historiography, the collection is a valuable exposition of the development of a widely influential military doctrine.
Korea: Records of the U.S. Department of State 1930-1963 (Archives Unbound series)
This collection includes digitised archival documents from the U.S. Department of State, Division of Far Eastern Affairs, and the U.S. Department of Commerce, addressing the Japanese occupation of Korea after World War II, Korean War, and 1953 armistice. Materials include reports on political, military, industrial, and economic affairs.
Queen of England for 63 years from 1837 to 1901 and Empress of India from 1876, Queen Victoria wrote her first diary entry in 1832 - aged thirteen - and continued for nearly sixty-nine years, writing her final entry shortly before she died in 1901, aged eighty-one. Queen Victoria's Journals reproduces every page of the surviving 141 volumes of the Queen's diaries (including draft volumes and copies made by Lord Esher and Princess Beatrice), as high-resolution colour images along with separate photographs of the many original illustrations by Victoria and inserts within the pages. Each page is also being meticulously transcribed and re-keyed, allowing for journals to be searched. The online collection is an amazing window into Victorian Britain, it covers all the key events of the Queen’s life, including her Coronation, her wedding to Prince Albert and the Diamond Jubilee celebrations to mark her 60 years on the throne in 1897.
Records of the U.S. State Department: Korea, political and governmental affairs, 1963-1966 (Archives Unbound series)
This digital archive provides researchers with a unique opportunity to review the development of the Korean peninsula under a reactionary communist regime in the North and a quasi-democratic government in the South. Documents are arranged topically and chronologically on crucial subjects including political parties and elections, unrest and revolution, human rights, government administration, fiscal and monetary issues, labour, housing, police and crime, public health, national defence, foreign policy-making, wars and alliances, education, religion, culture, trade, industry, natural resources, and more.
State Papers Online provides access to the British State Papers, the papers of the Secretary of State from Henry VIII's accession in 1509 to 1782. Covering a wide range of documents, subjects, and importance, they concern internal English/British affairs and administration of the country, and foreign affairs, marriage alliances, treaties, and wars.
Part Idelivers the complete series of State Papers Domestic for the Tudor era, encompassing every facet of early modern government, including social and economic affairs, law and order, religious policy, crown possessions, and intelligence. The collection is of immense value to researchers of religious history, chronicling social unrest in England as it pitched back and forth between the religious positions of its rulers: from the boy-king Edward VI's promotion of the Reformation, to Mary I's bloody reassertion of Catholicism and Elizabeth's loyalty to Protestantism and enduring suspicion of Catholic plots.
Part II reunites the Foreign, Scotland, Borders and Ireland papers with the Registers (‘Minutes’) of the Privy Council for the whole of the Tudor period. Together they give comprehensive coverage of international diplomacy, colonial policy, commercial and maritime law, trade and industry and naval and military policy. These documents offer detailed and exciting insights into the inner workings of the Tudor court but also those of its foreign allies and enemies.
Part III covers the Stuarts' internal struggles through a wealth of primary source documents from one of the most compelling and turbulent eras in Britain's social, political, and religious history. Among the more than one million pages of manuscripts, researchers will find original, first-hand accounts of the English Civil War, the execution of Charles I, and the invasion of William of Orange.
The Stuart era was witness to great changes, civil war, and transformation, particularly affecting matters of religion and politics that are still influential today. State Papers Online, Part IV charts international affairs throughout periods of revolution and upheaval in Britain and Europe's history.
State Papers Online: 18th Century 1714 – 1782 (part 1-4)
This collection focuses research on British domestic politics and society in an age punctuated by plots, rebellions, uprisings, and financial crises. Part I offers researchers online access to approximately 300,000 folios from the reigns of King George I, King George II, and part of the reign of King George III, plus military, naval, and plantation registers, sheriffs' lists, and State Papers of Scotland and Ireland.
This rich archive includes correspondence with English diplomats abroad and foreign diplomats in England, original and draft treaties, letters between heads of state, intercepted dispatches and other intelligence, working papers of the secretaries, and material relating to military, naval, and colonial policy. The collection’s detailed coverage of international diplomacy offers eighteenth-century scholars fresh insights into the workings of the Hanoverian court and those of its allies and enemies in Europe.
Part III includes reports and correspondence from wars and alliances across Europe, alongside other events with wide international repercussions. Additionally, the minutiae of the correspondence of British agents with Whitehall also casts light on aspects of social history such as public health, the status of merchants abroad, and the personal relationships between political figures or Royal families of Europe.
The letters and papers of this collection cover the great northern rivalry of Russia and Sweden, as well as Britain’s relations with Prussia, a heavy-weight in European politics, particularly under Frederick the Great. The Foreign Ministers (in England) series contains mainly original in-letters and memorials to the Secretary of State from foreign envoys and ministers accredited to the Court of St James.
State Papers Online: The Stuart and Cumberland Papers from the Royal Archives, Windsor Castle Digitised for the first time, the Stuart papers represent the correspondence and personal documents of the exiled members of the Stuart dynasty after 1688. Available here alongside the Cumberland papers of William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland and second surviving son of George II, they provide a unique window into the world of the Stuarts and their Jacobite followers, as well as to the incumbent Hanoverian monarchy during a time of continental wars, domestic conspiracies and rival claims to the throne.
State Papers Online Colonial: Asia (part I and II)
State Papers Online Colonial: Asia contains the British Colonial Office’s files now housed in The National Archives in the United Kingdom. These documents record Britain’s administration and governance of Asian countries, their international relations across the period, and the changing demographics and daily life of their inhabitants. Colonial history continues to influence these now independent countries today through chosen strategic alliances, institutional structures, and how they deal with the repercussions of their colonial legacy.
The Dublin Castle Records, 1798-1926 (Archives Unbound series)
This collection contains records of the British administration in Ireland prior to 1922, a crucial period which saw the rise of Parnell and the Land War in 1880 through to the establishment of the Irish Free State in 1921. Most of these papers relate directly or indirectly to the methods adopted by the authorities, using civil and military forces, to combat the efforts of the Nationalist organizations to secure Irish independence. The series contains lengthy memoranda on the various Nationalist movements, including Ribbonism, United Irish League, Sinn Fein, and at the other end of the political spectrum, Ulster Unionists. Also included are accounts of judicial proceedings, censorship, and the seizure of seditions literature, reports by both police and military, papers relating to the establishment of the Lord Lieutenant's Household, Dublin Metropolitan Police, and more.
The First World War Portal (Module III and IV)
The First World War portal makes available invaluable primary sources for the study of the Great War. From personal collections and rare printed material to military files, artwork and audio-visual files, content highlights the experiences of soldiers, civilians, and governments on both sides of a conflict that shook the world.
Module III: Visual Perspectives and Narratives - This module is drawn entirely from the unparalleled holdings of the Imperial War Museum. There is a major emphasis on visual sources – photographs, artwork, posters, film clips and museum objects. Also included are substantial documentary materials – manuscript, rare printed and ephemeral sources – which help to contextualise dominant themes covered by the visual sources, such as the international dimensions of the conflict, the Home Front, and the role of women in the war.
Module IV: A Global Conflict - This module is drawn from British, American, and Canadian archives. It contains collections of correspondence, diaries, ephemera, posters, artwork, government records, photographs and museum artefacts that provide insights into the experiences and deployment of troops from around the world. It brings together personal collections and official papers to highlight the significant impact of the conflict on all corners of the world, far beyond the Western Front. The primary sources focus on the global nature of the war, in and beyond the European theatres.
This unique online collection provides students and researchers with the declassified documentary record about the successes and failures of the U.S. intelligence community in the Far East during the Cold War (1945-1991). Particular emphasis is given to America’s principal antagonists in Asia during the Cold War era: the People’s Republic of China, North Korea, and North Vietnam.
This collection of over 4,000 formerly classified U.S. government documents provides a comprehensive survey of the U.S. intelligence community’s activities in Europe, including Eastern Europe, Turkey, and Cyprus, covering the period from the end of World War II to the fall of the Iron Curtain and beyond.
This comprehensive collection sheds light on the U.S. intelligence community’s spying and analytic efforts in the Arab world, including the Middle East, the Near East, and North Africa. It covers the period from the end of World War II to the present day, up until the 2002-2003 Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) assessments, the Global War on Terror, the Iraq War, and Iran’s nuclear program.
This collection contains more than 2,600 formerly classified U.S. government documents, most of them classified Top Secret or higher. Covering the period from the end of World War II to the present day, it provides unique access to previously unpublished reports, and other declassified documents. The papers in this collection detail how America’s stockpiles of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons were developed and the role they played in a series of world crises, how they shaped U.S. and NATO defence and foreign policy during the Cold War, and what incidents and nearly averted disasters happened. Moreover, they shed a light on the dreadful human and ecological legacy left by decades of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons manufacturing and testing in the U.S. and overseas.
The collection is broken down into four parts:
History Vault: U.S. Military Intelligence Reports, 1911-1944
History Vault: Confidential U.S. State Department Central Files, Asia
History Vault: CIA Cold War Research Reports and Records on Communism
Women's Studies Archive, Part 1: Issues and Identities (Gale Primary Sources)
A comprehensive, academic-level archival resource focusing on the social, political, and professional achievements of women throughout the nineteenth and twentieth century. Along with providing a closer look at some of the pioneers of women’s movements, this collection offers scholars great insight into the issues that have affected women and the many contributions they have made to society. Topics covered include: the history of feminist theory and activism; domestic culture; lay and ordained church women; women in industry; women’s sexuality and gender expression; women’s education; women’s movements; women’s health and mental health; women and law; women and the control of their bodies; and women’s roles and interactions within society.
Books
This archive contains over 11,000 book titles published by Brill before the year 2000, across disciplines such as Asian Studies, Biblical Studies, Classical Studies, History, Language & Linguistics, Literature and Cultural Studies, Middle East and Islamic Studies, Philosophy, Religious Studies, Theology, International Law, Social Sciences, and Biology.
A series of over 2,000 monographs covering all aspects of classical learning including ancient history, ancient philosophy, classical art and architecture, classical languages, classical literature, and general classical studies. Most of the books arise from work done at Cambridge University. The collection includes critical editions of ancient texts, commentaries, literary and historical analysis, theoretical perspectives, reception studies, course texts, companions, and source books.
The archive captures books published in print by Oxford University Press between 1999 and 2009. The ANU Library has purchased perpetual access to two archival subject-based collections:
Art and Humanities Collection including over 3,400 book titles across disciplines such as Archaeology, Classical Studies, History, Linguistics, Literature, Music, Philosophy, and Religion.
Social and Behavioural Sciences Collection including over 1,200 book titles across disciplines such as Business & Management, Economics & Finance, Education, Political Science, Psychology, Public Health & Epidemiology, Social Work, and Sociology.
University Press Scholarship Online Classics (coverage: 2007-2024)
A collection of over 1,000 eBooks, published by Oxford University Press, written by leading scholars in the field of classical studies. Coverage includes Greek and Latin literature and culture, and ancient history. Every book has a home page providing structured access to the full text, as well as full bibliographic information, and links to related content.
Journals and Magazines
An archive of magazines comprising key research material in the fields of art and architecture dating from the late-nineteenth century to the twenty-first century. Subjects covered include fine art, decorative arts, architecture, interior design, industrial design, landscape gardening, and photography.
This resource offers facsimile page images and searchable full text for more than 300 journals from the ProQuest microfilm collections English Literary Periodicals and British Periodicals in the Creative Arts together with 10 additional titles, amounting to almost 3 million pages. Topics covered include literature, music, art, drama, archaeology, and architecture.
This online portal provides access to periodicals from the Church Missionary Society Archive (CMS). Founded in 1799 as an Anglican evangelical movement, the CMS has been active across the globe, proving one of the key agents of evangelism in the non-Western world. Documenting missionary work from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, the published periodicals include news, journals and reports offering a unique global perspective on not only evangelism and mission history but conflict, colonialism, and globalisation.
Japanese American Relocation Camp Newspapers: Perspectives on Day-to-Day Life (Archives Unbound series)
A collection of newspapers produced by the Japanese-Americans interned around America during World War II. The papers provide a unique look into the daily lives of the people who were held in these camps. Included are articles written in English and Japanese, typed, handwritten, and drawn. They advertise community events, provide logistical information about the camps and relocation, report on news from the community, and include editorials.
News, Policy & Politics Magazine Archive (coverage: 1918 to 2015)
This collection comprises the backfiles of 15 major consumer magazines (including the Newsweek archive), spanning areas including current events, international relations, and public policy. These titles offer multiple perspectives on the contemporary contexts of the major events, trends, and interests in these fields throughout the twentieth century.
Phonetica - Archive (coverage: 1957 to 2019)
This international peer-reviewed academic journal covers all aspects of phonetic science, from phonetic and phonological descriptions, to articulatory and signal analytic measures of production, to perception, acquisition, and phonetic variation and change. Papers published in this journal report expert original work that deals both with theoretical issues, new empirical data, and innovative methods and applications that help to advance the field.
Religious Magazine Archive (coverage: 1845-2015)
This collection offers digital access to the archival runs of major magazines in the field of religion, spanning the 19th-21st centuries. The magazines span a wide variety of religions and denominations, allowing for comparative studies of the responses of each to specific events and issues, not only in religious life, but also in wider society, politics, and international affairs.
Seminar: A Journal of Germanic Studies (coverage: 1965-2022)
Founded in 1965, Seminar is one of the leading journals today for the study of Germanic literature, media, and culture. It publishes the highest-quality scholarship on a range of fields including philology, philosophy, aesthetics, media studies, visual culture, gender studies, and transnationalism in so far as they relate to German-language material or other languages in a German-cultural context.
Times Digital Archive, 1785-2019 (GALE Primary Sources - Historical Newspapers series)
An online, full-text facsimile edition of the Times (London, England: 1788) and its predecessors The daily universal register (1785-1787) and the Times, or, Daily universal register (1788). Includes every page, editorial, news item, announcement, obituary and advertisement, illustrations, and photos from The Times newspaper - one of the most highly regarded resources for eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth century news coverage - from its beginning in 1785 up to 2019.
Chinese Periodical Full-Text Database, created by Shanghai Library, contains around 10 million pieces of writing in over 20,000 different kinds of periodicals published from 1911 to 1949. It includes journals of all disciplines and subjects published at the time.
Theses
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT) Global is the world's most comprehensive collection of dissertations and theses from around the world. In 2023 we purchased in perpetuity 51 PDF replacement copies of ANU PhD dissertations that had been lost or damaged as well as 600 non-ANU PhD dissertations.
Text Data Mining Tools
An online platform for conducting text analysis and data visualization on material extracted from Gale Primary Source Collections licensed by ANU Library. Users can also upload their own corpora to be cleaned and analysed using the Lab's toolkit.
Research Methods
AM Research Methods is a platform designed to develop students' primary source literacy and critical thinking skills. Module II provides practical guidance for students re-examining primary sources and de-centring dominant narratives. Thematic tools and guides will support digital learning and critical approaches to colonial sources with a focus on reading against the grain, interpreting archival silences and uncovering marginalised voices and perspectives.
