This page gives information on some of the places to look for grey literature in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Visit your subject-specific Library Guide to see more.
For further assistance and advice on grey literature, please contact the Humanities and Social Sciences Library Subject Team: culturecommlib@swansea.ac.uk.
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A large collection of pamphlets on Egyptology and the ancient Near East which belonged to the personal library of Sir Alan Gardiner (1879–1963), the distinguished Egyptologist and linguistic scholar. These include many offprints from journals. The pamphlets are on permanent loan from the Sackler Library in the University of Oxford. The majority of the writings are in English, but there are also many in other languages including in German, French or Italian.
The collections held at the South Wales Miners' Library (located at Hendrefoelan Student Village) explore the political, social and cultural aspects of industrial South Wales. The South Wales Coalfield Collection (SWCC) is the largest research collection, but the library holds numerous smaller collections donated by academics, politicians, institutions and workers. These provide valuable resources for research across numerous disciplines, including Industrial History, English Literature, Politics, Astronomy and Philosophy. Check out the South Wales Miners' Library's Research Collections page for further information.
Most UK law reports are available online from either Westlaw UK or the Lexis Library. Westlaw UK provides the best starting point for England and Wales cases.
Mass Observation was a pioneering social research organisation founded in 1937 to record everyday life in Britain. This online resource contains primary material gathered by Mass Observation from 1937-1967, including diaries and questionnaires sent in by its panel of volunteers, and research gathered by paid investigators in the form of File reports and Topic collections.
Launched in 1981 by the University of Sussex as a rebirth of the original 1937 Mass Observation, its aim was to document the social history of Britain by recruiting volunteers to write about their lives and opinions. Still growing, it is one of the most important sources available for qualitative social data in the UK. This collection consists of the directives (questionnaires) sent out by Mass Observation in the 1980s and 1990s and the thousands of responses to them from the hundreds of Mass Observers. Topics covered are wide-ranging, from the deeply personal (sex, family) to everyday life (shopping, holidays), to global affairs.
The Internet History Sourcebooks provide copy-permitted historical texts for educational use.
This site provides access to collections at the British Library, the National Library of Scotland, the National Library of Wales, the New York Public Library and several major European libraries etc. At present the date coverage is between the 1570s and the 1950s.
Contains digital scans of OS paper map sheets including all available County Series maps at 1:2,500 and 1:10560 scales published between 1843 and 1939 and all available National Grid maps at 1:1,250, 1:2,500 and 1:10560/10,000 scales published from 1945 and before the introduction of the Ordnance Survey's digital Land-Line product.
Migration to New Worlds explores the movement of peoples from Great Britain, Ireland, mainland Europe and Asia to the New World and Australasia. It concentrates on the period 1800 to 1924 and includes primary source material such as: Colonial Office files on emigration; Diaries and travel journals; Ship logs and plans; Printed literature; Objects; Watercolours and Oral histories. Carefully selected secondary research aids are also included.
This resource contains digitizations of popular culture collections from the U.S. and U.K. between 1950 to 1975. These original archival materials are from various libraries and archives. Topics include student protests, civil rights, consumerism, and the Vietnam War. The collection includes pamphlets, letters, government files, eye witness accounts, underground magazines, visual and video materials and ephemera and memorabilia. Part II contains additional material, such as music, press kits, mail order catalogues, advertising proofs, additional photos from the Mirrorpix archives, and documents on student unrest and the Troubles in Northern Ireland from the National Archives.
English Historical Documents contains over 5,500 historical documents dating from between 500 and 1914. A further new volume will be added soon covering between 1914 and 1957. In addition to the chronological volumes the site contains American Colonial Documents to 1776.
The Picture Post Historical Archive comprises the complete archive of the Picture Post from its first issue in 1938 to its last in 1957 - all digitized from originals in full colour. Picture Post provides a fascinating snapshot of British life from the 1930s to the 1950s, with thousands of photos of ordinary people doing ordinary things.
British History Online is a digital library of core printed primary and secondary sources of British history from 1100 to the mid-twentieth century, with a focus on the medieval and early modern period.
Findmypast includes records of births, marriages and deaths, parish records, census records, passenger lists of ships leaving for the US and Canada and Australia, military records, records relating to churches, schools, workhouses and many other institutions, and much more. The majority of the records relate to Britain and Ireland. Most of the records are from the last two or three centuries, but some go back much further.
This collection of primary sources documents American History from 1860 to the mid-twentieth century. It is sourced from the Gilder Lehrman Collection. *Note: Despite the title, our access only covers 1860-1945.
This application allows you to compare selected georeferenced maps to each other and to modern map or satellite layers in a split-screen viewer.
