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Selected Sources Sections Studying History Reformation Early Modern World Everyday Life Absolutism Constitutionalism Colonial North America Colonial Latin America Scientific Revolution Enlightenment Enlightened Despots American Independence French Revolution Industrial Revolution Romanticism Conservative Order Nationalism Liberalism 1848 Revolutions 19C Britain British Empire History 19C France 19C Germany 19C Italy 19C West Europe 19C East Europe Early US US Civil War US Immigration 19C US Culture Canada Australia & New Zealand 19C Latin America Socialism Imperialism Industrial Revolution II Darwin, Freud, Einstein 19C Religion World War I Russian Revolution Age of Anxiety Depression Fascism Nazism Holocaust World War II Bipolar World US Power US Society Western Europe Since 1945 Eastern Europe Since 1945 Decolonization Asia Since 1900 Africa Since 1945 Middle East Since 1945 20C Latin America Modern Social Movements Post War Western Thought Religion Since 1945 Modern Science Pop Culture 21st Century
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Internet Modern History Sourcebook

Editor: Paul Halsall



The Modern History Sourcebook works as follows:

  • This Main Index page shows all sections and sub sections. These have also been regularized in a consistent hierarchy. This should allow rapid review of where texts are.
  • To access the sub-section pages, simply browse the sections below and select the highlighted section title.
  • The navigation bars on the left also offers links to each sub-section and are the easiest way to navigate around the site.

Additional Study/Research Aids

In addition to the above structure the following may be of interest to educators and students.


Bad Links

1. This project is both very large and fairly old in Internet terms. At the time it was begun (1996), it was not clear that web sites [and the documents made available there] would often turn out to be transient. As a result there is a process called "link rot" - which means that a "broken link" is a result of someone having taken down a web page. Efforts are made to remove all dead links, but new link problems do come up.

2. All links to documents marked [At this Site] should be working.

3. Users may attempt to locate texts not currently available, or where the links have changed via The Internet Archive/Way Back Machine. Alternately, a search via Google may locate another site where the document is available.


SECTIONS

Subjects covered by the source texts in each Section.

Studying History

  • Introduction: Using Primary Sources
  • Nature of Historiography
    • Writing History
    • Ancient Theories
    • 19th Century Philosophies of History
    • Professional Theories
    • History and Epistemology
    • History and Anthropology
    • History and Identity Politics
    • Post-Modern Theories
    • Misc. Discussions
  • Other Sources of Information on Modern History
    • General Guides to Net Text [link to texts at other sites.]
    • General Etext Projects [sites with texts online.]
    • Economics
    • Law
    • Military
    • Religion
    • Philosophy
    • Literature
    • Music Lyrics
    • Western Civilization/Europe
    • United States History
    • Latin American History
  • Student Papers and Projects
    • Student Papers
    • Student Web Projects

The Early Modern World

Reformation

  • Protestant Reformation
    • Precursors and Papal Critics
    • Luther and Lutheranism
    • Calvin and Calvinism
    • Zwingli
    • Radical Reformers
    • English Reformation
    • Scottish Reformation
      • John Knox
    • Protestant Culture
  • Catholic Reformation
    • Precursors
    • The Catholic Response
    • The Council of Trent
    • Activist Popes
    • Other Catholic Reformers
    • The Society of Jesus
    • Catholic Culture
  • Conflict
  • Women and Reformation

Early Modern World

  • The Early Modern World System
    • The European "Age of Discovery"
    • The "Columbian Exchange"
    • The Americas
    • South and South East Asia
    • East Asia
    • The Middle East: Ottomans and Safavids - Rivals of European Powers
    • Africa
    • Eastern Europe Becomes a Peripheral Area
  • Mercantile Capitalism
  • Reflections on the Trade and the New Economy

Everyday Life

  • Structures of Life in the West
    • Population
    • Climate
    • Geography
    • Food and Famine
    • Housing
    • Clothes and Fashion
    • Technology
    • Money
    • Towns and Cities
  • Everyday Life
    • Country Living
    • Urban Live
    • Trades
    • Criminal Justice
    • Social Welfare
    • Health and Disease
    • Women, Men and Children
    • Witchcraft
  • From Popular to Mass Culture

Absolutism

  • Absolutism
    • Spain
    • England
    • Prussia
  • France and the Ancien Regime
    • The Crisis: French Wars of Religion
    • The Creation of an Absolutist Regime
    • The Sun King
    • Absolutism and Trade Policy
  • French Culture in the 16th and 17th Centuries

Constitutional States

  • Constitutional States
    • The Holy Roman Empire
    • Poland
    • Switzerland
  • The English Revolution
    • Tudor Government
    • The Stuart Challenge
    • Civil War and Revolution
    • Radicals
  • Religious Groups
    • "Puritans"
    • Baptists
    • Quakers
    • Catholics
  • The Restoration
  • The "Glorious Revolution"
  • English Culture in the 17th and 18th Centuries
  • The Netherlands
  • Philosophical Reflections on Constitutional Politics
  • Internationalist Ideas 
Colonial North America
  • Colonial North America
  • Early Conquest and Exploitation
  • Political Forms
    • Virginia
    • New England
    • Middle Atlantic
  • American Society

Colonial Latin America

  • Colonial Latin America
  • Conquest and Exploitation
    • Indigenous Voices
    • Mexico
    • Peru
    • Profits
    • Criticism
  • The Creation of Latin American Cultures
    • Mexico
    • Peru
    • Paraguay
    • Brazil

The Transformation of the West
Scientific, Political, and Industrial Revolutions

Scientific Revolution

  • The Scientific Revolution
    • Traditional Aristotelianism
    • New Medieval Analyses of motion
    • The Challenge: Astonomy in the 16th Century
    • Galileo Galilei: The Turning Point
    • Philosophy of Science: Induction/Deduction
    • The Creation of Classical Physics
    • New Medical Theories
    • Scientific Institutions
    • Science and Religion
  • The Scientific Attitude

Enlightenment

  • The Enlightenment
    • Precursors
    • The Enlightenment as a Propaganda Project
    • The Enlightenment and Political Analysis
    • The Enlightenment Evaluation of the Human Condition
    • The Enlightenment and Economics
    • Enlightenment and Philosophy
    • Enlightenment Attitudes
    • The Social Setting
    • Enlightenment Philosophy - Full Texts
    • Enlightenment Politics and Economics - Full Texts
  • Religion in an Age of Reason
    • Opposition to Religion
    • State and Religion
    • Rational Christianity
    • Evangelicalism
    • Catholic Pietism
    • Jewish Responses
Enlightened Despots

Government in the Age of Enlightenment

  • Rising Polities
    • Russia
    • Austria
    • Prussia
  • Declining Polities
    • Holy Roman Empire
    • Poland
    • Ottoman Empire

American Independence

  • American Independence
    • Mid-18th Century Politics
    • Early New York
    • French and Indian Wars
    • Benjamin Franklin
    • American Revolution
    • Loyalism
    • War
  • The Establishment of the American State
  • Commentators on America
  • Native Americans
  • Slavery
French Revolution
  • The French Revolution
    • Lead Up
    • Liberal Revolution
    • Radical Revolution
    • The Revolution and Culture
    • Internal Resistance to the Revolution
  • Responses to Revolution
  • Napoleon
  • Napoleonic Wars
Industrial Revolution
  • The Industrial Revolution
    • The Agricultural Revolution of the 17th-18th Centuries
    • The Revolution in the Manufacture of Textiles
    • The Revolution in Power
      • Railroads
      • Steam Ships
    • The Great Engineers
    • The Process of Industrialization
  • The Industrial Revolution and the Transformation of the World
  • Social and Political Effects
    • The Lives of Workers
    • Urban Life: New Social Classes
    • Social Reformism
  • Literary Response

Romanticism

Romanticism

  • Roots of Romanticism
  • Romantic Philosophy
  • Romanticism in Literature
  • Romanticism in Visual Arts
  • Romanticism in Music

The 19th Century and Western Hegemony

Conservative Order

  • The Congress of Vienna System and Challenges
  • Reactionary Thought
  • Modern Conservatism

Nationalism

  • Nationalism
    • Analyses
    • Non-National Forms of Government
  • Cultural Nationalism: The Nation as Positive Focus of Identity
  • Liberal Nationalism: The Nation as a Basis for Liberal Democracy
  • Triumphal Nationalism: The Nation as a Claim to Superiority

Liberalism

  • Liberalism
    • Utilitarianism
    • Laissez-Faire Economics
    • Radical Politics
    • John Stuart Mill
    • Other Liberalisms
    • Welfare Liberalism
    • Judgements on Liberalism
  • Feminism
    • Origins
    • Political Feminism
      • United States
      • Britain
      • Other Countries
    • Prohibitionism

1848

1848: Europe in Revolt

  • France
  • Austria
  • Prussia/Germany

19C Britain

  • Britain
    • Radicalism
    • Liberal Reformism
      • The State
      • The Professions
      • The Poor
      • Men, Women, and Sex
    • Social Class
  • Ireland
  • Victorian Sensibility
  • Victorian Literature

British Empire History

  • British Imperialism
  • Medieval Antecedents
    • Angevin Empire
    • Plantagenets in France
    • Ireland
    • Wales
  • Tudor Claims
    • Henry VIII and the word "Empire"
    • Wales
    • Sea Power
  • The First British Empire
    • Elizabeth I
    • James I and VI
    • West Indies
    • North America
    • Slave Trade
    • Commerce
  • The Second British Empire
    • Seven Years War
    • American Independence
  • India and the Raj
    • India
    • Persia and the Great Game
    • The Gulf
  • Canada
    • Quebec
    • English Canada
  • Australia and New Zealand
    • Australia
    • Transportation
    • Gold
    • New Zealand
  • The Mediterranean
    • Gibraltar
    • Cyprus
    • Corfu
    • Malta
  • Slavery and Abolition
    • Slavery
    • Abolitionism
    • Abolition
    • Royal Naval Squadrons
  • Hong Kong and China
    • Contacts
    • Opium Trade
    • Hong Kong
  • Singapore and Malaya
  • South Africa
    • Boer States
    • Cape Colony
    • Wars
  • East Africa
    • Kenya
    • Uganda
    • Tanganyika
    • Zanzibar
  • West Africa
    • Sierra Leone
    • Nigeria
    • Gold Coast/Ghana
  • Egypt
    • Sinai Canal
    • Egypt
    • Sudan
  • Economic Imperialism
    • Argentina
    • Brazil
    • Chile
  • Imperial Institutions in Britain
    • East India Company
    • Public Schools
    • Oxford and Cambridge
    • Exam Systems
    • "Imperial families"
  • Mandates
    • Palestine
    • Iraq
  • Dissolution
    • Attitudes in Britain
    • Ireland
    • India
    • Pakistan
    • Palestine
    • Africa
    • Honk Kong
    • The Commonwealth
  • Assessments
    • Assessments
    • The British Empire in British Schools

19C France

  • France
    • The Restoration
    • The July Monarchy, 1831-1848
    • 1848
    • The Second Empire
    • The Franco-Prussian War and the Commune
    • The Third Republic
  • French Literature

19C Austria and Germany

  • Austria-Hungary
  • Germany
  • German Literature

19C Italy

  • Italy

19C West Europe

Other Western European Countries

  • Switzerland
  • Netherlands
  • Belgium
  • Denmark
  • Sweden
  • Norway
  • Spain
  • Portugal

19C East Europe

Eastern European Countries

  • Greece
  • Romania [Moldavia/Wallachia/Transylvania]
  • Bulgaria
  • Hungary
  • Poland
  • Bohemia
  • Russia

Early US

  • The United States Emerges
  • Political Institutions
  • Economic Development
  • Expansion and Manifest Destiny
  • The United States as a World Power
  • Early US Society
  • Early US Religion

US Civil War

  • The American Civil War
  • The Conflict over Slavery
  • The Civil War
    • Confederate Documents
    • Union Documents
    • The Military History of the Civil War
    • The Social History of the Civil War
  • Reconstruction, and Jim Crow

US Immigration

  • US Immigration and Its Effects
  • European Immigration
    • General
    • British
    • German
    • Irish
    • Italian
    • Jewish
    • Other
  • Asian Immigration
  • Latin American Immigration
  • Ellis Island and New York
  • Opposition to Immigration

US Culture

  • The Maturation of American Culture
  • Legal Framework of American Life
  • The Gilded Age
  • The Emergence of Modern Politics
  • American Thought
  • American Literature

Canada

Canada: Another North American Society

  • Origins
    • Loyalism
  • Creation of the Canadian State
  • Canadian Society
  • Canadian Regions

Australia and New Zealand

  • Australia
  • New Zealand

19C Latin America

  • Latin America in the 19th Century
    • Independence
    • Political Development
    • United States Imperialism
    • Immigration
  • Mexico
  • Argentina
  • Brazil
  • Chile
  • Colombia/Panama
  • Cuba
  • Nicaragua
  • Peru
  • Venezuela
  • Paraguay

Socialism

  • Responses to Economic Growth: Socialism and Marxism
  • Early Socialism
  • Marxism
  • Versions of Socialism
    • Revisionism
    • Fabianism
    • Labor Parties
  • Socialist Culture
  • Trade Unionism

Imperialism

  • Imperialism
    • Analyses
    • Motives and Attitudes
    • Celebrations and Objections
  • China and the West
  • India Under the British
  • Africa
  • The Middle East
  • The Japanese Exception
  • American Imperialism

Industrial Revolution II

  • The Second Industrial Revolution and Advanced Capitalism
    • Growth: Free Markets and Government Support
    • The Modern Corporation
    • The Life of the Workers
    • The Consumer Marketplace
  • New Technologies
    • The Steel Industry
    • The Chemical Industry
    • Electricity
    • Aviation
    • Confidence and Disaster

Darwin, Freud, Einstein

  • Contradictions of the Enlightenment: Darwin, Freud, Einstein, Dada
    • The Classical Synthesis
    • The Advance of Medical Theory and Treatments
    • Geology
    • Biology: Red in Tooth and Claw
      • Reactions to Darwin
      • Social Darwinism
    • Physics: The End of the Classical Synthesis
    • Astronomy
    • Psychology: The Obscurity of the Mind
  • Philosophical Reflections: The End of Reason?
  • Literature: Humanity's Heart of Darkness?
  • Visual Arts: What to Do After Photography?

19C Religion

  • Religion in the Face of Modernity
  • Catholicism: Reaction and Radicalism
    • The Popes: Reaction and Reform
    • Renewed Marianism and Devotionalism
    • Converts
    • Converts and Decadence
    • Radicals
    • Missionary Expansion
  • Protestantism: Activism, Rationalism, and Fideism
    • Biblical Criticism
    • Liberal Protestantism
    • Muscular Christianity
    • The Oxford Movement
    • Quakers
    • Fundamentalism
    • Missionary Expansion
    • Resistence to Roman Control
      • Old Catholics
      • "Modernism"
  • Eastern Orthodoxy: Christian Life Under Tsars and Sultans.
  • Judaism and Modernity
  • Eastern Religions in the West
  • Humanist Consideration of Religious Thought

World Wars and the End of Western Dominance

WWI

  • World War I
  • The Path to War
    • Ottoman Empire: Weakness
    • The Balkans: Conflict
    • Austria Hungary
    • German Arms Race
    • The Alliance System
  • The War
    • Diplomatic History
    • Military History
    • Personal Accounts
  • Resistence to War
  • Literary Responses
  • The Aftermath

Russian Revolution

  • The Tsarist State
  • Russian Revolution
    • The Development of the Opposition
    • Lenin
    • 1905
      • 1905 Party Programs
    • 1917
  • Bolshevik Rule to 1924
  • Stalinism

Age of Anxiety

  • Age of Anxiety: The Interwar Years
  • European Culture
  • Western Europe
    • Britain
    • France
  • The New States of Eastern Europe
    • Yugoslavia
    • Czechoslovakia
    • Hungary
    • Romania
    • Greece
    • Turkey
  • The United States
  • Latin America in the Early 20th Century
    • United States Intervention
    • Mexico
    • Argentina
    • Chile
    • Uruguay
  • Inter-War International Relations

The Depression

  • Economic Problems and the Depression
    • War Reparations
  • Economic Problems in Europe
  • The Depression in the US

Fascism in Europe

  • Italy
  • Spain
  • Other Countries

Nazism

  • The Weimar Republic
  • National Socialism
    • Hitler
    • Elections
    • The Churches and the Nazis

Holocaust

  • The Holocaust
  • Anti-Semitism
    • Religious Anti-Semitism
    • Racist Anti-Semitism
    • Violent Racist Anti-Semitism
  • The "Final Solution": The Murder of European Jewry
  • Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust
  • The Handicapped
  • The Roma [Gypsies]
  • Serbs
  • Jehovah's Witnesses
  • Homosexuals
  • "Revisionism"
  • Pre- and Post-Holocaust Genocides
    • Armenia 1914-
    • Bangladesh 1971
    • East Timor 1975-
    • Cambodia 1978
    • Rwanda 1996
    • Former Yugoslavia

WWII

  • Lead Up to War
  • War In Europe
    • The Home Front
  • War In Asia
    • Use of Atomic Bomb
  • After the War

The World Since 1945

Bipolar World: The Cold War 1945-1991

  • World Unity
    • The United Nations Organization
    • Human Rights: Universal Ideals or a Western Impositions?
  • The Cold War
    • Beginnings
    • Berlin Crises
    • Cuban Crises
    • Able Archer 83
    • Cold Warriors
    • Various Detentes
  • Literary Reflections

US Power 1945-1990

  • America as World Leader: External Power
  • American Foreign Relations
    • Realpolitik or Human Rights
  • Relations with the Soviet Union [also see above "Cold War]
  • Relations with China
  • The Korean War
  • The "Vietnam War"

US Society 1945-1990

  • America as World Leader: Internal Change
  • US Domestic Politics: The State
    • American Conservatism
      • McCarthyism
      • Republicans
    • American Liberalism
      • Democrats
      • American Radicalism
  • American Society: Immigration
  • The 20th Century Expansion of Legal Rights
    • Balance of Power
    • Rights in Court
    • Racial Equality
    • Free Speech

Post-War W Europe

  • Western Europe Since 1945
    • The Division of Europe
    • Reconstruction
    • European Union
    • The Welfare State
  • Post-War Western European States
    • Britain
    • Germany
    • France
    • Italy
    • Spain
    • Ireland
    • Other Western Countries

Post-War E Europe

  • Eastern Europe Since 1945
  • The Soviet Union/Russia
    • Domestic Politics
    • Foreign Policy
  • Other Central and Eastern European Countries
    • Albania
    • Hungary
    • Yugoslavia
  • 1989: What Happened and Why?
    • Romania
  • After 1989

Decolonization

  • Decolonization
    • Retreat from Empire
    • The Non-Aligned Movement
  • Globalization: New Hegemonies?

Asia since 1900

  • India
  • China
    • Chinese Efforts to Modernize: 1911-1949
    • Communist Rule
    • Chinese Relations with the United States
    • Dissidents
    • Post Mao China
    • Hong Kong
  • Japan
  • Korea
  • Vietnam
  • Other Asian States

Africa Since 1945

  • Africa
  • South Africa
  • Other African Countries

Middle East Since 1914

  • Israel and Palestine
    • Zionism
    • The British Mandate
    • The Establishment of the State of Israel
    • Israeli Soceity
    • The Palestinians
  • Turkey
  • Egypt
  • Algeria
  • Iran
  • Kurds

20C Latin America

  • 20th Century Latin America
  • Common Themes and Issue
    • United States Interference
    • Pan-American Efforts
    • Economic Progress
    • National Identity
    • Liberation Theology
  • Argentina
  • Chile
  • Brazil
  • Paraguay
  • Uruguay
  • Peru
  • Central America
  • Nicaragua
  • Mexico
  • Cuba
  • Indigenous Peoples

Modern Social Movements

  • Modern Social Movements
  • Feminism
    • Origins of Third Wave
    • Cultural Feminism
    • Political Feminism
    • Liberal Feminism
    • Radical Feminism
  • Black Power
    • The US Civil Rights Movement
    • Radicals
    • Since 1968
  • Other Ethnic/Minority Movements
  • Lesbian and Gay Rights

Post-War Thought

Post-War Western Thought

  • Existentialism
  • Post-Structuralism and Offspring
    • Linguistics
    • Anthropology
    • Pomo Marxism
    • Deconstruction
    • Social Constructionism
    • Queer Theor

Post-War Religion

  • Religion since 1945
  • Roman Catholicism
  • Protestantism
  • Eastern Orthodoxy
  • Judaism
  • Islam
  • Buddhism
  • Humanist-Religious Debate

Modern Science

  • Science, Technology and the Transformation in the Means of Production
  • Biology: The DNA Revolution
  • Physics
  • Space Exploration
  • Computers
  • Knowledge Based Production
  • The Internet
  • The World Environment: Cornucopeian Plenty or a Crisis Situation

Pop Culture

  • Popular Culture
    • United States
    • Europe
  • Sports: The Opium of the People?

The Twenty-First Century

21st Century

  • Selected Documents

Introduction

The Internet Modern History Sourcebook is one of series of history primary sourcebooks. It is intended to serve the needs of teachers and students in college survey courses in modern European history and American history, as well as in  modern Western Civilization and World Cultures. Although this part of the Internet History Sourcebooks Project began as a way to access texts that were already available on the Internet, it now contains hundreds of texts made available locally.

The great diversity of available sources for use in modern history classes requires that selections be made with great care - since virtually unlimited material is available. The goals here are:

  • To present a diversity of source material in modern European, American, and Latin American history, as well as a significant amount of materal pertinent to world cultures and global studies. A number of other online source collections emphasize legal and political documents. Here efforts have been made to include contemporary narrative accounts, personal memoirs, songs, newspaper reports, as well as cultural, philosophical, religious and scientific documents. Although the history of social and cultural elite groups remains important to historians, the lives of non-elite women, people of color, lesbians and gays are also well represented here.
  • To present the material as cleanly as possible, without complicated hierarchies and subdirectories. What you get here is direct access to significant documents, not the efforts of some whizkid "website designer". In other words, we are interested here in the music, not the Hi-fi!.
  • Within the major sections, to indicate a few high quality web sites for further source material and research.

Sources of Material Here

The texts on these pages come from many sources:

  • Files posted to various places on the net. In some cases, the source URL no longer exists.
  • Shorter texts created for class purposes by extracting from much larger texts.
  • Texts scanned in from printed material. In some cases the printed book may be recent, but the material scanned is out of copyright.
  • Texts sent to me for inclusion.
  • Links to other online texts. External links sometimes cease to work. An effort has been made to provide a back-up link to an impression of such texts at the Internet Archive.

Efforts have been made to confirm to US Copyright Law. Any infringement is unintentional, and any file which infringes copyright, and about which the copyright claimant informs me, will be removed pending resolution.


NOTES:

The Internet Modern History Sourcebook is part of the Internet History Sourcebooks Project. The date of inception was 1998. Links to files at other site are indicated by [At some indication of the site name or location]. WEB indicates a link to one of small number of high quality web sites which provide either more texts or an especially valuable overview.



The Internet History Sourcebooks Project is located at the History Department of  Fordham University, New York. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook, and other medieval components of the project, are located at the Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies.The IHSP recognizes the contribution of Fordham University, the Fordham University History Department, and the Fordham Center for Medieval Studies in providing web space and server support for the project. The IHSP is a project independent of Fordham University.  Although the IHSP seeks to follow all applicable copyright law, Fordham University is not the institutional owner, and is not liable as the result of any legal action.

© Site Concept and Design: Paul Halsall created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 11 March 2024 [CV]