- In Collections on Latin America at the IISH, you will find some brief overviews and information about some collections that are in our Institute.
- In Archives and Collections on Labour History in Latin America you will find, in the future, information about some collections in different countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. We invite you to send us information about your collections and we will publish it on our web-page. Please use this form.
- In Archives in Latin America, you will find links to the main Archives of different countries that hold documents and collections on labour history and workers.
Collections on Latin America at the IISH
Workers in Bolivia: their voices and an analysis of their history, 1965-1996
This 1.20 TB digital collection has been produced by the Latin American Desk and its team in cooperation with the Museo Nacional de Etnografía y Folklore (MUSEF, La Paz) where the physical collection is located. The work consisted of digitizing 1.835 cassettes or audio-tapes during 2012 and 2013. Each cassette and audio received a detailed archival description through 44 fields allowing sophisticated searches by name, event, date, subject, place, etc.
This important collection is unique in the sense that it preserves, orally, events that have not been registered in written documents. This means that this is a recovery of endangered archives that represent 30 years of workers memory.
The material can be divided into two groups:
1. Workers's Voices: recordings of Meetings of Peasant Congresses, Mining Congresses, Artisans, Indigenous Movements, Coca Leaf peasants, Left-Wing Political Parties.
Audio tapes recorded the voices of peasants and indigenous people, miners, coca producers (or “cocaleros”), teachers and artisans in their meetings. These different workers have an oral culture and very rarely leave traces in written documents. This is why these audios are valuable sources and unique documents for the historical research. Thanks to these oral documents, researchers can have access to the context of the period, to the ideology, organization, strategies and socio-political reading that the workers had during the process of restoration of democracy, the period of transition toward a new economic model, the neoliberal model, and the institutional political practice of representative democracy.
Examples:
- First Peasant National Congress of Agrarian Reform (23 tapes, 1983)
- XXII Mining National Congress of Bolivia’s Mineworkers' Federation (FSTMB) (30 tapes, 1988)
- Expanded Congress of the Ayllu Chullpa about mine nationalization (19 tapes, 1987)
2. Voices of leaders and intellectuals: academic events, meetings, TV programs and seminars on different topics
Besides workers' voices, there are also audio tapes that recorded analysis of different public figures and intellectuals from the trade union sector and the political sphere, from the academic area and the left that analyzed different topics of the period. These voices, with macro-social analysis, complement the workers's voices.
Examples:
- Agrarian reform (its progress and limitations) and the economic reality of agriculture and the peasantry (72 tapes,1982-1990)
- Workers movement and economic crisis (90 tapes from 1982 to 1985)
- History of the mining world: cooperativism, crisis of Bolivia’s Mining Corporation and the relocated miners problem (144 tapes from 1985 to 1990)
- Indigenism, peasant struggles, colonialism and social class (18 tapes of the period1988-1994)
Read more: short version on the IISH website, large version (.docx)
The International Labour Organization (ILO) and workers' education: policies toward Latin America in the 1960-1970. (in Spanish).
This working paper presents a preliminary approach to these themes. It is a description of the materials that can be found in the Archive and Library of the IISH. The main goal is to point out some topics that are not very common with labour historians.
Read more on the IISH website.
Archives and Collections on Labour History in Latin America
If you want to notify us of collections or archives to be listed on this website, please fill in this form. We will check the information and publish it on this page. Please use the form.
Archives in Latin America and the Caribbean
Argentina
- National Archive: www.mininterior.gov.ar/archivo/archivo.php
- Trade Union: www.cta.org.ar
- Truth and Reconciliation: www.derhuman.jus.gov.ar/anm/ and www.desaparecidos.org/nuncamas/web/index2.htm
- Human Rights Ombudsman (Defensoria del Pueblo): http://www.dpn.gob.ar
- Social Movements: www.cedinci.org
- Biblioteca Nacional - Archivos y colecciones particulares: http://www.bn.gov.ar/archivos-y-colecciones-particulares
- Archivo de la DIPBA (Dirección de Inteligencia de la Policía de la Provincia de Buenos Aires): http://www.comisionporlamemoria.org/archivo/
- Memoria Abierta: http://www.memoriaabierta.org.ar/bases/opac/
- Archivo de Historia Oral de la Argentina Contemporánea: http://iigg.sociales.uba.ar/archivo-de-historia-oral/
Argentinian websites with online collections
- Ruinas Digitales: http://www.ruinasdigitales.com/
- Topo Blindado: http://eltopoblindado.com/
- CGTA: http://www.cgtargentinos.org/
- Archivos de SITRAC-SITRAM: http://sitrac.historiaoralargentina.org/
Bolivia
- National Archive: www.archivoybibliotecanacionales.org.bo
- Trade Union: www.csutcb.org
- Human Rights Ombudsman (Defensoria del Pueblo): www.defensoria.gob.bo
- Documentation Centre CEDIB: www.cedib.org
- Research Centre for Agrarian and Labor Development (CEDLA): www.cedla.org
Brazil
- National Archive: www.arquivonacional.gov.br
- Trade Union: www.cut.org.br
- Truth and Reconciliation: www.memoriasreveladas.gov.br and www.cedem.unesp.br
- Human Rights Ombudsman (Defensoria del Pueblo): www.dpu.gov.br/
- Social Movements: www.ufpe.br/nudoc/
Chile
- National Archive: www.dibam.cl/archivo_nacional
- Trade Union: www.untchile.cl
- Social Movements/Truth and Reconciliation: www.memoriachilena.cl and www.archivochile.com
- Human Rights Ombudsman: ombudsman.bcn.cl
Cuba
- National Archive: www.arnac.cu
Ecuador
- National Archive: www.ane.gob.ec
- Trade Union: www.ugtecuador.com
- Human Rights Ombudsman: www.dpe.gob.ec
- Social Movements: www.secretariadepueblos.gov.ec
Peru
- National Archive: www.agn.gob.pe
- Trade Union: www.cgtp.org.pe
- Truth and Reconciliation: www.pnud.org.pe/yuyanapaq/yuyanapaq.html
- Human Rights Ombudsman: www.defensoria.gob.pe and derechoshumanos.pe