LibGuides: Migration History: Refugees

Refugee Archives

Living Refugee Archive
“The Living Refugee Archive (LRA) is home to a growing collection of resources relating to refugees and forced migration. The Living Refugee Archive was established as a portal to help facilitate access to digital archive materials and existing archival collections including the Refugee Council Archive at the University of East London.” (LRA) Much of the archive is oral histories of various refugee groups in the UK. There is an extensive digital archive which includes videos, poetry and more.
Harvard Project on the Soviet Social System
Summary transcripts of 705 interviews conducted with refugees from the USSR during the early years of the Cold War. A unique source for the study of Soviet society between 1917 and the mid-1940s, the HPSSS includes vast amounts of one-of-a-kind data on political, economic, social and cultural conditions.

Post - World War II

Wiener Library Digital Resources
The Wiener Library in London has an extensive archive of Holocaust era documents. Their digital collection has a portion of this archive, including a large set of refugee family papers, UN War Crimes Commission Archives, testimonies and multimedia resources.

Refugees, Relief, and Resettlement:Forced Migration and World War II This link opens in a new window
This database "chronicles the plight of refugees and displaced persons across Europe, North Africa, and Asia from 1935 to 1950 through correspondence, reports, studies, organizational and administrative files, and much more." (Gale)
This database includes the following modules

• Refugee Records from the General Correspondence Files of the Political Departments of the Foreign Office, Record Group 371, 1938-1950
• Refugee Files from the Records of the Foreign Office, 1938-1950
• Refugee Records from the War Cabinet, the Colonial Office, the Home Office and the War Office, 1935-1939
The Early Cold War and Decolonization
Post-War Europe: Refugees, Exile and Resettlement, 1945-1950 This link opens in a new window
This online archive delivers essential primary sources for the study and understanding of the challenges facing the European peoples in the aftermath of World War II. It covers the politics and administration of the refugee crisis in Europe after World War II as well as the day-to-day survival of the refugees themselves.

For more information on refugee producing situations see: Human Rights & Genocide Fondren Library Guide

UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
“UNHCR is a United Nations agency with the mandate to protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities and stateless people, and assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to a third country.” (Wikipedia)
UNHCR Archives
“The collections are globally and historically unique in scope and content … Our archives contain information from the founding of the organization in 1950 to the present day. They also hold several pre-UNHCR collections, which provide valuable background to the development of protection work...” (UNHCR) While most documents are in the physical location in Geneva, there are ample digitized documents and a web archive as well.
RefWorld
“Refworld is the leading source of information necessary for taking quality decisions on refugee status. It contains a vast collection of reports and information relating to situations in countries of origin, policy documents and positions, and documents relating to international and national legal frameworks.” (UNHCR)

Refugee History
A general resource to start exploring and understanding the wide variety of refugee crises and histories.
Refugee Studies Centre (RSC)
“Today, we are engaged in a wide range of innovative research projects and we offer a number of popular learning programmes. To ensure the broader impact of our work we publish widely in books and journals and through academic papers; we build networks, run workshops and organise conferences; and we engage with our audiences online through podcasts, videos, and social media.” (RSC) The site also includes research projects, publications and case studies related to refugees and forced migrants.
Forced Migration Review
“Forced Migration Review is the most widely read publication on forced migration – available in English, French, Spanish and Arabic, and free of charge in print and online. It is published by the Refugee Studies Centre in the Oxford Department of International Development, University of Oxford. Through FMR, authors from around the world analyse the causes and impacts of displacement; debate policies and programmes; share research findings; reflect the lived experience of displacement; and present examples of good practice and recommendations for policy and action.”(FMR) Articles are available in print and podcast format.