Searching the Collections

The American Folklife Center (AFC) has numerous collections that relate to the topic of Latinxs, Hispanic studies, and Latin America. Using the Library of Congress Online Catalog, the searches below will bring you to a limited number of catalog records that can get you started. For more specific or focused research based on your interests we suggest you use our "Ask a Librarian" service in order to connect with one of our reference specialists .

Search the online catalog for "Hispanic" in AFC archival collections
This search will help you find archival collections that the AFC holds with keyword "Hispanic." For results outside of the AFC, use the "Refine your Search" button at the top of the page to update the search to "All Locations in the Library."
Search the online catalog for "Latin American" in AFC archival collections
This search will help you find archival collections that the AFC holds with keyword "Latin American."
Search the online catalog for "Latino" in AFC archival collections
This search will help you find archival collections that the AFC holds with keyword "Latino."
Search the online catalog for Subject Heading "Latin America," "Spanish," and "Hispanic" in AFC Reference Collection
This search will help you find published resources that AFC has in the Reading Room on Latinx and Latin American populations, culture, and tradition.
Search the online catalog for Subject Heading "Latin America" in the Library General Collections
This search will help you find multi-format resources, including books and newspapers, with subject heading "Latin America" throughout the Library's general collections. This search returns more than 10,000 results; refine your results further using the advanced filters, including by publication date or language.

Collection Summaries

Below are links to legacy collection summaries, many of which were last updated in 2014. These collection summaries list collections acquired prior to 2014 by the AFC by geographic region, including country or US state or territory. While they are no longer updated with newer acquisitions, they still provide a useful overview and tool to search our collections. Below are links to just a few of the countries of Latin America; please refer to the first link for the full list of available country summaries.

The collections in the Archive of Folk Culture include folk cultural material from six continents, every U.S. state and territory, and the District of Columbia. For countries that are not listed in the directory we may not have an online guide for the region, but we may still have collections for the region available in the archive. For more information and help to search for further collections, please contact the reference team via the Ask A Librarian online form to the left.

Collection Finding Aids

Finding aids provide a gateway to this wealth of Library treasures, helping you discover and navigate through the thousands of boxes and folders that house each collection. These guides provide comprehensive overviews of unique Library resources. Progressively detailed descriptions of a collection's component parts summarize the overall scope of the content, convey details about the individuals and organizations involved, and list box and folder headings. Special service conditions are noted, including terms under which the collection may be accessed or copied. Links are provided to digitized content, when available.

Library of Congress finding aids are XML documents created using the Encoded Archival Description (EAD), an international standard maintained by the Library of Congress in partnership with the Society of American Archivists.

View ALL Finding Aids at the Library of Congress

Selected Finding Aids

Alejandro Paz Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico collection
This collection documents Puerto Rican textile making, mask making, and cockfighting. The eight interviews explore their practices and how Hurricane Maria and the U.S. response affected their lives. Related photographs of people, hurricane damage, and rooster farms are included as well.
Juan B. Rael collection, 1939-1999
Sound recordings and manuscripts that document the musical heritage and cultural traditions of the Hispano residents of the portion of the Northern Rio Grande region of northern New Mexico and southern Colorado, collected by Juan B. Rael in 1940.
Felipe Hinojosa collection of interviews with Latino Mennonites
Collection of field recordings of approximately 85 hours of oral history interviews with about 20 Latino Mennonites in South Texas, Puerto Rico, Kansas, and Indiana. Topics of the interviews include religious and ethnic community formation; the politics of cultural, religious, and ethnic identity; civil rights and social justice; and interactions between evangelical and mainstream religious groups.
Sol Biderman collection, 1954-2004
Brazilian chapbooks, xilogravuras woodblock illustrations and woodblocks, sound recordings and additional research material on the subject of Brazilian literatura de cordel collected by Sol Biderman. The collection also includes a play, poems, and other writings by Biderman along with his collection of Chicano corridos and poems.
Charlie Seemann collection of photographs of vaqueros and gauchos, 1985-1986
From November 2-13, 1985, folklorist Charlie Seemann led a group of six volunteers for the California-based Center for Field Research to document vaqueros in the Concepción area of Paraguay and a horse trading operation near Asunción. Photographs documented vaqueros at work, their dress, horses, cattle, gear, and saddles. Additionally, Seemann documented the estancia haciendas, ranch buildings, corrals and fencing, landscapes, and ranch life (175 color slides from Paraguay). From September 12-25, 1986, Charlie Seemann led a similar trip to document guachos in Uruguay at the Estancia San Pedro de Timote, and near Melo, Uruguay. This group traveled to Bagé, in southern Brazil, to observe and document the Dia Do Gaúcho festival, started in 1848 to commemorate the gaúchos who fought in Guerra Dos Farrapos, or War of the Rags. The festival included a parade of some 3,000 mounted gaúchos, music, food, dance, and an outdoor Catholic mass for mounted gaúchos (60 color slides from Brazil). The group returned to Paysandú, Uruguay, and documented the estancia of Hubert Maness, Los Mortreros, near Mercedes on the Rio Negro (138 total color slides from Uruguay). The collection includes Charlie Seemann's original field notes (25 pages).

Collections of Interest

The following collection titles link to fuller bibliographic information in the Library of Congress Online Catalog. Links to additional online content, including finding aids for the collections, are included when available.

Selected Collections

These collections are illustrative of the kinds of materials the American Folklife Center houses for the topic of "Latinx Studies and Latin America."

Latin American Cartonera Collection
Call Number: AFC 2020/001
Published/Created: 2000-2017
Collection of 175 volumes of Cartonera books from Latin America, primarily Brazil and Paraguay; collected by Library of Congress, Rio de Janiero office. Each volume is also cataloged individually.
Rubén Cobos collection of Hispanic folk music of the southwest
Call Number: AFC 1990/004
Published/Created: 1949 and undated
Collection of field recordings of songs and instrumental music recorded by Rubén Cobos at various locations in New Mexico in 1949; most recordings are undated. The collection includes secular and religious songs -- posadas, decimas, corridos, romances, inditas, alabados (some performed by Ricardo Archuleta of Cerro, New Mexico) -- and others, some recordings with guitar and violin.
Luiz Heitor Corrêa de Azevedo collection on Latin American folklore, 1904-1986 (bulk 1940-1960).
Call Number: AFC 2005/008
Published/Created: 1904-1986
Comprises a collection of publications pertaining to Latin American folklore and musical traditions from the library of Luiz Heitor Corrêa de Azevedo, Brazilian folklorist and musicologist. The collection includes monographs, articles, bibliographies, conference proceedings, and other publications about folk music, musical instruments, popular music, dance, folklore, food traditions, proverbs, children's folklore, traditional and folk medicine, folk drama, local religious celebrations (including Christmas, Epiphany, and Easter) and devotions to various saints, Cuban santeria, Afro-Brazilian traditions, and anthropological studies of indigenous people of Brazil, among other topics. Publications are predomiantly about Brazilian culture but include significant works on folk culture in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, Puerto Rico, Uruguay, and Venezuela.
Surviving Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in Houston Collection
Call Number: AFC 2008/006
Published/Created: 2006-2008
Oral history interviews with 104 survivors of Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita who relocated to Houston, Texas, after the 2005 storms. Interviews were conducted from 2006 to 2008 as part of Surviving Katrina and Rita in Houston: A Survivor-Centered Storytelling and Documentation Project, directed by Carl Lindahl and Pat Jasper in consultation with the American Folklife Center, Library of Congress. Approximately 50 interviewers, who are survivors of the hurricanes themselves, were trained to conduct the interviews in which survivors told of their personal experiences of the disasters. The collection includes 371 pages of sound recording logs, not all are complete; and five folders of articles and publicity about the project.
Rio Grande Arts Center "Tradiciones del valle -- valley traditions" Collection
Call Number: AFC 1986/023
Published/Created: 1985-1986
Collection of field recordings of Hispano popular and traditional songs and dance music; Catholic church services and choirs; Hispano evangelical hymns; Mormon Pioneer Day dance; Mexican folk songs; Tejano conjunto band; Anglo-American fiddle tunes and songs; and 1986 Sunshine Festival Fiddle Contest, recorded in the San Luis Valley of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico by Dana Everts, May 1985 to August 1986 for the Rio Grande Arts Center. Includes penitente songs and stories, alabados, corridos, canciones, decimas, inditas, versos, and dance band music on violin and guitar, accordion, bajo sexto, bass guitar, drums, electric guitar, guitarron, keyboard, mandolin, organ, requinto, and trumpet; also interviews about various wedding, funeral, Christmas, New Year's Eve, Lenten, and feast day customs; storytelling, family histories, plays, proverbs, riddles, oraciones, beliefs, healing customs, and herbal remedies. The collection includes two linear inches of notes.
Ethnic broadcasting in America Collection
Call Number: AFC 1981/018
Published/Created: 1977-1981
Survey of ethnic radio broadcasts recorded for the Ethnic Broadcasting in America Project of the American Folklife Center, Library of Congress. Recorded mostly off the air by Elena Bradunas, Theodore Grame, Alan Jabbour, and Wolfgang Fleischhauer at various locations in the United States,1977-1979. The radio broadcasts include contemporary, popular, and folk music; community news and announcements; advertising; comedy; news; sports; politics; paid political ads; and religious broadcasts, with hymns, gospel music, sermons, church services, and masses. Sound recordings from ethnic broadcasts in languages including: Albanian, Arabic, Aramaic, Armenian, Basque, Cajun French, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, English, Estonian, German, Greek, Haitian, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Lithuanian, Macedonian, Maltese, Navajo, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Punjabi, Romanian, Russian, Ruthenian, Serbian, Serbo-Croation, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, Tagalog, Turkish, Ukrainian, Ute, Yiddish, and other languages.
Música de los cultos africanos en Cuba
Call Number: AFC 1959/013
Published/Created: circa 1957
Field recordings featuring instrumentals, prayers, salutes, and songs recorded in Agramonte, Jovellanos, Pedro Betancourt, and Perico, Matanzas Province, Cuba, and in Havana, by Josefina Tarafa, circa 1957. The majority of these recordings are of Lucumí religion, but also includes liturgical songs of the Arará and several Kongo Angolan cults. Unless stated otherwise all songs are accompanied by a combination of drums, metallic idiophones, and shakers.

Latinx and Latin American Collections: Resources in the American Folklife Center

American Folklife Center: Ask a Librarian