Browse Primary Sources
Locate primary sources, including images, objects, media, and texts. Annotations by scholars contextualize sources.
Millennium Development Goals: Primary School Enrollment 2009
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight goals related to poverty, education, gender equality, health, environmental sustainability and development set in the year 2000 at the UN Millennium Summit, and adopted by 189 nations.
Millennium Development Goals: Primary School Enrollment 2009
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight goals related to poverty, education, gender equality, health, environmental sustainability and development set in the year 2000 at the UN Millennium Summit, and adopted by 189 nations.
UNICEF Data on Orphans by Region to 2010
The definition of an orphan for statistical purposes is a child under 18 years old who has lost one or both parents. A single orphan is a child who has lost one parent, a double orphan is a child who lost both parents. A maternal orphan is a child whose mother died, while a paternal orphan has lost the father.
Johannesburg Recycled Material Toys
The photograph shows boys in Diepsloot Township, Johannesburg, South Africa, and one of the rolling toy creations with which the photo shows them playing. These elaborately designed constructions are made from discarded aluminum or steel, soft drink cans, plastic processed food tubs, and water bottles. The material that holds them together is ordinary wire such as coat-hangers.
Street Children Billboard, Uganda
The billboard shown in the two photographs carries a slogan used widely by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to promote public interest in the plight of abandoned, orphaned and runaway children living on the streets in cities of Africa, Asia, the Americas and elsewhere.
Child Labor Statistics by World Region
The chart shows summative data for several world regions and types of countries on the subject of child labor. The figures refer to the percentage of children 5-14 years of age involved in child labor, meaning as a percentage of the total population of children in a country or region.
Child Labor Statistics by Gender and Sector
The chart shows the employment sectors for male and female child laborers from age cohorts 5-14 and 15-17. The information is drawn from national child labor surveys in sixteen sample countries. It is based on nationally representative household surveys conducted between 1999 and 2007. The data comes from a study IPEC Statistical Information and Monitoring Programme on Child Labour (SIMPOC).
Child Labor in Domestic Service by Gender
The chart shows the proportion of male and female child laborers between the ages of 5 and 14 who are engaged in domestic work for third-party households. As the note on the chart indicates, only those countries in the data sample of 16 nations where domestic work could be distinguished from other kinds of work are featured in this chart.
Yoruba Handwoven Baby Wrapper, Nigeria
Handwoven by a woman in Nigeria, this traditional Yoruba cloth that is tied around the mother’s waist is used as a baby carrier. The baby sits snugly against her mother’s back; her legs wrap around her mother’s waist. The mother’s hands remain free to work or carry other things. The Yoruba wrapper measures 72 inches (183 cm) long and 16 inches (41 cm) wide.
Recycled Wire Toy Truck, Uganda
The photograph shows a boy "driving" an ingeniously simple but functional toy truck made of wire, wood, and what are likely plastic bottlecap wheels. Purchased, often imported toys are very expensive and homemade toys are common in many poorer countries. A father or other relative may compensate for this by making a simple toy out of old cans and wire.
Girl with Mossi Doll, Burkina Faso
This girl is from a village in the Mossi country of Burkina Faso (a landlocked country in West Africa). The doll she is holding is a traditional wooden figurine made from one piece of wood standing on a broader base.
Moonbeam Youth Training Center, Kenya
The video shows The Moonbeam Youth Training Centre in Mavoko, Nairobi. The Centre is a project of UN-HABITAT built with support from UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon and UN-HABITAT Executive Director Mrs. Anna Tibaijuk. The purpose of the center is to improve housing in urban slums by training young people in low cost, alternative construction technologies.
Dan Passport Masks
This small, mask ( 9.5 cm high and 5 cm wide) carved from wood is called a "passport" mask because it was worn on the body, kept in a leather pouch, or sewn onto a piece of cloth to represent group or family affiliation. Passport masks are used by the Dan people, a group of several hundred thousand people in the western part of the Côte d’Ivoire and into Liberia.
Los tres mulatos de Esmeraldas
This is a painting entitled “The Mulatto Gentlemen of Esmeraldas” from Spanish America. The painting was made in 1599 by a relatively well-known indigenous painter who was working in Quito at the time, a man named Andrés Sánchez Gallque.
Codex Mendoza
This image shows the front piece of the Codex Mendoza which is believed to have been commissioned by the first viceroy of New Spain, Don Antonio de Mendoza in the 1540 to record information about the Aztecs and their empire. For example, the front piece shown in the image contains information about the organization and foundation of the Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec empire.
Florence Farmborough’s Journal
Florence Farmborough was an English nurse working on the Russian front during World War I. Her diary contains many descriptive, lively accounts of the war and the very active role played by women, both in the traditional role as caretakers of the wounded, but also as fighters.
Missionary Journal, Chinese Culture
This article was published in a missionary journal printed in the cities of Fuzhou and Shanghai. The Chinese Recorder and Missionary Journal operated between 1868 and 1912. It was read by English-speakers living in the major cities of China as well as abroad.
Women’s Work for Woman
This article was published in a missionary journal printed in the cities of Fuzhou and Shanghai. The Chinese Recorder and Missionary Journal operated between 1868 and 1912. It was read by English-speakers living in the major cities of China as well as abroad. In this paper, Mrs. Farnham addresses her “missionary sisters” on the matter of working to convert Chinese women.
Schools for the Education of Chinese Girls
This article was published in a Protestant missionary journal based in Canton that operated from 1832 until 1851. Its readership included both the foreigners living in Canton and home religious communities in Britain and the United States.
Foot Binding
This photograph presents a very different vision of foot binding from that depicted by Western observers in the 19th century. Whereas Western visitors to China seemed most interested in the bound foot unbound, as deformity or fetish, this photo shows the bound foot as it had meaning in Chinese culture: as part of clothing or fashion.