Welcome to the guide for Radical Literature collection in the UMBC Special Collections. This guide contains information on the Radical Literature collection held at UMBC, links to online references and collections outside of UMBC, and selected books and databases for research on Radical Literature.
The Radical Literature collection contains 19th and 20th century pamphlets, booklets, newsletters, handbills, and other publications about political and social movements and activism, specifically communism, socialism, anarchism, labor and unions, U.S. race issues and relations, Black and Indigenous rights and power, and Women's rights. Other topics addressed include organizing, liberation, and thought in Africa, Central and South America, and Asia; and Soviet and European radical ideologies. Several items touch on the intersections between different concepts and identities, such as intersections of race and labor and of religion and communism.
Similar collections at UMBC:
- Alternative Press Center collection: back issues of the titles collected by the Alternative Press Center (APC) from its beginning to five years prior to the current year (e.g. if the year is now 2015, we have up to 2010). The APC is a non-profit collective dedicated to providing access to and increasing public awareness of the alternative press.
- Needle Collection: books and pamphlets focusing on 19th century British and American socialism and radical philosophy, Shakerism, social reform and utopian thought.
