The Latin American Library at Tulane University is one of the world’s foremost collections of research materials dedicated to the study of Latin America.
The Latin American Library houses 460,000 circulating volumes, over 13,500 rare books, a unique collection of Mexican pictorial manuscripts, over 4000 linear feet of manuscripts dating from the 16th to the 20th centuries, and substantial collections of rare printed ephemera. The Library also houses Latin American government publications, maps and broadsides, historic newspapers, and a growing collection of digital resources.
Notable strengths of the collection include: Central American history and culture; the Southern states of Mexico; primary and secondary resources for the study of native languages, history and cultures, particularly from Mesoamerica; the Spanish American colonial and early Republican periods; Latin American art history and architecture from all periods; popular culture such as folk art, tourism and carnival. Holdings are in Spanish, Portuguese, English and other western languages with substantial holdings in Mesoamerican languages.
The Latin American Library’s commitment to research on Latin America and the Caribbean reflects the historical ties of Tulane University and New Orleans, to the region. Founded in 1924 to support Tulane’s Middle American Research Institute (MARI), a pioneering program for the study of Mesoamerican archaeology, anthropology, and history, the Latin American Library maintains its historic collection strengths in Mesoamerican Studies. Through a generous donation from New Orleans businessman Samuel Zemurray at the time of its founding, the Library acquired a substantial portion of the William Gates Collection of manuscripts, books, and other rare printed materials, which form the cornerstone of the Library’s initial holdings. Other purchases and donations of manuscripts and rare early imprints soon followed and the Library continues to build on these initial strengths.
After its incorporation within Tulane’s main library system in the 1940s, the Latin American Library broadened its scope. The Library’s current collection encompasses materials pertaining to all of Latin America in all disciplines of the humanities and social sciences, includes various formats, from rare codices to academic publications, and comprises materials from the contact period to present. One of only three stand-alone Latin American collections in U.S. universities, the Latin American Library today is one of the most comprehensive of its kind.
The Latin American Library provides a variety of services for Tulane University’s Latin Americanist faculty and students, researchers from the New Orleans community, from around the country and the world.
One-on-one research assistance
Course-integrated library instruction
Duplication services for our special collections
Dedicated special collections reading room
Study carrels for Tulane faculty and graduate students
