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This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held in the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in our reading room, and not digitally available through the World Wide Web. See the Duplication Policy section for more information.
Size | 38.0 feet of linear shelf space (approximately 14,000 items) |
Abstract | Robert Coles is a child psychiatrist who worked at Harvard University, social activist, and prolific author. His work especially concerns the experiences of children, but he has also written about contemporary literature, psychology, religion, and other dimensions of American culture. The collection contains correspondence and writings of Coles and other material documenting his career. Correspondence is with psychiatric and journalistic colleagues, students, editors and publishers, readers, friends, and others, including Daniel Berrigan, Robert Jay Lifton, Will Campbell, Robert Penn Warren, C. Vann Woodward, Cormac McCarthy, and Walter Mondale. Writings include drafts of most of Coles's books, and drafts and published versions of most of his articles. Other writings include speeches, interviews, and congressional testimony by Coles, writings by others about Coles, and miscellaneous subject files relating to Coles's teaching and public appearances. The collection also includes drawings by children that were included in an exhibit titled "Their Eyes Meeting the World: The Drawings and Painting of Children," as well as other exhibit materials. |
Creator | Coles, Robert. |
Language | English |
The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.
Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.
Time magazine has called Robert Coles "the most influential living psychiatrist in the U.S." Though best known for his work on children, he is also a leading authority on poverty and racial discrimination in the country. He first won recognition for his studies of black children in the South. From these, he has gone on to observe and write about children of other minorities (Native Americans, Inuit, and Chicanos) and in other stressful or disadvantaged situations (migrant camps, ghettos, Appalachia, and Northern Ireland.) Through his writings and testimony before congressional committees, he has sought reform in the areas of race relations, mining conditions, pesticides, health services, and, particularly, hunger and malnutrition. Coles has also written widely on contemporary literature, religion, psychology, and other dimensions of American culture.
Coles was born October 12, 1929, in Boston. He earned his B.A. from Harvard in 1950 and his M.D. from Columbia in 1954, after which he decided to become a child psychiatrist and continued his training through into the Air Force and served as chief of neuropsychiatric services at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi.
At the end of his tour of duty in 1960, Coles became a member of the Psychiatric Staff of Harvard's Medical School (1960-1962) and Health Services (1963-). He and his wife, however, lived in Vining, Georgia, near Atlanta, for the first half of the 1960s, where he studied black children and how they were affected by school desegregation and the civil rights movement. He himself was actively involved in civil rights work during those years, particularly through the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), which he served as psychiatric counselor. In 1966, he returned to Harvard as a lecturer in general education. In 1978, he became professor of psychiatry and medical humanities at the Harvard Medical School.
A year after his return to Harvard, Coles published his first book, Children of Crisis: A Study in Courage and Fear, based on his work in the South. This was the first of a five-volume series, volumes two and three of which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Coles has written over thirty-five books (as of 1983) and over 500 articles, which have been published in more than sixty magazines, journals, and newspapers. He is a regular contributor to Atlantic Monthly, New Yorker , New York Times Book Review, Washington Post Book World, Boston Globe , and several psychiatric journals. Since 1966, he has been a contributing editor to the New Republic, and has served on the editorial boards of American Scholar and several other journals.
In 1960, Coles married Jane Hallowell of Boston. They co-authored the two-volume Women of Crisis and several other works. They live in Concord, Mass., and are the parents of three sons.
Back to TopThe collection consists primarily of child psychiatrist, social activist, and author Robert Coles's correspondence and writings from the mid-1960s onwards, with a few articles from earlier years. Correspondence is with psychiatric and journalistic colleagues, students, editors and publishers, readers, friends, and others, including Daniel Berrigan, Robert Jay Lifton, Will Campbell, Robert Penn Warren, C. Vann Woodward, Cormac McCarthy, and Walter Mondale. Writings include drafts of most of Coles's books, and drafts and published versions of most of his articles. Other writings include speeches, interviews, and congressional testimony by Coles, writings by others about Coles, and miscellaneous subject files relating to Coles's teaching and public appearances. The collection also includes drawings by children that were included in an exhibit titled "Their Eyes Meeting the World: The Drawings and Painting of Children," as well as other exhibit materials.
Additions to the collection have not been incorporated into the original arrangement.
Back to TopRESTRICTED: Series 1 may be used only with the permission of Robert Coles.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by correspondent.
Letters to Coles from psychiatric and journalistic colleagues, students, editors and publishers, government officials, and readers (including children) responding to his writings, as well as of carbon copies of some of Coles's letters to them. These letters to and from Coles reflect his roles as doctor, teacher, researcher, consultant, writer, and friend. There are numerous letters from Daniel Berrigan, Alex Harris, Harry Huge, George Abbot White, and Norman Rockwell, each of whom collaborated with Coles on one or more projects. Other regular correspondents include Walter Mondale, McGeorge Bundy, Daniel Erikon, Robert Jay Lifton, Will Campbell, Robert Penn Warren, C. Vann Woodward, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., and Andrew Greeley. Material from most correspondents is foldered separately, although correspondence with those represented by only one or two letters is included in "miscellaneous" files at the end of each letter of the alphabet.
See Additions of February 1996, May 1996, and July 1996 for more correspondence.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by folder title.
Manuscript, typescript, and/or published versions of Coles's writings. There are three subseries based on the form of writing involved. Subseries 2.1 is made up of drafts and galley proofs of Coles's many books.
Versions of many of Coles's shorter writings are contained in Subseries 2.2, made up of approximately 540 articles, essays, and book reviews. More than any other part of the collection, these writings reflect his range of experiences, interests, and areas of expertise. They include the results of his research contacts with children, minorities, and underprivileged groups; medical and psychoanalytical studies; social and political commentary on a wide variety of themes, with particular emphasis on race relations, urban and rural poverty, education, and ethics; and literary analyses of various writers, particularly Flannery O'Connor, James Agee, Walker Percy, Simone Weil, and William Carlos Williams. Other figures whose work Coles admires and has often written about include Dorothy Day, Erik Erikson, Cesar Chavez, and Reinhold Neibuhr. This subseries also includes numerous book reviews, and several of Coles's introductions and forewards for books by other authors.
Subseries 2.3 consists of works by Coles that were first presented orally. These include lectures, interviews, and panel discussions, most of which were subsequently pubulished, and testimony Coles gave at hearings before various Senate and other governmental committees.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by folder title.
Works about Coles by other writers. These include a short biographical sketch, two magazine cover stories, a dissertation chapter, and a dialogue between two of Coles's associates.
RESTRICTED: Series 4 may be used only with the permission of Robert Coles.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by title.
Files of subjects Coles utilized in his writings as well as his research. This is a scattered rather than a comprehensive set of files focusing on a small number of Coles's interests and activities.
RESTRICTED: Series 5 may be used only with the permission of Robert Coles.
Arrangement: Chronological and geographical.
Correspondence and other items relating to invitations to appear or serve that Coles received from various organizations and individuals.
RESTRICTED: Series 6 may be used only with the permission of Robert Coles.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by folder title.
Files relating to courses Coles taught at Harvard and elsewhere.
RESTRICTED: Additions may be used only with the permission of Robert Coles.
Children's drawings collected by Coles.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by folder title.
Coles's files, late 1980s-around 1991, from his office at the University Health Services, Harvard University and, in 1995, from the University Health Services Office and from the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University. Letters chiefly relate to professional activities.
Note that files are in very loose alphabetical order.
Arrangement: Chronological by year.
Coles's correspondence files, 1982-1994 and undated.
Arrangement: Alphabetical by folder title.
Correspondence files, R-S, mostly from the late 1980s to around 1991. Letters chiefly relate to professional activities. A-P files for these years were received in February 1996.
Folder 1453-1457
Folder 1453Folder 1454Folder 1455Folder 1456Folder 1457 |
Late 1980s-1991: R #04333, Subseries: "Addition of July 1996 (Acc. 96109), 1982-1992." Folder 1453-1457 |
Folder 1458-1460
Folder 1458Folder 1459Folder 1460 |
Late 1980s-1991: S #04333, Subseries: "Addition of July 1996 (Acc. 96109), 1982-1992." Folder 1458-1460 |
Children's drawings that were used in an exhibit titled "Their Eyes Meeting the World: The Drawings and Painting of Children," along with other exhibit materials including labels, a catalogue of the collection, and a packet of exhibit information that was sent to prospective curators.
Oversize Paper Folder OP-4333/1-11
OP-4333/1OP-4333/2OP-4333/3OP-4333/4OP-4333/5OP-4333/6OP-4333/7OP-4333/8OP-4333/9OP-4333/10OP-4333/11 |
Exhibit materials #04333, Subseries: "Addition of June 1999 (Acc. 98375)." OP-4333/1-11 |
Processed by: SHC Staff, 1980s-1990s, and Margaret Dickson, June 2007
Encoded by: Margaret Dickson, June 2007
Additions have not been incorporated into the original arrangement.
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