RESEARCH 101

SOURCES, SOURCES, SOURCES!

LET’S PLAY A GAME… What just happened???

Sometimes, history can be like a giant game of telephone– the “actual” message (or what really happened) can get all mixed up as it travels through time.

WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO WITH ALL OF THIS INFORMATION??? The historical record is huge and limitless. For every single event that has ever happened, there are a ton of different accounts of what happened. Every person who witnessed the event or heard about the event will have a slightly different version of what actually happened. Also, events are happening all the time– this is why history is so interesting! The first soccer ball, the most popular song on the radio during your mom’s senior year of high school, and last football season are all a part of “history.” Luckily, there are different types of sources that we use for different purposes!

PRIMARY SOURCES A primary source is something that was written or created by an observer during the time under study. This means that the author/creator is a witness and is not retelling.  Ex: Ms. Hargrove won tickets to Super Bowl XLV and saw the Packers beat the Stealers. She went home and wrote her best friend an about the game. This is a primary source because Ms. Hargrove watched the Super Bowl with her own two eyes and told her friends the facts while it was still fresh in her mind.  Primary sources can include:  Original documents (Diaries, speeches, manuscripts, letters, interviews, news film footage, autobiographies, official records, etc.)  Creative works (Poetry, drama, novels, music, art)  Relics/artifacts (Pottery, furniture, clothing, architecture)  What else? Any other examples?

SECONDARY SOURCES A secondary source is a source that interprets, examines, or analyzes primary sources.  A secondary source is a great place to start your research! For example, our textbook or an encyclopedia is a great resource for gaining a general understanding of an event or historical figure! Secondary sources can include:  Scholarly publications (Academic journals, textbooks, encyclopedias)  Commentaries  Re-enactments  Can you think of any more examples?

I’M SICK OF READING… CAN’T WE JUST WATCH A MOVIE? Sources don’t have to just be books! Books are considered print resources– you read print resources in order to gain information. Some examples might include: Books Scholarly publications Articles A visual resource helps you with your research, and all you have to do is look at it! Some examples might include: Artwork Photographs Architecture An oral resource is generally another person! You can learn a lot by listening to someone speak or interviewing someone! For a very long time, most history was oral– people passed down stories about historical events generation to generation before print resources were widely available! Some examples might include: Interviews Speeches

“THE TRUTH? YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH!!” Bias is “an inclination of temperament or outlook; especially: a personal and sometimes unreasoned judgment: prejudice.” (Merriam-Webster)

BE CAREFUL! Sometimes we find sources that aren’t completely neutral– the writer might be “playing favorites” or trying to make things appear differently from the way that they happened. Bias isn’t necessarily negative; it’s just a bit skewed. You might have a positive bias:  For example, if I told you that the Texans/Jets game last week was “the worst football game ever” because the Jets lost to the Texans, I’m feeding you biased information. Although the Jets did lose, you still learned that the Texans won the game (which is a fact.)

Part of doing research involves making sure that your sources are valid, and you’ll need to do some detective work to make sure that you’re using good information. This means using several different types of sources and making sure that they all are essentially saying the same thing.

THINK ABOUT IT THIS WAY… WHEN YOU’RE DECIDING WHAT MOVIE TO GO SEE, WHO DO YOU ASK FOR ADVICE? IS IT BETTER TO ASK SOMEONE WHO HAS ACTUALLY SEEN THE MOVIE, OR SOMEONE WHO KNOWS SOMEONE WHO’S SEEN THE MOVIE? On one hand, if the person you’re talking to has seen the movie, s/he can give you his opinions based on his/her actual, real-life experience. On the other hand, someone can still report facts and other peoples’ opinions about the movie. I haven’t seen “Kung Fu Panda 2,” but I have read the reviews and have heard multiple people say that they liked the movie. You might want to consider this information too.

PARLEZ-VOUS MA LANGUE? Sometimes, the source that we want to use wasn’t originally written in English. We have to use the same process to make sure that we are understanding the author’s ideas by reading multiple translations, or doing research on which translation is best. This way, we can make sure that what we are reading is as close as possible to what the author meant in his/her native tongue.

WHACHA DOIN? We also need to think about why we’re doing research. If we want a general description or broad overview of an event, it is probably best to use a secondary source, like an encyclopedia or scholarly articles from an academic journal. Sometimes, we have to do original research.  In college, Ms. Hargrove had to write a thesis, which is an extremely long paper that requires “original research”– Ms. Hargrove couldn’t rely only on secondary sources. She had to use a ton of primary source documents in order to create a secondary source document of her own as accurately as possible! After reading and conducting interviews, interpreting legislation, interpreting historical data and much more, Ms. Hargrove was able to synthesize all of her research into one product!

TO INFINITY… AND BEYOND! Even though we discussed a lot of different types of sources today, we definitely haven’t covered every type of source in our lists of examples– there are a lot of sources we haven’t discussed, or that might actually surprise you!  If someone wanted to research Ms. Hargrove’s life, her birth certificate would be a good primary source document. Can you think of any other surprising examples?