History

How Do Historians Study History?

History

“My connection to the past, like any Historian's, is through the stuff that's left behind. It's not an imaginative connection, although imagination is part of it. It's about documents , it's about sources, it's about clues, it's about the leavings, the shards, the remnants of people who once live and don't live anymore. Without the documents, there's no history.”

What Sources Does a

Historian Use?

Primary Sources

Secondary Sources

What are Primary Sources?

A Primary Source is anything that was written

or recorded at the time an event took place.

Examples of Primary Sources are:

Journals

Diaries

Carvings on Walls

Ancient Scrolls

What is a Secondary Source?

A Secondary Source is any source written after

an event has occurred.

Information from a Secondary Source is

gathered from primary sources.

Examples of Secondary Sources include:

Encyclopedia Articles

Textbooks

How Can Sources Be Misleading?

Bias

Falsehoods

Distortions

Political Agendas

Questions to Consider?

Who wrote the source?

When was the source written? [Think about

more than just the date: What was happening

at that time?]

Who did the author want to read the source?

Where was the source written? [As with the

“when”, this more than simply an issue of

place.]

What was the purpose in writing the source?

“My connection to the past, like any Historian's, is through the stuff that's left behind. It's not an imaginative connection, although imagination is part of it. It's about documents , it's about sources, it's about clues, it's about the leavings, the shards, the remnants of people who once live and don't live anymore. Without the documents, there's no history. And women left very few documents behind.”

. . . Look Again

Kate’s New Look

The Israel-Lebanon War (2006)