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Primary Sources

Primary Sources. Thinking Like a Historian Memorizing Dates vs. Investigating Evidence. Historians As Detectives. Searching for evidence, among primary sources, to a mystery that can never be completely solved. Do Historians Know Everything?.

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Primary Sources

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  1. Primary Sources Thinking Like a Historian Memorizing Dates vs. Investigating Evidence

  2. Historians As Detectives • Searching for evidence, among primary sources, to a mystery that can never be completely solved.

  3. Do Historians Know Everything? • No – They do know how to approach primary sources as evidence. • You can do this as well!

  4. Sourcing • Think about the document’s author and it’s creation • Who created it? • When? • For what purpose? • How trustworthy might the source be? • Why?

  5. Contextualizing • Situate the document and its events in time and place • Piece together major events, themes, people in the era it was created

  6. How do these items help?Context from the time period

  7. Close Reading • Carefully consider what the document says and the language used to say it. • Think out loud: • “I’ve never heard that expression before…Hmm, that may be a reference to…I wonder if that’s what really happened…)

  8. Using Background Knowledge • Use historical information and knowledge to read and understand the document. • “What else do I know about this topic?”

  9. Reading the Silences • Identify what has been left out or is missing from the document by asking questions of its account. • “What is the author not mentioning?” • “Whose voices are we not hearing?” • “Which perspectives are missing?”

  10. Corroborating • Ask Questions about important details across multiple sources to determine points of agreement and disagreement. • “What other primary sources might corroborate or dispute this interpretation?”

  11. Think Like A Historian • Question the Source • Evaluate the evidence it offers for its assertions • Read and consider the source more carefully than any historical account read before

  12. Analyzing Photographs

  13. Analyzing Primary SourcesObserve – Identify and note details • What do you notice first? Find something small but interesting • What do you notice that you didn’t expect? • What do you notice that you can’t explain? • What do you notice now that you didn’t earlier?

  14. Analyzing Primary SourcesReflect-generate and test hypothesis about the source • Where do you think this came from? • Who do you think somebody made this? • What do you think was happening when this was made? • Who do you think was the audience? • Why do you think this was important? • If made today, would it be different? • What can you learn from examining this?

  15. Analyzing Primary SourcesQuestion- to lead to more observations and reflections • What do you wonder about… • Who? • What? • When? • Where? • How?

  16. What’s in Lincoln’s Pockets?

  17. Drawings • Newe Welt und AmericanischeHistorien – Johan Ludwig Gottfried, 1655 • http://www.americanjourneys.org/images.asp Source:Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, General History of the Things New Spain, Arthur J. O. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble, trans, book 12, "The Conquest of Mexico" (Santa Fe: School of American Research and the University of Utah, 1975), XXXX.

  18. http://www.oshermaps.org/special-map-exhibits/columbus-letterhttp://oshermaps.org/search/zoom.php?no=7325.0070#img64http://www.oshermaps.org/special-map-exhibits/columbus-letterhttp://oshermaps.org/search/zoom.php?no=7325.0070#img64 • The Basle 1494 Columbus Letter • Christopher Columbus's letter announcing the success of his voyage to the "islands of the Indian sea" ...

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