Unit 2: How to Analyze a Primary Document
How to Analyze a Primary Source
Primary documents are the key sources of information for professional historians. They provide a window into the past that cannot be matched by textbooks or other secondary sources. Examining letters, journals, speeches or other items that were written by real people are what makes historical research so interesting.
However, each historian, utilizes such sources to gather information or to prove a hypothesis. There is no wrong interpretation of a document, just a chance to discover something new and fascinating about the past.
In order to analyze a primary source properly, you need to take several steps.
1. You need to place the document in its historical context. (i.e. who is the author, when was it written)
2. You need to determine what type of document it is and how this impacts it validity?
3. How does the author get his or her point across, in writing, in song, in paint?
4. Why should I read this document?
5. How does your own past knowledge impact your reading of the document?
Video: How To Analyze a Primary Source:
Assignment: http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/images/research/speeches/trstrenlife.pdf
Read The Strenuous Life. Pretend you are Teddy Roosevelt. Provide background information on yourself, your goals, and the main points you are trying to convey in your speech. Also describe the audience you are speaking to and how you judged the reaction of the readers or audience members. In your opinion, are your ideas or suggestions ground-breaking or supporting existing ideology and will they be heeded by your fellow countrymen and women.
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