Sources for Historical Research - Student Development.
Secondary Sources. Secondary sources describe, discuss, interpret, comment upon, analyze, evaluate, summarize, and process primary sources. Secondary source materials can be articles in newspapers or popular magazines, book or movie reviews, or articles found in scholarly journals that discuss or evaluate someone else's original research.
Secondary sources in history and humanities are usually books or scholarly journals, from the perspective of a later interpreter, especially by a later scholar. In the humanities, a peer reviewed article is always a secondary source.
Therefore, the majority of sources in a literature review are secondary sources that present research findings, analysis, and the evaluation of other researcher's works. Reviewing secondary source material can be of valu e in improving your overall research paper because secondary sources facilitate the communication of what is known about a topic.
For this assignment you will use the tools of historical research to write a paper on a topic of importance for the time period covered in this history course. You will need to incorporate a primary source document (source from the time period) as well as secondary source documents (modern history books written after the fact) into your research paper.
Secondary Sources. Secondary sources describe, discuss, interpret, comment upon, analyze, evaluate, summarize, and process primary sources. A secondary source is generally one or more steps removed from the event or time period and are written or produced after the fact with the benefit of hindsight.
How can I teach about primary and secondary sources? Use this PowerPoint to explore what Primary and Secondary sources are and how they are used in the study of history. Also, use this PowerPoint to introduce the concept of bias which can affect the way we use certain sources.
Advantages: Secondary sources provide a variety of expert perspectives and insights. Also, peer review usually ensures the quality of sources such as scholarly articles. Finally, researching secondary sources is more efficient than planning, conducting, and analyzing certain primary forms of research.