Reading Primary Sources
Text
1. Purpose of the source: What was the author's message or argument? What was he/she trying to get across? Is the message explicit, or are there implicit messages as well? Prescriptive or descriptive: what should happen or what the writer thought did happen?
2. Rhetorical form and purpose: How does the author get his/her message across? What is its purpose?
3. Close reading: Pay attention to word use, metaphors, symbols, placement in time, etc. How is the message communicated?
Context
1. Where did your source come from? Newspaper? Letter? Published?
2. Author: What do you know about him/her in terms of race, gender, class, occupation, religion, age, sexual orientation, region, political beliefs? Does any of this matter? How?
3. Audience: Who is the intended audience? Public or private? Does it matter?
Subtext
1. Silences: What is NOT there that conceivably could be included? Read historically (i.e., don’t read contemporary issues back into the past), but also look for silences, things that are missing.
2. What does the text presume of its readers? What are the unstated understandings, agreements, winks and nods?
3. Does it present ideas or look at behaviors? What ideas are embedded in behaviors?
4. Whose perspective is presented? (Go back to questions of who the author is and the importance of issues such as class, race, gender, etc.)
Your Text
1. What historical questions can you answer using this source? What are the benefits of using this kind of source? What are its limitations?
[Edited from a variety of sources included Carleton College’s History Department and Robert Hatch at the University of Florida]
Other sources: Bowdoin College, University of Cambridge, William & Mary
1. Purpose of the source: What was the author's message or argument? What was he/she trying to get across? Is the message explicit, or are there implicit messages as well? Prescriptive or descriptive: what should happen or what the writer thought did happen?
2. Rhetorical form and purpose: How does the author get his/her message across? What is its purpose?
3. Close reading: Pay attention to word use, metaphors, symbols, placement in time, etc. How is the message communicated?
Context
1. Where did your source come from? Newspaper? Letter? Published?
2. Author: What do you know about him/her in terms of race, gender, class, occupation, religion, age, sexual orientation, region, political beliefs? Does any of this matter? How?
3. Audience: Who is the intended audience? Public or private? Does it matter?
Subtext
1. Silences: What is NOT there that conceivably could be included? Read historically (i.e., don’t read contemporary issues back into the past), but also look for silences, things that are missing.
2. What does the text presume of its readers? What are the unstated understandings, agreements, winks and nods?
3. Does it present ideas or look at behaviors? What ideas are embedded in behaviors?
4. Whose perspective is presented? (Go back to questions of who the author is and the importance of issues such as class, race, gender, etc.)
Your Text
1. What historical questions can you answer using this source? What are the benefits of using this kind of source? What are its limitations?
[Edited from a variety of sources included Carleton College’s History Department and Robert Hatch at the University of Florida]
Other sources: Bowdoin College, University of Cambridge, William & Mary