SSC 101 Extra Credit: Primary Sources

Primary and secondary sources extra credit

Before you begin this assignment, watch the power point lecture I shared in Tues 5.21.19 and review the material in Week 7 “Readings”. I’m including another short video tutorial explaining primary and secondary sources here as well.

Link (Links to an external site.)

Using the Digital Public Library of America’s Primary Source Sets (Links to an external site.) and choose ONE item to examine. The sources are organized in “set” which is common for online archives of primary sources. You will need to choose a set (they are organized by topic like “the California Gold Rush”), and then choose a primary source from within that set. Everything in this collection is a primary source, so you don’t have to search for and identify a primary source.

Once you have chosen a source, you will write it about it.

1. Write down two reasons why you know it’s a primary source.

2. Identify who made it.

3. What do you know because this is a primary source that you couldn’t know if it had been analyzed like a secondary source is.

Example: James Madison Papers (Links to an external site.) (as shown in the power point lecture). I know this is a primary source because it’s a journal, meaning that Madison himself wrote it. I know it’s a primary source because Madison is describing his own thoughts and ideas, he is not talking about another person’s thoughts and ideas. Because I read this primary source I know that Madison had very tidy handwriting, and that he also had to edit his work to get it just right (since he scratched a lot of ideas out).