Primary Sources

A primary source provides direct or firsthand evidence about an event,

object, person, or work of art. Primary sources include historical and legal
documents, eyewitness accounts, results of experiments, statistical data,
pieces of creative writing, audio and video recordings, speeches, and art
objects. Interviews, surveys, fieldwork, and Internet communications via
email, blogs, listservs, and newsgroups are also primary sources. In the
natural and social sciences, primary sources are often empirical studies—
research where an experiment was performed or a direct observation was
made. The results of empirical studies are typically found in scholarly articles
or papers delivered at conferences.

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.
Journals, magazines, and newspapers are serial publications that are
published on an ongoing basis.
Many scholarly journals in the sciences and social sciences include primary
source articles where the authors report on research they have undertaken.
Consequently, these papers may use the first person ("We observed…").
These articles usually follow a standard format with sections like "Methods,"
"Results," and "Conclusion."
In the humanities, age is an important factor in determining whether an
article is a primary or secondary source. A recently-published journal or
newspaper article on the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court case
would be read as a secondary source, because the author is interpreting an
historical event. An article on the case that was published in 1955 could be
read as a primary source that reveals how writers were interpreting the
decision immediately after it was handed down.
Serials may also include book reviews, editorials, and review articles. Review
articles summarize research on a particular topic, but they do not present
any new findings; therefore, they are considered secondary sources. Their
bibliographies, however, can be used to identify primary sources.
Books
Most books are secondary sources, where authors reference primary source
materials and add their own analysis. "Lincoln at Gettysburg: the Words
that Remade America" by Gary Wills is about Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg
Address. If you are researching Abraham Lincoln, this book would be a
secondary source because Wills is offering his views about Lincoln and the
Gettysburg Address.

Books can also function as primary sources. For example,Abraham Lincoln's

letters, speeches, or autobiography would be primary sources. To locate
primary sources in the library catalog, do a keyword search and include
"sources" in your search. The search results for "Abraham Lincoln" and
"Sources" would include include "The Civil War: the First Year Told By Those
Who Lived It", a book that includes letters written by Abraham Lincoln.

Visual and Audio Materials

Visual materials such as maps, photographs, prints, graphic arts, and original art
forms can provide insights into how people viewed and/or were viewed the world in
which they existed.

Films, videos, TV programs, and digital recordings can be primary sources.

Documentaries, feature films, and TV news broadcasts can provide insights into the
fantasies, biases, political attitudes, and material culture of the times in which they
were created. Radio broadcast recordings, oral histories, and the recorded music of
a particular era can also serve as primary source material.

Archival Material
Manuscripts and archives are primary sources, including business and personal
correspondence, diaries and journals, legal and financial documents, photographs,
maps, architectural drawings, objects, oral histories, computer tapes, and video and
audio cassettes. Some archival materials are published and available in print or
online.

Government Documents
Government documents provide evidence of activities, functions, and policies at all
government levels. For research that relates to the workings of government,
government documents are primary sources.

These documents include hearings and debates of legislative bodies; the official text
of laws, regulations and treaties; records of government expenditures and finances;
and statistical compilations of economic, demographic, and scientific data.
 Tertiary Sources
Tertiary sources contain information that has been compiled from primary and
secondary sources. Tertiary sources include almanacs, chronologies, dictionaries
and encyclopedias, directories, guidebooks, indexes, abstracts, manuals, and
textbooks.

2. Primary sources
These are contemporary accounts of an event, written by someone who experienced
or witnessed the event in question. These original documents (i.e., they are not about
another document or account) are often diaries, letters, memoirs, journals, speeches,
manuscripts, interviews and other such unpublished works. They may also include
published pieces such as newspaper or magazine articles (as long as they are written
soon after the fact and not as historical accounts), photographs, audio or video
recordings, research reports in the natural or social sciences, or original literary or
theatrical works.

3. Secondary sources
The function of these is to interpret primary sources, and so can be described as at
least one step removed from the event or phenomenon under review. Secondary source
materials, then, interpret, assign value to, conjecture upon, and draw conclusions about
the events reported in primary sources. These are usually in the form of published
works such as journal articles or books, but may include radio or television
documentaries, or conference proceedings.

4. Defining questions
When evaluating primary or secondary sources, the following questions might be asked
to help ascertain the nature and value of material being considered:
 How does the author know these details (names, dates, times)? Was the author present
at the event or soon on the scene?
 Where does this information come from—personal experience, eyewitness accounts, or
reports written by others?
 Are the author's conclusions based on a single piece of evidence, or have many
sources been taken into account (e.g., diary entries, along with third-party eyewitness
accounts, impressions of contemporaries, newspaper accounts)?
Ultimately, all source materials of whatever type must be assessed critically and even
the most scrupulous and thorough work is viewed through the eyes of the
writer/interpreter. This must be taken into account when one is attempting to arrive at
the 'truth' of an event.

xamples of primary sources:

 Autobiographies and memoirs

 Diaries, personal letters, and correspondence
 Interviews, surveys, and fieldwork
  Internet communications on email, blogs, listservs, and newsgroups
 Photographs, drawings, and posters
 Works of art and literature
 Books, magazine and newspaper articles and ads published at the time
 Public opinion polls
 Speeches and oral histories
 Original documents (birth certificates, property deeds, trial transcripts)
 Research data, such as census statistics
 Official and unofficial records of organizations and government agencies
 Artifacts of all kinds, such as tools, coins, clothing, furniture, etc.
 Audio recordings, DVDs, and video recordings
 Government documents (reports, bills, proclamations, hearings, etc.)
 Patents
 Technical reports
 Scientific journal articles reporting experimental research results

Examples of secondary sources:

 Bibliographies
 Biographical works
 Reference books, including dictionaries, encyclopedias, and atlases
 Articles from magazines, journals, and newspapers after the event
 Literature reviews and review articles (e.g., movie reviews, book reviews)
 History books and other popular or scholarly books
 Works of criticism and interpretation
 Commentaries and treatises
 Textbooks
 Indexes and abstracts