External and Internal

Criticism
Presented by: Jennifer Umali-Garcia, LPT, MA.Ed

Credits to: DR. CHARITA DE LOS REYES (U.P BAGUIO)

Can you provide an example
of a recent fake news story
you read on social media or a
reading reference?
 1. This post shared around 1,500 times has a caption that says, translated
to English: “I hope the VP still remembers this. Please spread so this can
reach Her!”.
 All of the posts contain a screengrab of an article credited to “The Adobo
Chronicles”, this satirical website. Here is the original Adobo Chronicles
article shown in the post, which is dated May 7, 2019.
What is Fake News?

 those news stories that are false: the story itself is fabricated, with no
verifiable facts, sources or quotes. It can be a propaganda that is
intentionally designed to mislead the reader or may be designed as
“clickbait” written for economic incentives (the writer profits on the
number of people who click on the story).
 “fake news” is a complex and nuanced problem, one that is far
greater than the narrow definition above- people use it to cast doubt
on their opponents, controversial issues or the credibility of some media
organizations.
 "Fake news" exists within a larger ecosystem of mis- and disinformation.
Misinformation and Disinformation

Is false or inaccurate information that is

mistakenly or inadvertently created or spread;
the intent is not to deceive.

is deliberate and includes malicious content

such as hoaxes, spear phishing and
propaganda. It spreads fear and suspicion
among the population.
Misinformation and disinformation is
produced for a variety of complex reasons:

• Partisan actors want to influence voters and policy makers for political gain, or to influence
public discourse (for example, intentionally spreading misinformation about election fraud)
• More clicks means more money. Some news stories are created by people wanting to
generate clicks for financial gain, regardless of the content
• Political regimes want to advance their own propaganda (for example, Russia’s
weaponization of “fake news” in order to control the narrative around its invasion of Ukraine)
• Satirists want to either make a point or entertain you, or both
• The blurry lines between news and entertainment and the explosion of news sites, as well
as the pressure of the 24-hour news cycle, may contribute to shoddy writing that doesn't
follow professional journalistic standards or ethics
 HOW TO
SPOT and
STOP FAKE
NEWS?
Historical method
Refers to the process of probing
primary sources that will be used
in writing history. This includes
source criticism which studies the
external and internal validity of
sources.
Historical Sources
It includes documents, artifacts,
archeological sites, features, oral
transmissions, stone inscriptions, paintings,
recorded sounds, images (photographs,
motion picture), ancient relics and ruins
and oral history.
Historical Criticism

Historical criticism (also known

as historicism or higher criticism) refers
to the study of literary texts,
particularly ancient texts.
It aims to analyze text to understand
it.
In short…

The problem of authenticity

To spot fabricated, forged, faked
documents
To distinguish a hoax or
misrepresentation
Evaluation of
Historical
Sources
 Credibility

• defined as quality or power of inspiring belief.

Credible sources, therefore, must be reliable
sources that provide information that one can
believe to be true.

Authenticity
How? • Refers to the proven fact that something is
legitimate or real

Provenance

• refers to the sources of information, such as

entitles and processes, involved in producing or
delivering an artifact.
 Authenticity of the sources by examining
the DATE, LOCALE, CREATOR, ANALYSIS,
and INTEGRITY of the historical sources.

These information must be consistent with

each other
External
Criticism It means for example, that the materials
used in a source must match the time and
place when it was produced.
 Appearance of the source

Consistency with historical period

Medium of the source

HOW IS IT
DONE? Quality of the paper and ink used

The grammar and handwriting of the

author and creator
Methods to Examine a
Primary Source
 Linguistics
 Archeology
 Numismatics- collection of currency, including coins, tokens,
paper money, medals and related objects.
 Philately- the collection and study of postage stamps.
 Paleography- study of ancient writing systems and the
deciphering and dating of historical manuscripts.
 Cryptography- the art of writing or solving codes.
 DNA Technology
 Cartography
 Radiocarbon dating- a method that provides objective age
estimates for carbon-based materials that originated from
living organisms
INTERNAL CRITICISM

Determine the CREDIBILITY of the source

Studies the content of the source to know
its truthfulness. For a source to be valid, its
content must be reasonable and
historically precise.
One should now rely on a data which is
not supported by evidence.
How is it done?

Historians carefully reads the text of

the source for context.
Focus on attention on the
author/creator
Situation surroundings its existence
Intended audience or reader
Neuman 2003 p. 421
External criticism:

Garraghan divides criticism into six inquiries:

1. When was the source, written or unwritten, produced
(date)?
2. Where was it produced (localization)?
3. By whom was it produced (authorship)?
4. From what pre-existing material was it produced (analysis)?
5. In what original form was it produced (integrity)?
6. What is the evidential value of its contents (credibility)?
Test of Authenticity

1. Determine the date of the document to see whether

they are anachronistic
e.g. pencils did not exist before the 16th Century
2. Determine the author
e.g. handwriting, signature, seal
3. Anachronistic style
e.g. idiom, orthography, punctuation
4. Anachronistic reference to events
e.g. too early, too late, too remote
Test of Authenticity

5. Provenance or custody
determines its genuineness
6.Semantics – determining the
meaning of a text or word
7.Hermeneutics
determining ambiguities
Why Internal and
External Criticism is
important?
Importance:

Without thorough
Use of unverified,
criticisms of historical
falsified and untruthful
evidences, historical
historical sources can
deception and lies will
lead to equally false
be highly probable
conclusions.
(possible)
 TO AVOID
HISTORICAL
DISTORTION
References
 Gilbert J. Garraghan, A Guide to Historical Method, Fordham University
Press: New York (1946). ISBN 0-8371-7132-6 •
 Louis Gottschalk, Understanding History: A Primer of Historical Method,
Alfred A. Knopf: New York (1950). ISBN 0-394-30215-X.
 Martha Howell and Walter Prevenier, From Reliable Sources: An Introduction
to Historical Methods, Cornell University Press: Ithaca (2001). ISBN 0-8014-
8560-6.
 C. Behan McCullagh, Justifying Historical Descriptions, Cambridge University
Press: New York (1984). ISBN 0-521-31830-0.
 R. J. Shafer, A Guide to Historical Method, The Dorsey Press: Illinois (1974).
ISBN 0-534-10825-3.
Recommended Videos to watch:
 How to evaluate the reliability of historical sources. (2019, February 27). YouTube.
Retrieved September 11, 2022, from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=IbCr1aGS4CQ&fbclid=IwAR1VatKaGx
nJ1FhqHXX1IT9WdGhUvnWIXQPnVXYXxtBUsmgs9pXPGto1ZTM
 History Skills]. (2020, January 3). Historical source evaluation explained. YouTube.
Retrieved September 11, 2022, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_WyxYuvvis
 [Xiao Chua]. (2020, May 29). Xiao Time: Ang Kodigo ni Kalantiaw. YouTube. Retrieved
September 11, 2022, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFjr9_azT6s
Additional
Readings
Source criticism
 The following core principles of source criticism were formulated
by two Scandinavian historians, Olden-Jørgensen (1998) and
Thurén (1997):
• Human sources may be relics such as a fingerprint; or narratives
such as a statement or a letter. Relics are more credible sources than
narratives.
• Any given source may be forged or corrupted. Strong indications
of the originality of the source increase its reliability.
• The closer a source is to the event which it purports to describe, the
more one can trust it to give an accurate historical description of
what actually happened.
 A primary source is more reliable than a secondary source
which is more reliable than a tertiary source, and so on.
 If a number of independent sources contain the same
message, the credibility of the message is strongly
increased.
 The tendency of a source is its motivation for providing
some kind of bias. Tendencies should be minimized or
supplemented with opposite motivations.
 If it can be demonstrated that the witness or source has
no direct interest in creating bias then the credibility of the
message is increased.
Forged or Misleading Documents

Documents are sometimes fabricated for the ff

reasons:
It was used to bolster a false claim or title
Due to less mercenary considerations
Some facts are base only on some practical
jokes
To mislead certain contemporaries
Internal Criticism: historical reliability
 An author's trustworthiness
Value and worth of the content
Literal meaning and reliability
Authors good faith, motive, competence,
accuracy and his knowledge on the
subject covered
In short…

The Problem of Credibility

Relevant particulars in the document
– is it credible?
Verisimilar – as close as what really
happened from a critical
examination of best available
sources
Test of Credibility

1. Identification of the author

e.g. to determine his reliability; mental
processes, personal attitudes
2. Determination of the approximate date
3. Ability to tell the truth
- nearness to the event, competence of
witness degree of attention
Test of Credibility
4. Willingness to tell the truth
- to determine if the author consciously or
unconsciously tells falsehoods
5. Corroboration
i.e. historical facts – particulars which rest
upon the independent testimony of two or
more reliable witnesses (Louis Gottschalk,
Understanding History)
Eyewitness evidence
 R. J. Shafer offers this checklist for evaluating eyewitness
testimony:[5]
1. Is the real meaning of the statement different from its literal
meaning? Are words used in senses not employed today? Is
the statement meant to be ironic (i.e., mean other than it
says)?
2. How well could the author observe the thing he reports?
Were his senses equal to the observation? Was his physical
location suitable to sight, hearing, touch? Did he have the
proper social ability to observe: did he understand the
language, have other expertise required (e.g., law, military);
was he not being intimidated by his wife or the secret police?
3. How did the author report?, and what was his ability to do so?
1. Regarding his ability to report, was he biased? Did he have
proper time for reporting? Proper place for reporting? Adequate
recording instruments?
2. When did he report in relation to his observation? Soon? Much
later? Fifty years is much later as most eyewitnesses are dead and
those who remain may have forgotten relevant material.
3. What was the author's intention in reporting? For whom did he
report? Would that audience be likely to require or suggest distortion
to the author?
4. Are there additional clues to intended veracity? Was he
indifferent on the subject reported, thus probably not intending
distortion? Did he make statements damaging to himself, thus
probably not seeking to distort? Did he give incidental or casual
information, almost certainly not intended to mislead?
4. Do his statements seem inherently
improbable: e.g., contrary to human nature, or
in conflict with what we know?
5. Remember that some types of information
are easier to observe and report on than
others.
6. Are there inner contradictions in the
document?
Indirect witnesses
 Garraghan says that most information comes from "indirect witnesses," people
who were not present on the scene but heard of the events from someone
else.[7]
 Gottschalk says that a historian may sometimes use hearsay evidence. He writes,
"In cases where he uses secondary witnesses, however, he does not rely upon
them fully. On the contrary, he asks:
1) On whose primary testimony does the secondary witness base his statements?
2) Did the secondary witness accurately report the primary testimony as a whole?
3) If not, in what details did he accurately report the primary testimony?
In such cases the secondary source is the historian's 'original' source, in the sense of
being the 'origin' of his knowledge. Insofar as this 'original' source is an accurate
report of primary testimony, he tests its credibility as he would that of the primary
testimony itself."[8]
Oral tradition
 Gilbert Garraghan maintains that oral tradition may be accepted if it
satisfies either two "broad conditions" or six "particular conditions", as
follows:[9]
1. Broad conditions stated.
1.1 The tradition should be supported by an unbroken series of witnesses,
reaching from the immediate and first reporter of the fact to the living
mediate witness from whom we take it up, or to the one who was the first
to commit it to writing.
1.2 There should be several parallel and independent series of witnesses
testifying to the fact in question.
2. Particular conditions formulated.
2.1. The tradition must report a public event of importance, such as would
necessarily be known directly to a great number of persons.
2. 2. The tradition must have been generally believed, at least for a
definite period of time.
 2.3 During that definite period it must have gone without
protest, even from persons interested in denying it.
 2.4 The tradition must be one of relatively limited
duration. [Elsewhere, Garraghan suggests a maximum
limit of 150 years, at least in cultures that excel in oral
remembrance.]
 2.5 The critical spirit must have been sufficiently
developed while the tradition lasted, and the necessary
means of critical investigation must have been at hand.
 2.6 Critical-minded persons who would surely have
challenged the tradition — had they considered it false
— must have made no such challenge.
Test of Authenticity
 Examining the date of the document to see if it is
anachronistic.
 Isographies- dictionaries of biography giving examples of
handwriting.
 Using techniques known as paleography and diplomatic-
authenticate medieval charters and other documents by
their handwriting, vary from place to place and from time to
time and by the variant highly stylized conventions and forms
to publish easily legible printed version of them.
 Sigillographers- studies the seals used to authenticate archival
documents
Garbled Document
A document that its entirety or in a large
part is the result of a deliberate effort to
deceive may hard to evaluate occur
frequently in copies of documents whose
originals disappeared causes error of
omission, repetition or addition
Intention can be to modify, supplement or
continue the original
Restoration of Text
Historian attempt to reconstruct a text
that comes from ancestors, noted striking
similarities and add together passages
appeared to be descended and guess its
contents.
In many instances the original text can be
approximately or entirely restored.