Hello, I am an aspiring historian hoping for some advice. I don't think I'm breaking any rules but I'd be happy to remove this post if it's not allowed. This quarter I have to write multiple primary source analyses in which I have to explain what the document says about an aspect of the culture. This is obviously basic stuff but when I'm given broad writing prompts I have a hard time in taking in the information and turning it into a point that I want to prove, due to some learning disabilities. I was wondering if there are specific questions that you ask yourselves or techniques you use as historians when you are reading and analyzing a document. If I can figure out how to break this down into steps and focus my attention in a productive way, this quarter will a lot more fun.
We did a Monday Methods thread on evaluating primary source documents a while back.
I'm going to quote the post I did on primary source evaluation 101, because it would be relevant for your purposes:
The problem with using primary sources alone is that one is not immediately made aware of the larger context that a document is written in. Primary sources are generally not written with future historians in mind; rather, they are written for a specific audience, usually to advance a specific goal (or more). Because of this, one should never take primary source documents at face value: if one doesn't understand the larger context in which a primary source document was written, one can get an extremely misleading viewpoint of history, which gives rise to a number of bad historical tropes.
So how does one critically evaluate a primary source document?
While I read a primary source document, I'm asking myself the following six questions:
- What is this? Is this a letter, a poem, a political cartoon, a picture, a flyer, a memo, what? Different types of documents and sources have different goals and mindsets.
- When was this written? This puts the source in the proper time frame chronologically.
- Who created this primary source? This might sound like a stupid question, but actually knowing who wrote the document allows you to ask about the author's biases. Is the author a man or a woman? Who does this author work for? Who is the author allied with? Does the author have a relationship with the intended audience? These questions help to set the tone for question 2:
- Who is the intended audience of this document that I'm looking at? A letter from a daughter to a father has an audience of 1: the father. A government document about redirecting Social Security checks back to the Social Security Administration might have a few audience members: namely, those who are authorized to read it. A flyer about how an organization is a victim of a conspiracy has a much wider audience (namely, the average reader). Keep this in mind while you're reading the primary source. Being aware of who the intended audience is allows you to ask yourself what the author is assuming the audience already knows, what the author believes the audience doesn't know, and what the author is refusing to disclose.
- What is the goal of the primary source? Primary sources are generally made for a reason. So what is it that the author is trying to convey to the audience? An autopsy of a person's body has the goal of discussing how a person died, and to explain how the pathologist came to that conclusion. An office memo between a supervisor and one of their employees might be intended to convey new ideas regarding options on a previously made plan. Etc. Being aware of what the source is trying to convey is useful to critically evaluating it. This further relates to the first question (who is the audience?), and it's also necessary to ask yourself the next question:
- Why was this written? This is completely different from “what is the goal of the primary source” – while the goal of the primary source could be found using textual evidence in the document itself, the reason why it was written requires you to understand the context surrounding the document in question. You might know that a flyer accusing a group of violating the human rights of individuals within that group was written to convince the reader to investigate said group, but this doesn't explain why the author found it necessary to produce it. So, ask yourself, why was the author decide to write this in the first place?
It sounds basic, but these are like the fundamental questions that historians ask themselves while evaluating primary sources.
Good luck!
/u/cordis_melum has posted a great link, and I will only add:
Talk to your professor about this. S/he will be able to give you advice specific to your assignment, and may even be willing to help you work through the first one during office hours. Stop by and start a conversation, and see what strategies your prof thinks will work best with this assignment. The one-on-one help you can get during office hours is one of the advantages of taking a college course vs. only depending on the internet for advice.
Your professor should also be able to point you toward tutoring resources at your school, which should have specific experience dealing with learning disabilities like yours. My university, for example, has a writing center that will help anyone re-write a draft of a paper to make it stronger. Your professor can point you toward the resources available on your campus.
Please do continue to seek out advice like you're doing here, but don't neglect the resources you have on campus. Milk your tuition dollars for everything they're worth!
Good luck!