HOW DO WE KNOW WHAT WE KNOW? “Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunters.” ~African Proverb

ANALYZING PRIMARY SOURCES

What are Primary Sources? A primary source is a piece of living history.  It may be defined as any artifact that provides first hand or direct information about the past.  Primary sources may include: first person accounts (e.g. oral histories, diaries, memoirs, correspondence) documents (e.g. correspondence, treaties, laws, speeches) images (e.g. maps, photographs, drawings, paintings) historically gathered data.

Questions to Consider When You Analyze Written Primary Sources Who created the source and why? What sorts of information does the source supply? Under what circumstances was the source created?  How would this influence the content of the source? For whom was the source created? Was the source meant to be public or private? Did the creator wish to inform, persuade, or deceive his or her audience?  What did the creator hope to accomplish by writing the source? Can you trust the source's content at face value? What were the opinions, motivations, or interests of the creator?  How does his or her point of view compare to other writers of the period?  What kind of impact would this have on the content of the source?

Questions to Consider When You Analyze Visual Primary Sources: Why was the image created? What does the image reveal about its subject? What is the point of view of the image? Whose story is it telling? What is the setting of the image?  What sorts of details does it include or emphasize?  What sorts of details does it exclude? What are the underlying messages of the image and motives of the artist? How long after the event was the image created? How does this influence the image's content or perspective?

How Can I Remember to Ask the Critical Questions? ACRONYM 1: “TAP APE” T – Time Period = When was the source produced? A – Author = Who produced the source? Age? Race? Gender? Status? (Any info about the author) P – Purpose = What type of source is this? What does the source intend to do? What is the source’s audience? A – Argument = What main ideas does the source convey? P – Perspective = Is there bias in the source? How does that bias influence the ideas that the source conveys? E – Extra = What extra (“outside”) information do I know that is related to the ideas in the source? How does this extra information help to explain the ideas in the source?

When You Interpret Primary Sources, The Challenge is to Figure Out Answers to the Following Questions: 1) What does the document say? (i.e., the meaning of the document) 2) Why are the ideas in the document important? (i.e., the significance of the document)

Remember: People are Products of Their Time, Upbringing, and Environment Insert your Pic here 

What is Wrong with this Image? This 1967 photograph shows Mildred and Richard Loving, a married couple in Virginia.

Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924 An Act to Preserve Racial Integrity 4. No marriage license shall be granted until the clerk or deputy clerk has reasonable assurance that the statements as to color of both man and woman are correct. 5. It shall hereafter be unlawful for any white person in this State to marry any save a white person, or a person with no other admixture of blood than white and American Indian. For the purpose of this act, the term "white person" shall apply only to the person who has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than Caucasian; but persons who have one-sixteenth or less of the blood of the American Indian and have no other non-Caucasic blood shall be deemed to be white persons. All laws heretofore passed and now in effect regarding the intermarriage of white and colored persons shall apply to marriages prohibited by this act.

Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924 An Act to Preserve Racial Integrity 1) What does the document say? (i.e., the meaning of the document) 2) Why are the ideas in the document important? (What does the law reveal about Virginia)? (i.e., the significance of the document)

Loving v. Virginia (1967) At the time of the Loving v. Commonwealth of Virginia Supreme Court ruling in 1967, three years after the 1964 Civil Rights Act, sixteen states still maintained and actively invoked anti-miscegenation laws banning marriage between white and black citizens.