DISTINCTION BETWEEN

SECONDARY
AND
PRIMARY SOURCES
 HISTORICAL SOURCES
✣ an object from the past or testimony
concerning the past on which
historians depends in order to create
their own depiction of the past

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 Primary and Secondary Sources

✣ What is the meaning of them?

✣ What are their examples?

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 Primary souces
✣ are original records of a certain event of people who
have actually experienced or witnessed it.
✣ Primary sources enable the researcher to get as close
as possible to what actually happened during an
historical event or time period.

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 PRIMARY SOURCE
Journals and diaries

*Sarah Morgan was young woman

during the Civil War. She wrote in her
diary or journal what happened to her
and her family during the war.
*Sarah Morgan Dawson: A
Confederate Girl's Diary

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 PRIMARY
SOUCES

Interviews

Example 1: During the 2008

election Barack Obama, had many
interviews that were televised.

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 PRIMARY SOURCES
LETTERS

This is an original
letter written by
Thomas Jefferson
to John Adams in
1788.

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 PRIMARY SOURCES
More examples;
• Speeches
• Photographs
• Audio and Video Recordings
• Original literary or theatrical works
• Original advertisements
• Magazine and Newspaper Articles (as long as they
are written soon after the fact and not as historical
accounts) 8
 SECONDARY
• SOURCES
A secondary source is something written about a
primary source.
• Usually the author of a secondary source will have
studied the primary sources of an historical period or
event and will then interpret the "evidence" found in
these sources.
• You can think of secondary sources as second-hand
information.
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 These may include researches,textbooks,
journals,commentaries, biographies, and criticism or reviews
of literary and creative works.
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 SECONDARY SOURCE

• Think about it like this....

If I tell you something, I am the
primary source. If you tell someone
else what I told you, you are the
secondary source.
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Represented by: Rymcelle Joy C. Aquino
Block 1G
THANK YOU !
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