EDSS220/520 CPA 1

WEEK 4 WORKSHOP

Concept in focus:Using historical sources as evidence

Use sources as evidence

Primary and secondary sources must be evaluated before being used as evidence. This involves the identification, attribution, contextualisation, close analysis and corroboration of sources.

WORKING WITH EVIDENCE

Seixas & Morton, The big six historical thinking concepts,

2013, p. 42

key terms

accountcontextcorroboration evidence

inferenceinterpretationsourcesourcingtrace

HISTORIANS LOOK AT

SOURCES EVIDENCETO PROVIDE

ie. a file in a public record

office

Historians discover

information

Not useful

information

Interpretation of sources

values limitations

Useful and relevant to

research

Evidence• Evidence is the foundation of historical activity, but

– How can we make use of this evidence?

– What do we do with it?

• Historical literacy

– “To be historically literate, students have to be aware of what they are looking for, how to look for it and how to make sense of it.” (Taylor et al, 2012)

– Disciplinary knowledge is:

• Substantive

• Procedural

– (Lee and Ashby, 2000)

Source Analysis

• “Source inquiry constitutes the main building

block for developing adolescents’ capacity to

think in time and reason historically.” (Taylor

et al, p108)

Identification Attribution Perspective Judgment

Reliability Assessment

VanSledright (2004)Slide courtesy of John Whitehouse (UoM, 2015)

Historical Thinking and Sources (VanSledright)

Sourcing Contextualizing Close Reading Corroboration

Wineburg (2001), Rosenzweig & Wineburg (2008)Slide courtesy of John Whitehouse (UoM, 2015)

Historical Thinking and Sources (Wineburg)

Guideposts to evidence (Seixas & Morton)

Refer to your textbook

activity 1:i left a trace…(Seixas & morton, 2013, p. 50)

the role played by traces & broader questions

- were there any things you did that left no trace or that left only traces that would not be preserved? What does this suggest about the historical record?

- What would future historians think about you if they were able to study your traces? What if they were able to see only those traces that you left purposefully?

- what if all traces of everyone on Earth disappeared and your traces were the only ones to survive? How much would future historians be able to learn about our society by studying only your traces?

- What other kind of traces, relics, testimony, and records would help historians learn about our society?

- what if historians were trying to study you? What materials - other than those actually created by you - could they use?

Dachau:A case study

‘Prisoners building the swimming pool’Friedrich Franz Bauer, commissioned by the SS muncher illustrierte Presse, july 16, 1933

prisoners on their way to work Friedrich Franz Bauer, commissioned by the SS muncher illustrierte Presse, july 16, 1933

from the ‘illustrierter beobachter’, dec. 3rd 1936photo by Friedrich Franz Bauer, commissioned by the SS

Life in a german concentration camp for political opponents of the nazis, London illustrated news, Feb. 10, 1934

working with evidenceInterpretations based on inferences

Asking good questions (historical inquiry)

Sourcing (attribution/origins)

Contextualisation- links to perspectives- historical empathy

Corroboration