Answered: 5-2 Activity: Historical Interpretations of Past and Present
Answered: 5-2 Activity: Historical Interpretations of Past and Present
Describe how exploring your research question improved your understanding of the historical roots of your current event.
Overview
Over the past few weeks, you have examined how context, perspective, and bias impact what we know about history and how we talk about it. You also started to make connections between your research question, historical event, and current event. In this activity, you will build upon that work to consider the historical roots of your current event and what the narratives would be like if told from a different perspective.
Prompt
Use the provided Module Five Activity Template: Historical Interpretations Word Document to complete this activity. First, you will reflect on the process of researching the subject of your historical research question and its connection to your current event. You will then consider the impact of bias on our existing knowledge. Finally, you will address how the narratives about your historical and current events would change if told from alternative viewpoints.
Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria:
Describe how exploring your research question improved your understanding of the historical roots of your current event.
How did learning more about the subject of your research question help you identify events from the past that contributed or led up to your current event?
Explain how biased perspectives influence what is known about both your historical and current events.
Support your points with relevant course resources.
Propose how the narrative about your historical event might change if it were told from a missing perspective.
Refer to the missing perspective you identified in this week’s discussion. How might this point of view change the story about your historical event? For example, would the narrative focus on different details, or would those details be interpreted differently?
Propose how the narrative about your current event might change if it were told from a missing perspective.
Expand on the missing perspective from criteria three and apply it to your current event. How might your current event be understood differently by examining it from that perspective?
Answered: Historical Interpretations of Past and Present
Every period leaves traces, what historians call “sources” or evidence. Some are more credible or carry more weight than others; judging the differences is a vital skill developed by good historians. Sources vary in perspective, so knowing who created the information you are examining is vital. Anonymous doesn’t make for a very compelling source. For example, an FBI report on the antiwar movement, prepared for U.S. President Richard Nixon, probably contained secrets that at the time were thought to have affected national security. It would not be usual, however, for a journalist’s article about a campus riot, featured in a local newspaper, to leak top secret information. Which source would you read? It depends on your research topic. If you’re studying how government officials portrayed student activists, you’ll want to read the FBI report and many more documents from other government agencies such as the CIA and the National Security Council. If you’re investigating contemporary opinion of pro-war and anti-war activists, local newspaper accounts provide a rich resource. You’d want to read a variety of newspapers to ensure you’re covering a wide range of opinions (rural/urban, left/right, North/South, Soldier/Draft-dodger, etc).
Historians classify sources into two major categories: primary and secondary sources.
II. Historical Analysis
III. Topic, Thesis, Sources
Definition of Terms
Because your purpose is to create new knowledge while recognizing those scholars whose existing work has helped you in this pursuit, you are honor bound never to commit the following academic sins:
Plagiarism: Literally “kidnapping,” involving the use of someone else’s words as if they were your own (Gibaldi 6). To avoid plagiarism you must document direct quotations, paraphrases, and original ideas not your own.Recycling: Rehashing material you already know thoroughly or, without your professor’s permission, submitting a paper that you have completed for another course.Premature cognitive commitment: Academic jargon for deciding on a thesis too soon and then seeking information to serve that thesis rather than embarking on a genuine search for new knowledge.
Choose a Topic
“Do not hunt for subjects, let them choose you, not you them.” –Samuel Butler
Choosing a topic is the first step in the pursuit of a thesis. Below is a logical progression from topic to thesis:
Close reading of the primary text, aided by secondary sourcesGrowing awareness of interesting qualities within the primary textChoosing a topic for researchAsking productive questions that help explore and evaluate a topicCreating a research hypothesisRevising and refining a hypothesis to form a working thesis
First, and most important, identify what qualities in the primary or secondary source pique your imagination and curiosity and send you on a search for answers.
Bloom’s taxonomy of cognitive levels provides a description of productive questions asked by critical thinkers. While the lower levels (knowledge, comprehension) are necessary to a good history essay, aspire to the upper three levels (analysis, synthesis, evaluation).
Skimming reference works such as encyclopedias, books, critical essays and periodical articles can help you choose a topic that evolves into a hypothesis, which in turn may lead to a thesis. One approach to skimming involves reading the first paragraph of a secondary source to locate and evaluate the author’s thesis. Then for a general idea of the work’s organization and major ideas read the first and last sentence of each paragraph. Read the conclusion carefully, as it usually presents a summary (Barnet and Bedau 19).
Craft a ThesisVery often a chosen topic is too broad for focused research. You must revise it until you have a working hypothesis, that is, a statement of an idea or an approach with respect to the source that could form the basis for your thesis.
Remember to not commit too soon to any one hypothesis. Use it as a divining rod or a first step that will take you to new information that may inspire you to revise your hypothesis. Be flexible. Give yourself time to explore possibilities.
The hypothesis you create will mature and shift as you write and rewrite your paper. New questions will send you back to old and on to new material. Remember, this is the nature of research–it is more a spiraling or iterative activity than a linear one.
Test your working hypothesis to be sure it is:
broad enough to promise a variety of resources.narrow enough for you to research in depth.original enough to interest you and your readers.worthwhile enough to offer information and insights of substance“do-able”–sources are available to complete the research.Now it is time to craft your thesis, your revised and refined hypothesis. A thesis is a declarative sentence that:
focuses on one well-defined ideamakes an arguable assertion; it is capable of being supportedprepares your readers for the body of your paper and foreshadows the conclusion
What is it?
No matter what you read, whether it’s a primary source or a secondary source, you want to know who authored the source (a trusted scholar? A controversial historian? A propagandist? A famous person? An ordinary individual?). “Author” refers to anyone who created information in any medium (film, sound, or text). You also need to know when it was written and the kind of audience the author intend to reach.
You should also consider what you bring to the evidence that you examine. Are you inductively following a path of evidence, developing your interpretation based on the sources? Do you have an ax to grind? Did you begin your research deductively, with your mind made up before even seeing the evidence. Historians need to avoid the latter and emulate the former. To read more about the distinction, examine the difference between Intellectual Inquirers and Partisan Ideologues .
In the study of history, perspective is everything. A letter written by a twenty- year old Vietnam War protestor will differ greatly from a letter written by a scholar of protest movements. Although the sentiment might be the same, the perspective and influences of these two authors will be worlds apart. Practicing the “5 Ws” will avoid the confusion of the authority trap.
Who, When, Where, What and Why: The Five “W”s
Historians accumulate evidence (information, including facts, stories, interpretations, opinions, statements, reports, etc.) from a variety of sources (primary and secondary). They must also verify that certain key pieces of information are corroborated by a number of people and sources (“the predonderance of evidence”). The historian poses the “5 Ws” to every piece of information he examines: Who is the historical actor? When did the event take place? Where did it occur? What did it entail and why did it happen the way it did? The “5 Ws” can also be used to evaluate a primary source. Who authored the work? When was it created? Where was it created, published, and disseminated? Why was it written (the intended audience), and what is the document about (what points is the author making)? If you know the answers to these five questions, you can analyze any document, and any primary source. The historian doesn’t look for the truth, since this presumes there is only one true story. The historian tries to understand a number of competing viewpoints to form his or her own interpretation– what constitutes the best explanation of what happened and why.
By using as wide a range of primary source documents and secondary sources as possible, you will add depth and richness to your historical analysis. The more exposure you, the researcher, have to a number of different sources and differing view points, the more you have a balanced and complete view about a topic in history. This view will spark more questions and ultimately lead you into the quest to unravel more clues about your topic. You are ready to start assembling information for your research paper.
Secondary Sources
Definition:Secondary sources are created by someone who was either not present when the event occurred or removed from it in time. We use secondary sources for overview information, to familiarize ourselves with a topic, and compare that topic with other events in history. In refining a research topic, we often begin with secondary sources. This helps us identify gaps or conflicts in the existing scholarly literature that might prove promsing topics.
Types:History books, encyclopedias, historical dictionaries, and academic (scholarly) articles are secondary sources. To help you determine the status of a given secondary source, see How to identify and nagivate scholarly literature.
Examples:Historian Marilyn Young’s (NYU) book about the Vietnam War is a secondary source. She did not participate in the war. Her study is not based on her personal experience but on the evidence she culled from a variety of sources she found in the United States and Vietnam.
Primary Sources
Definition:Primary sources emanate from individuals or groups who participated in or witnessed an event and recorded that event during or immediately after the event. They include speeches, memoirs, diaries, letters, telegrams, emails, proclamations, government documents, and much more.
Examples:A student activist during the war writing about protest activities has created a memoir. This would be a primary source because the information is based on her own involvement in the events she describes. Similarly, an antiwar speech is a primary source. So is the arrest record of student protesters. A newspaper editorial or article, reporting on a student demonstration is also a primary source.
