History 101

This week's post is brought to us by CarrieAnne D. Check out her great tips on how to learn more about history. And thanks CarrieAnne for your thoughts and insights!

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As a classically trained historian, I LOVE History! Musty libraries, brittle documents and speaking about dead people really gets me excited. For those of you who have also caught a bit of the history bug here are a few hints that will help you find quality historic information as quickly as possible.

It goes without saying that in the age of the internet anyone can write and publish anything without having to prove its merits. There are a few simple things to keep in mind when doing historic research to avoid the pitfalls that are so rampant on the web.


There are two types of sources for historic information:

PRIMARY SOURCES: This is actual evidence from the time period or subject in question. It could include diaries, photographs, actual artifacts, items of popular culture like posters or movies, court documents, old maps, government records or anything else which was created by or related to the topic you are studying in the time and place you are studying.

For example, I study British women who traveled to Jerusalem in the 19th century. Two of the types of primary sources I rely on heavily for my research are diaries of the travelers and the travel guide books they wrote and sold to the public.

How can you find Primary Sources?

1. Check out the Bibliographies of Secondary Sources (see below). Where did these authors find their primary materials?

2. Do a Google search with the topic that interests you and the word "archive" in the search engine. Archives are stashes of materials on a the same topic and can often be found in University libraries, museums, or private collections.

Also many archives can now be found online. I once wrote an article on Gertrude Bell and based almost my entire research on the photographs and original letters that were scanned and uploaded by her library to this website: http://www.gerty.ncl.ac.uk/. Before the internet I would have had to travel all the way to England for that privilege.

3. Check out your local museums. You might find artifacts of interest on display or could even request access to documents and artifacts they have in storage. Curators LOVE to talk about their collections so don't be afraid to get friendly.

SECONDARY SOURCES These are books or scholarly articles written about the topic you are interested in. Secondary Sources normally involve a historian or lay person examining a bunch of Primary Sources and creating a theory about them. This doesn't mean their theory is correct or that they have used Primary Sources in a valid way. Bad or what we call POP history (what you find a lot of on the History Channel) doesn't always use Primary Sources - in these instances it is just a guy or gal spouting their opinion without backing it up with hard facts.

How can you find GREAT Secondary Sources?

1. Check the author's credentials. Does the author have a PhD or at least a Master's degree in the field in which they are writing about. What other books have they written on the topic? If he or she is not a traditional academic are they a journalist or someone who has worked in a related field and has practical experience of the topic? All of this information is normally available on the jacket cover of the book or can be quickly Googled.

2. Who published the book or article? Though in many cases general publishing houses like Penguin or Random House do publish legitimate works of scholarship, you are almost always safer if the book you are referencing was printed by an Academic Press. These are signified by the name of a University in the Publishers name - for example: Rutgers University Press, New York University Press, etc.

3. Paying expensive tuition for your beloved son or daughter to attend BYU or another University? Get something back from this investment. All Universities extend to their students library privileges and these privileges extend to online scholastic journals that non-students have to pay big bucks to access. Some schools even let students print articles for free. JSTOR is an excellent and commonly use database for scholastic articles. Have your student search JSTOR for articles which interest you. Articles have a much shorter publication process and so are often much more current in their theories and discoveries than books. University libraries also have inter library loan privileges. Get your little cutie to order a hard to find book for you that you just can't get in your local public library which has a much smaller book purchasing budget. You can even get great primary sources in this way. If you student balks at such notions as entering the library or doing these little academic favors for you I suggest withholding home cooked meals and laundry privileges when they come home for a visit.

I hope this brief tutorial on basic historical research gets the Indiana Jones in you fired up. Whether the topic that interests you is how the rolling pin was invented or why WWII was started, doing a little research to learn more about the world we live in, inevitably teaches us more about ourselves.