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The process then requires identifying the source type and handling its specific challenges, placing the source in context through three key questions, assessing limitations via validity, reliability, and representativeness, and concluding on historical usefulness by linking value to the assignment’s 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must you identify when summarising a historical source for a source commentary?","Question",{"text":63,"@type":64},"You need to establish what the source is, when and why it was produced, by whom, its form, plus its basic content, central message, and perhaps its structure.","Answer",{"name":66,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":67},"How should you handle different types of sources in a commentary?",{"text":68,"@type":64},"Consider the specific challenges and opportunities of the source type—for example, private vs. official writings, or quantitative vs. visual sources—and use appropriate methodological awareness.",{"name":70,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":71},"What questions help you put a source into context?",{"text":72,"@type":64},"Ask what broader picture is needed to make sense of the source, what the source tells us about that broader picture, and how it compares with other primary sources.",{"name":74,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":75},"How do you evaluate the limitations and usefulness of a source?",{"text":76,"@type":64},"Question validity, reliability, and representativeness, clarify what the source cannot tell you, and decide how useful it is to historians by linking it to the particular issue or assignment.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":32,"og:type":79,"og:title":10,"og:site_name":45,"og:description":12},"article",{"robots":81,"canonical":32},"index,follow",{"doc_id":83,"site_id":7},178163,1788330675,{"code":4,"msg":86,"data":87},"success",[88,93,98,103,108,113,118,123,128],{"id":89,"doc_module":22,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":90,"show_sort_weight":91,"slug":92},11,"Presentations",90,"presentations",{"id":94,"doc_module":22,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":95,"show_sort_weight":96,"slug":97},12,"Resumes",80,"resumes",{"id":99,"doc_module":22,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":100,"show_sort_weight":101,"slug":102},14,"Invoices",70,"invoices",{"id":104,"doc_module":22,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":105,"show_sort_weight":106,"slug":107},15,"Posters",60,"posters",{"id":109,"doc_module":22,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":110,"show_sort_weight":111,"slug":112},16,"Social 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Identify and summarise the source. You do need to establish what your source is, when and why it was produced, by whom, and what form it takes – as well as the basic content, the central message and perhaps the structure of the source – to give you a platform for the following commentary.\n2. Consider the particular type of source. There are particular challenges and opportunities offered by private or official writings, even when the author is the same. A campaign speech or the posthumously published diaries of the same politician, for example. Likewise, quantitative or visual sources need to be handled appropriately. There’s a wealth of methodological literature on many different source types, so make sure you’re aware of what the issues are with the source in front of you.\n3. Put your source in context. This means asking three questions, each of which will mean drawing upon your wider reading:\nWhat do we need to know about the broader picture to make sense of this source? The author, the environment (political, social, cultural backdrop), the time and the key issues each have their own history. What would we struggle not knowing? These are the sorts of things you often find mentioned in a brief preface to a source extract in anthologies.\nWhat does this source tell us about the broader picture? We piece together our wider understanding one source at a time. So what does this source add, that we might not be aware of or have evidence for otherwise?\nHow does this source compare to others? It’s not just secondary sources that give us our wider understanding, but other primary sources too. How might other primary sources you know of answer questions raised by this one, show a different side of the same happenings, corroborate or call into question what we see here?\n4. Consider the limitations of the source. Rarely will the source be an outright forgery, but you should still question the validity, reliability and representativeness of the source. What can’t it tell you? I would advise against using the term bias. Labelling a source as biased may not be wrong but it is redundant, since every source is biased in some way. Saying so can often mask the need to ask how. Better to identify the perspective from which events are described.\n5. Answer the question: How useful is this source to historians? Depending on the particular assignment, we might add: in relation to our particular issue.\nYou might answer these questions in a number of different ways or orders, but they will usually fall broadly into the structure of description then commentary. The exact schema of your assignment will depend on the nature of the source. Remember, there is no one form for a primary source. We might often think of letters, official documents, photographs and maps – but it could literally be anything. An increased consideration of material culture in recent years has made this more true than ever.\nIt would be unrealistic to expect one source to provide the answer to every question.  Remember, the question is not: Is this source useful to historians? Rather, it’s: In what ways is it useful? Everything around us will be of interest, it’s just a matter of matching up the right source with the right historian, asking the right question.\nIf this is the answer, what’s the question? What sort of historian, trying to understand what about the past, would find this source useful?\nSource: \u0013 HYPERLINK \"https://gcgosling.wordpress.com/advice/\" \u0014https://gcgosling.wordpress.com/advice/\u0015","cbCaieUCLJ9JaANT","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaieUCLJ9JaANT","docx",15652,"English","# Key steps for a source commentary\n## Identify and summarise the source\n## Consider the particular type of source\n## Put the source in context\n## Consider limitations of the source\n## Answer how useful the source is to historians","[{\"question\":\"What must you identify when summarising a historical source for a source commentary?\",\"answer\":\"You need to establish what the source is, when and why it was produced, by whom, its form, plus its basic content, central message, and perhaps its structure.\"},{\"question\":\"How should you handle different types of sources in a commentary?\",\"answer\":\"Consider the specific challenges and opportunities of the source type—for example, private vs. official writings, or quantitative vs. visual sources—and use appropriate methodological awareness.\"},{\"question\":\"What questions help you put a source into context?\",\"answer\":\"Ask what broader picture is needed to make sense of the source, what the source tells us about that broader picture, and how it compares with other primary sources.\"},{\"question\":\"How do you evaluate the limitations and usefulness of a source?\",\"answer\":\"Question validity, reliability, and representativeness, clarify what the source cannot tell you, and decide how useful it is to historians by linking it to the particular issue or assignment.\"}]","Source Commentaries - How to Write a Source Commentary | DOCX"]