This clip is from a podcast published by BBC History Magazine.
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
This is a secondary source. Historian Michael Scott is providing one interpretation of events long since passed
The following quote is from the Communist Manifesto, by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, and published in 1848.
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
In one sense, this a secondary source because Marx and Engels are analyzing events that occurred through history. However, if we are using this document to understand the 19th century class struggles that prompted Marx and Engels to write this work in the first place, then it is a primary source.
This is from a rejection letter historian Margaret MacMillan received in response to one of her manuscripts.
“Nobody wants to read about a bunch of dead white men sitting around a table talking about peace treaties.”
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
The letter itself is a primary source document. It is of its time, and provides us with some insight into how the desire to generate sales can shape what is published; it also suggests that our understanding of history is evolving.
This is Wab Kinew, explaining 500 Years in Two Minutes.
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
This is a secondary source. Kinew is analyzing the past, providing an interpretations of events centuries before our time.
This is from the Indigenous Foundations website.
"Oral traditions form the foundation of Aboriginal societies, connecting speaker and listener in communal experience and uniting past and present in memory."
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
This is a secondary source. It explains the process through which history and tradition are (and have been) shared in indigenous societies.
This is a quotation from a speech made by Malcolm X, a militant civil rights activist in the 1960s.
“History is a people's memory, and without a memory man is demoted to the level of the lower animals.”
Is this a primary source or a secondary source?
It is a primary source because speeches are of their time. Historians might use this speech to better understand the various forces shaping America in the 1960s.