Step 2:
Finding and Evaluating Sources, the Annotated Bibliography
Revisiting Context: Step One
Congratulations! You have a topic and historical question! Now that you are ready to take the next step in the research paper process, make sure that you look back at the previous step. Is the background context clear (who did what, where and when)? Do you have a historical question that is open-ended and interpretive? Make sure you still wish to pursue this topic. If so, terrific! If not, go back to the Step One instructions and try again. Get help from Mr. Treppa if you need it!
Step 2 will be crucial in helping you determine whether there has been enough historical work done on your subject to sustain a good research paper, or whether you will have to work exclusively from primary sources from the time period (a much more difficult task, so be careful!). This step also is where a lot of the fun is, since you can see how different minds have perceived your subject before, which gives YOU the opportunity to think about new questions to ask or to evaluate what the others have done. Perhaps you will be historian that makes us look at a situation differently than anyone has before!
Source Selection:
Your goal, from this point on, is to develop a convincing set of answers to your question. To accomplish this, you will need to seek out other historians to see what has been done and argued about your topic. After all, you want your work to reflect the best thinking and evidence
available. If you have to have surgery, you want expert advice and “second opinions” from the best surgeons. Similarly, if you want to interpret a past situation well, you want to read different interpretations of it by the best historians.
The better your research, the more convincing your argument, and thus, the better your paper will be. We will figure out how to find relevant books and articles first. Then we will look at how to separate the good sources from the bad!
Taking the Second Step: Finding and Evaluating Sources
Finding the Sources:
Homewood-Flossmoor Library Electronic Resources
Start your quest for resources by visiting https://sites.google.com/a/hf233.org/researchpaper/ and click on the Library Resources tab. This webpage gives you access to the electronic resources and tools that you will need to find excellent sources. (See the picture below)
Search Words and Phrases
Well-formed search words and phrases are very important in the research process. Many students make the mistake of searching for one or two things, finding nothing, and presuming that there are no sources on their topic. To avoid this frustration, spend some time thinking of a variety of search words for your topic right now. You may want to refer back to Step 1. Look over those important events related to your topic. Think about the key people, places, events, and ideas that surround your topic. All of these can yield possible search words or phrases. Being specific is usually a good thing here. Also, try stringing words together with “and” or “and not.” This can help narrow your results down to the most useful ones. Remember, a search only takes a second or two, so try a bunch of them!
E-Books
HF also subscribes to a set of e-books provided by Thomson-Gale Publishing. The set includes dozens of valuable resources- including specialized encyclopedias. You can tell they are specialized because they have more specific names like Encyclopedia of Religion or
site. When prompted, enter (the password is different now, but I was asked NOT to put this on any document the public can see. You will have to get it from me in class) for the password. This site works similarly to the Encyclopedia Britannica website. Simply type a search term in the search box and hit enter. The results will be broken into logical categories on the left side of the page. You may also want to try searching within a specific e-book. When you click on a source, you can look at it one of two ways: as a webpage or as a scanned photo-like image of the book, also known as a pdf. Choosing the pdf will allow you to see accompanying photos and jot down the specific page number of the article in the book- which you will need to do the
bibliography properly.
Databases
Now it is time to look at the databases we offer here at Homewood-Flossmoor High School. A database is a way for researchers to access, in one place, a variety of sources that would
otherwise be difficult to find. Additionally, databases are useful because someone with
professional qualifications has made decisions about what is high quality and what is not. Some databases offer access to the archives of academic journals. Academic journals, like The Journal of American History, are periodicals meant for a very specific audience. While they typically don’t have the broad appeal of magazines, they are a perfect place for you to mine the rich evidence you need to write a strong paper.
We have two databases that make sense for our particular project. The databases are SIRS and EBSCO History Database. You need to click on them to go to their respective websites. In both cases, the user ID and the password are (the password is different now, but I was asked NOT to put this on any document the public can see. You will have to get it from me in class). The sites work like the others we have looked at. Keep in mind these tips as you search.
The search terms you use may have to be modified for success.
The Lexile Score in SIRS and EBSCO is an indication of how tough the reading is. The higher the score, the more complex the text.
Remember that you are not reading everything. Skim until you come to something that seems relevant. Look closely at the summary and abstract sections for brief descriptions of the source that will come in handy later..
Homewood-Flossmoor High School Library Holdings
From the Research Resources, clicking the Vikings button will take you to the Homewood-Flossmoor High School library catalog. In the search box, enter your topic just as you did with the databases. You should get a list of possibilities next. Click on titles you think might be useful and jot down the title and call number. You should go to the library and take a look at these sources as soon as possible. Remember that every history student in the school is writing a research paper and competition for sources can get pretty fierce.
Area Library Holdings
so, but you might not be able to benefit from the book until your paper is nearly complete. The
SWAN catalog does have minor book reviews which may help you with annotation, even if you do not get your book from this spot.
A Few Words on…
Web Pages and Internet Search Engines
While the Internet can be a researcher’s dream, it can also be a nightmare. Your teacher will decide to what extent he or she will accept web pages as sources. It is important to keep in mind that many web pages dealing with history are created by amateurs in the field, filled with
political bias and outright falsehoods. If your teacher allows you to use web pages, be sure to carefully investigate the reliability of the source before you use it. (More on this later) Do not base your paper entirely on web page sources. Instead, consider using Google Scholar to limit your results to more academic web pages.
Films
If you use film as a source, you absolutely must pay attention to two issues: what the purpose of the film was and how the film gained its information. If the film was made for entertainment purposes, look out! The makers of entertainment films often have priorities other than historical accuracy. As for how the film gained its information, if the film merely uses secondary sources to put together a narrative, then you should look at the sources more than at the film. If the film is a documentary using primary sources, make sure you know the motivations of the maker of the documentary. Either way, you need to investigate the reliability of the sources and of the film before you use it.
Primary Sources/Oral Histories
These are terrific materials to use, but you need to keep a couple of things in mind. If you are going to interview someone, be sure to get that person’s exact words (ask for permission to record them). Also, be sure the source is likely to have something worthwhile to say (e.g. don’t just interview your grandmother about disco dancing because your grandmother happened to be alive at the same time as disco). Lastly, remember that people have reasons for saying and/or writing certain things. Pay attention to the issue of what your source is hoping to accomplish with what he or she says or writes. They may not be lying, but they may emphasize the issues they want you or others to know or to think.
Textbooks/General Encylcopedias
These are intended to provide the reader with an overview of topics rather than a well-researched and defended interpretation of events. Though these sources usually are written by experts, the sources do not have the specific evidence to support the claims they are making, and therefore you have little ability to judge the strength of their arguments. In other words, do not use them as sources!!!!
The next step is to figure out which sources are better than others for your specific question. Evaluating sources takes a bit of time, but going through the process will pay off handsomely, since creating an annotated bibliography will help you see what historians have done with your topic so far. You will be able to see strengths and weaknesses of the different historical
accounts, which will in turn help you to draw your own conclusions.
A. Do an initial search and write down the bibliographic
information of each source in the first group on the Template
I decide to start with the Homewood-Flossmoor High School library catalog. I visit the Research Resources web page and click on the Viking. In the search box, I type Maya and get an extensive list of library resources.
I notice that the list contains a wide variety of sources, many of which are completely irrelevant to my purpose. I will look for a current (contemporary) historical account, because it will have the most recent scholarship but also should have references to earlier accounts that might be helpful.
One current entry catches my eye right away. It is called Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Given that my historical question concerns the collapse of the Maya, this book seems to be very promising, especially since it was published as recently as 2005, so it is likely to be a contemporary work. I click on the link and find more specific information about the book. This is enough information for me to determine that I should check the book out and evaluate it further. I also will write down the bibliographic information for this book on the template, following the formats in Appendix C. I will then select other sources that also look promising, based on C.R.A.P. detection…
B. Evaluate the source in greater detail (C.R.A.P. detection)
With the book in hand, I can get a better sense of it and whether it is something I can and should use for my paper. I read the back cover to get an idea of the scope of the book. I flip through the table of contents and introduction, keeping an eye out for stuff about the Maya. I notice that Chapter 5 is all about the Maya. I even check out the index for relevant entries outside of Chapter 5. Now, I need to evaluate the source. There are four parts to “CRAP” detection, and I will fill in the appropriate areas on the template.
1.
Context:
be discovered by a look at either a preface or an introduction (occasionally it can be discovered in a conclusion section in the back of a book).
A. Contemporary
These sources are the most recent histories of the topic. These accounts have the benefit of looking at earlier efforts and the interpretations of many different minds, plus any new evidence that has come to light. Historians refer to these current works as contemporary. You should have as many contemporary accounts as you can get. The other benefit of these sources is that they will have lists of sources they considered, which will help you find other sources to use and also will help you see how historians have changed their interpretations over time.
B. Traditional (at least 1)
The early efforts historians made to make sense of your topic would be called traditional accounts. For example, if you are looking at a book concerning the Holocaust, you should be aware that the Holocaust ended with the end of World War II, in 1945. A book that was written in the late 1940s or early 1950s probably would be a traditional account. You should strive to have at least one traditional account among the sources you use.
C. Revisionist (at least 1)
The other type of secondary source you should consider would be those historians who found problems with the traditional accounts of your topic and tried to offer new interpretations. The questions asked may be different, or the interpretation of very similar evidence may be different, or new evidence may be found or considered. These accounts are referred to as revisionist. With the Holocaust, you should see that these accounts have traditional histories in their lists of sources. You probably also will see the revisionist account mention how it adds new perspective to the topic, either in a preface or a conclusion of some sort. You should strive to have revisionist accounts among the sources you use.
2.
Reliable:
I am looking to see if this book was based on solid evidence. Looking at the footnotes, endnotes, or the bibliography, I will be able to see what sources the author used (if none of these exist, that is a definite warning sign!). The sources listed should then be
consulted if at all possible.
3.
Authoritative:
Now I need to take a closer look at the author- in this case, Jared Diamond. I need to know if this guy is a trusted name in the field, in order to be really confident about the source.
what some historians call frame of reference. Essentially, this is a term to describe the general lens through which the author views the world. You might call this a bias, but it does not have to be a negative one. More reading leads to me finding out that he has won the Pulitzer Prize and a couple other distinctions. This guy is the real deal. I can safely take on this source and use it as evidence in my paper, though I don’t have to accept his conclusions.
4.
Purpose:
What does the creator of the source want to accomplish with the source? For example, if the source was intended for children, then the writer probably will not use a lot of
evidence to back the claims made, so I will have a difficult time evaluating or using its material (besides, it would be based on other, better sources). If the source was intended for some other purpose than accurately describing and explaining your topic, then the history is not likely to be done well or fairly. Usually, if you have done the first three elements of CRAP detection, this part will be easy to determine.
