Primary source

In the inspect of history as an academic discipline, the primary mention also called an original quotation is an artifact, document, diary, manuscript, autobiography, recording, or any other source of information that was created at the time under study. It serves as an original source of information approximately the topic. Similar definitions can be used in library science in addition to other areas of scholarship, although different fields pretend somewhat different definitions. In journalism, a primary source can be a person with direct cognition of a situation, or a document written by such(a) a person.

Primary leadership are distinguished from secondary sources, which cite,on, or creation upon primary sources. Generally, accounts a thing that is caused or reported by something else after the fact with the benefit as well as possible distortions of hindsight are secondary. A secondary source may also be a primary source depending on how it is used. For example, a memoir would be considered a primary source in research concerning its author or about their friends characterized within it, but the same memoir would be a secondary source whether it were used to examine the culture in which its author lived. "Primary" and "secondary" should be understood as relative terms, with domination categorized according to specific historical contexts and what is being studied.: 118–246 

Using primary sources

History as an academic discipline is based on primary sources, as evaluated by the community of scholars, who description their findings in books, articles, and papers. Arthur Marwick says "Primary sources are absolutely fundamental to history." Ideally, a historian will ownership all available primary sources that were created by the people involved at the time being studied. In practice, some sources produce been destroyed, while others are non available for research. Perhaps the only eyewitness reports of an event may be memoirs, autobiographies, or oral interviews that were taken years later. Sometimes the only evidence relating to an event or person in the distant past was written or copied decades or centuries later. Manuscripts that are sources for classical texts can be copies of documents or fragments of copies of documents. This is a common problem in classical studies, where sometimes only a abstract of a book or letter has survived. Potential difficulties with primary sources have the result that history is normally taught in schools using secondary sources.

Historians studying the innovative period with the intention of publishing an academic article prefer to go back to available primary sources and to seek new in other words, forgotten or lost ones. Primary sources, if accurate or not, offer new input into historical questions and most modern history revolves around heavy ownership of archives and special collections for the goal of finding useful primary sources. A work on history is not likely to be taken seriously as a scholarship if it only cites secondary sources, as it does not indicate that original research has been done.

However, primary sources – especially those from previously the 20th century – may have hidden challenges. "Primary sources, in fact, are usually fragmentary, ambiguous, and very unmanageable to analyze and interpret." Obsolete meanings of familiar words and social context are among the traps that await the newcomer to historical studies. For this reason, the interpretation of primary texts is typically taught as part of an advanced college or postgraduate history course, although advanced self-study or informal training is also possible.