Primary Sources: What Are Primary and Secondary Sources?

A primary source is an original document or account of an event, usually written or created during the time under study by firsthand observers or participants.

Examples include:

• Published sources (in print or online) such as novels, poems, plays, data from a research study, autobiographies, speeches, eyewitness accounts found in newspapers, magazines or blogs, advertisements, maps, pamphlets, posters, laws, court decisions.

• Unpublished sources, such as personal letters, diaries, journals, wills, deeds, family histories, and many other sources.

• Interviews and recordings from people with firsthand knowledge of events.

• Visual documents and artifacts, such as photographs, films, paintings and other types of artwork. 

Journal articles are often classified as both primary and secondarysources.  The Method and Results sections of a paper may be considered primary information, while the Introduction, Discussion and Conclusion may be considered secondary information as the author is bringing in the work and ideas of others.

What are primary sources?

Primary sources are original resources created at the time historical events occurred,  or after events, in the form of memoirs and oral histories. Primary sources may include letters, manuscripts, diaries, journals, newspapers, speeches, interviews, government documents, photographs, audio recordings, moving pictures, video recordings, research data and objects or artifacts such as works of art. These sources serve as the raw material to interpret the past and when they are used along with previous interpretations by historians, they provide the resources necessary for historical research. ALA. "Using Primary Sources on the Web."

Examples:

• Diary of Anne Frank - Experiences of a Jewish family during WW II
• The Constitution of Canada - Canadian history
• A journal article reporting new research or findings
• Weavings and pottery - Native American history
• Plato's Republic - Women in Ancient Greece

What are secondary sources?

Secondary sources interpret and analyze primary sources. These sources are one or more steps removed from the event. Secondary sources may have pictures, quotes or graphics of primary sources in them.

Examples:

• Publications: textbooks, magazine articles, histories, criticisms, commentaries, encyclopedias
• A journal/magazine article which interprets or reviews previous findings
• A history textbook
• A book about the effects of WW I

A secondary source is a document that interprets or analyzes primary or other secondary sources.  It is second-hand information, i.e., one step removed from the event. 

Examples include:

• textbooks
• literature reviews
• journal articles (which are not primary reports of new research)
• newspaper & magazine articles which do not give first-hand accounts
• book reviews

Tertiary sources assimilate or gather information taken from primary and secondary sources.  
 
Examples include:

• encyclopedias (in print or online)
• fact books 
• almanacs
• biographical sources
• bibliographies
• directories