Research Guides: College Writing: Official Guide: Explore Primary Sources

Explore Primary Sources

What do I want to learn more about?

First, determine what you want to know from working with a primary source.

For example: I'm interested in examining how feminism is portrayed in popular culture.

Consider various types of primary sources

Think about different performances, movies, interviews or other things you've seen, listened to, or experienced.

For example: Beyonce's VMA performance; Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Ted Talk; Contemporary Women Artists

Use secondary sources to find primary sources

Brainstorm articles or books you have read recently that analyze primary source materials.

For example: This Ms. Magazine list describes "feminist moments" in pop culture in 2016: http://msmagazine.com/blog/2016/12/27/feminist-moments-popular-culture-year-review

Locating Source Material

What other primary source types could you consult?

The information primary sources contain is original and has not been rewritten or reinterpreted by someone else.

Original documents: records, files, reports, maps, first-hand accounts of events, interviews, letters, personal journals, diaries, videos/sound recordings, original research including scientific data, opinion polls, government documents, social media posts

Creative works: memoirs, photos, films, poetry, drama, novels, art work, gardens, code, advertisements, GIFs

Relics, artifacts: jewelry, pottery, furniture, clothing, tools, architecture/buildings

Secondary Sources

Often produced sometime after an event has occurred, interpret, analyze, and comment on primary sources.

Books
Interpretive articles from journals, magazines, newspapers
Reviews

A source can be primary or secondary depending on how it is being used. Often newspapers are considered secondary sources as journalists report, analyze, and interpret events and the experience of others. Newspapers can also be used as primary sources. If you are researching how American attitudes on welfare spending have changed during the past twenty years, newspaper editorials can serve as primary sources of public opinion.

Librarians and your instructor can help you identify primary and secondary sources for your projects.

Polling the Nations (1986 - )
500,000+ questions and responses, from 14,000+ surveys, conducted from 1986 through the present in the United States and more than 100 other countries around the world.

Pew Research Center
"Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world. [Pew] conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, content analysis and other data-driven social science research."

CQ Researcher (1991 - )
44 reports per year. Explores a single "hot" issue in the news in depth each week, featuring comments from experts, lawmakers and citizens on all sides of every issue.
Statistical Abstract of the United States (ProQuest)
Statistical Abstract of the United States is a one-volume, comprehensive summary of statistics on the social, political, and economic organization of the United States. Learn more about this database

Statesman's Yearbook Online
Reliable, concise information on any country in the world. Learn more about this database
Statista
Provides users with an innovative and intuitive tool for researching quantitative data, statistics and related information. Integrates data on over 80.000 topics from over 18.000 sources onto a single professional platform. Categorized into 21 market sectors, Statista.com provides companies, business customers, research institutions, and the academic community with direct access to quantitative data on media, business, finance, politics, and a wide variety of other areas of interest or markets.

America in Protest: Records of Anti-Vietnam War Organizations, The Vietnam Veterans Against the War (Archives Unbound)
FBI reports dealing with antiwar work carried out by the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), and their surveillance of antiwar student groups and Communist organizations. Contains over 20,000 pages between 1967-1975.
American Film Scripts Online
Over 1000 (mostly unpublished) scripts. Also includes detailed and fielded information on the scenes, characters and people related to the scripts, and facsimile images for more than 500 of these screenplays. Gift of Mary Wickes in honor of her parents Isabella & Frank Wickenhauser.
American West
Documents drawn from the Everett D. Graff Collection of Western Americana at the Newberry Library, Chicago. Includes contemporary newspapers and posters, records of key railroad companies, papers of early pioneers, explorers and hunters, manuscript travel journals, store catalogues, maps, illustrations, and literary and historical works.
ARTstor
Collection of nearly 2 million images, documenting artistic traditions across many times and cultures. Embraces architecture, painting, sculpture, photography, decorative arts, and design as well as many other forms of visual culture.
Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 (Archives Unbound)
Essential documents covering enactment and implementation of Clean Air Act Amendments and other environmental issues, comprised of various staff and office files from George H. W. Bush presidency (1989-1993).

Learn more about this database
Empire Online
Over 70,000 images of original documents relating to Empire Studies. The images are sourced from libraries and archives around the world, including a strong core of document images from the British Library.
Everyday Life and Women in America, c.1800-1920
Sources are drawn from the Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and Culture, Duke University and the New York Public Library. Contains monographs, pamphlets, periodicals and broadsides addressing political, social and gender issues, religion, race, education, employment, marriage, sexuality, home and family life, health, and pastimes.
First World War: Personal Experiences & The First World War: Propaganda and Recruitment
“The First World War: Personal Experiences,” drawn from archival collections around the world, provides an intimate glimpse into daily life in the army and auxiliary services, battles, trench warfare, weapons and equipment, and thoughts on the enemy, as seen through the eyes of the men and women who served in the First World War. Rather than official publications or newspaper accounts, this collection includes diaries, letters, scrapbooks, sketches, and photographs. Key features include interactive maps, 360° views of personal items and objects, and a virtual trench experience.
Popular Culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975 (Parts I and II)
Manuscripts and typescripts, newspapers, magazines, press kits, artist’s files, photographs, advertisements, memorabilia, and more from prominent library collections in the U.S. and UK. Key features include original video footage on key events and topics, and a multi-faceted chronology of the period with embedded articles and images.
PsycTHERAPY
Contains over 300 videos featuring therapy demonstrations showing clinicians working with individuals, couples, and families.
RAND Voices of Jihad Database
A compilation of speeches, interviews, statements, and publications of jihadist leaders, foot soldiers, and sympathizers. Nearly all content is in English translation, and has been collected from publicly-accessible websites. Original links are provided, along with excerpts and full-text content when available.
Rock's Backpages
Covers five decades of history. Contains 17,000 articles, interviews, and reviews from a variety of popular music press, from fanzines to titles such as Spin, Rolling Stone, and British New Musical Express. Also includes a discussion forum, audio interviews, writer profiles, and links to radio stations and rock-related websites.
Romanticism: Life, Literature and Landscape
Drawn from materials in the Wordsworth Trust, Dove Cottage, Grasmere, UK. Includes Wordsworth’s original verse manuscripts, working notebooks and some printed, annotated, editions, and materials from other Romantic writers and painters.
Sabin Americana
Works about the Americas published throughout the world from 1500 to the early 1900's. Included are books, pamphlets, serials and other documents that provide original accounts of exploration, trade, colonialism, slavery and abolition, the western movement, Native Americans, military actions and much more. Over 6 million pages from 29,000 works. Learn more about this database
Victorian Popular Culture
Comprised of four separate sections: Spiritualism, Sensation and Magic, Circuses, Sideshows and Freaks, Music Hall, Theatre and Popular Entertainment, and Moving Pictures, Optical Entertainments and the Advent of Cinema.
Vogue Archive
Complete, full-text contents of Vogue magazine (US edition) in full color page image, from the first issue in 1892 to the present, with monthly updates for new issues. Learn more about this database

Special Collections at WU

Documenting Ferguson
Digital repository that includes media-generated, original content that was captured and created following the killing of 18-year-old, Michael Brown by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9, 2014.
Film & Media Archive
Manuscripts
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum
Modern Graphic History Library
Rare Books
University Archives
WU Digital Gateway

College Writing: Official Guide

Engaging with Primary Sources with SOAPS

Explore Primary Sources

What do I want to learn more about?

First, determine what you want to know from working with a primary source.

For example: I'm interested in examining how feminism is portrayed in popular culture.

For example: Beyonce's VMA performance; Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Ted Talk; Contemporary Women Artists

Use secondary sources to find primary sources

Brainstorm articles or books you have read recently that analyze primary source materials.

For example: This Ms. Magazine list describes "feminist moments" in pop culture in 2016: http://msmagazine.com/blog/2016/12/27/feminist-moments-popular-culture-year-review

Locating Source Material

What other primary source types could you consult?

The information primary sources contain is original and has not been rewritten or reinterpreted by someone else.

Original documents: records, files, reports, maps, first-hand accounts of events, interviews, letters, personal journals, diaries, videos/sound recordings, original research including scientific data, opinion polls, government documents, social media posts

Creative works: memoirs, photos, films, poetry, drama, novels, art work, gardens, code, advertisements, GIFs

Relics, artifacts: jewelry, pottery, furniture, clothing, tools, architecture/buildings

Secondary Sources

Often produced sometime after an event has occurred, interpret, analyze, and comment on primary sources.

Books

Interpretive articles from journals, magazines, newspapers

Reviews

Librarians and your instructor can help you identify primary and secondary sources for your projects.