Sample Essay Question: What are the sources and methodology of history?

History is fragmentary by nature. It focuses on aspects or parts of an event and not the
whole event. No matter the efforts of an historian, it is impossible for him to capture
everything about his choice of study. Availability of evidence, its reliability and
consistency, available time and the objectives of the study shape his selection and
utilisation of sources and evidence.
The problem of sources is a serious challenge to the historian in the task of
reconstructing the past. The quality of the study is determined but the manner in
which sources are collected and used. The historian has no direct access to the past
since the events have already happened. What is left are the traces of the past which
may be in the form of primary and secondary sources. While Jenkins argues that there
is no real difference between primary and secondary sources as nothing is deeper,
genuine or original, Marwick says the distinction is explicit: primary sources are
created within the period of study and secondary sources are produced later. It is
necessary to fully exhaust all relevant secondary materials to be fully abreast of
current knowledge and areas needing the investigation before doing substantial
research in primary sources.
With reference to primary sources, Marwick draws a distinction between
public and private sources, and documents of record and discursive sources. He places
primacy on documents are vehemently rejects Jordonava’s criticism of the cult of the
archive and Carr’s fetishism of documents. The range of raw materials that historians
have at their disposal is immense and each have their own uses and difficulties. Tosh
lists both literary and non-literary sources: written word in the form of narratives,
memoirs, official papers, newspapers, literature, memos, minutes of meetings, official
correspondence, archival collection, diaries, church records, and, spoken word in the
form of oral traditions, shape of landscape, material artefacts which may
archaeological or from other disciplines and fine arts.
The principles governing the direction of original research can be reduced to
two. In the first, source oriented approach, the historian takes one group of sources
that fall within his general area of interest and extracts what he considers is of value,
thereby allowing the content of the source to determine the nature of the enquiry. The
second, problem oriented approach is the opposite. A specific historical question is
formulated by reading secondary authorities and the relevant primary sources are then
studied and conclusions are presented.
 The introduction of a critical approach to the sources into mainstream history
writing was Ranke’s important achievement. He won acceptance for the idea that the
evaluation of sources must be done. The first step in evaluating a document is to test
its authenticity. This is known as external criticism. It deals with issues of the author,
place and date of writing being what they purport to be. This is important in the light
of historical forgeries. The consistency of the document must be tested against known
facts. A command of palaeography and philology would help in detection.
The second stage which is more demanding is internal criticism, which is
interpretation of the document’s content. For example, if it is translation from a
foreign language, linguistic fluency and command of the historical context is required.
It is important to avoid anachronism – with respect to language and reading modern
meaning, morals into the past. The reliability of the document to use it as historical
evidence requires knowledge of the context and insight into human nature.
The tranquillity or attentiveness of the author, the first-hand or immediacy of
authorship, translations involved determine whether it can be used for historical
reconstruction. Intentions, prejudices, culture bound expectations and stereotypes are
factors which could have influenced the author. However, even the most tainted
sources can be used and bias itself, once identified, can be historically significant. The
historian should not give any source special weightage merely because of its
accessibility. Each source possesses strengths and weakness, and must be considered
together as well as compared against each other.
The next important step methodology is historical writing. The tension that
lies in the heart of all historical enquiry is between the desire to recreate the past and
the urge to interpret it. There are three basic techniques of writing: descriptive,
narrative and analytical. The reconstruction of the past which mainly involves
ascertaining facts and reporting them fully and concretely in literary form is
description. The narrative style like story-telling, creates suspense and arouses
emotions while conveying what it felt like to observe and participate in the past event
to achieve the effect of recreation. The treatment of multiple, many-layered causes
and consequences which is geared to problem solving and handling explanatory issues
is characteristic of analytical writing.
While writing it is important to maintain form and orderliness as the mind
demands a minimum of regularity and symmetry. Emphasis should be distributed
correctly between more important ideas and less important one in order to establish
logical sequence between ideas. The writer must be fully aware of the significance of
the information and make it clear to the readers. There should be continuous reflection
and revision to minimise gaps and inconsistencies.
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