SOURCE INTERPRETATION KEY CONCEPTS

HISTORY

Cause and effect - causation

This concept looks at change, focusing on the action(s) or condition(s) that resulted in the event as well as the outcome(s) that result from an event.

What could cause and effect be?

Long or short term, often looking at political, social, cultural, economic or environmental influences or outcomes.

Past and present

Consider links between what happened or what was happening prior to the event and what is happening now.

Consider how people have viewed events differently over time.

Continuity and change

Uninterrupted succession or flow, similarities in views over time or place, patterns and trends, endurance of an idea or institution.

VS

An alteration, progress, decline, short lived or long term, level or time of impact.

Specific and generalised

Looking at the depth and breadth of details, personal or wider social accounts, conclusions or reviews.

Perspectives

Consider age, gender, socio-economic, ethnicity, values, belief, attitudes, historical context.

What do you need to do for the perspectives concept?

Demonstrate an understanding of how people or society understand an issue or event.

Provide reasons for the differences in group viewpoints and analyse actions.

Influence and significance

This concept includes: change, revealing, importance, quantity, profundity, durability, relevance, varies.

Contingency

This concept is intertwined with the concept of change and change over time, focusing on the argument that history is never preordained or inevitable.

Reliability and usefulness

As a historian it is important to consider how valuable or useful a source is, alongside how trustworthy, accurate or correct a source is.

What do you need to check for reliability and usefulness?

Who produced the source, when it was produced and why it was produced.

Bias or propaganda

This is the inclination, prejudice or predisposition of a certain viewpoint, idea, group, culture or religion. It can be presented as a set of messages aimed at influencing certain groups to support certain ideas.

Intent and motivation

The reasons or influences between a certain idea or action and the particular idea or action influenced by certain reasons or influences. This is an example of the what and the why.