As stated in “Interpreting Your Source,” analyzing a historical source begins with understanding the contexts of its creation and preservation. Why was this source created? By whom? Why did someone decide to preserve this for the future? Answering such questions is critical for evaluating what information the source provides.
Once you have chosen a source you want to work with, for this assignment, you will write a short paragraph (200-250 words) that responds to the following: what do we need to know about your source in order to properly interpret it?
Neither for this essay nor for any part of the States of Belonging project are you expected to do any outside research. You should complete all of your work using only the information in your source and its introduction.
Questions you should consider:
What event(s) does your source describe?
Who created the source? Whose perspective does this source provide? Whose perspective does it not provide?
For what audience was the source created? Why? How did audience and purpose likely shape the content of the source?
When and where was your source created? How proximal was the source to the events described? How might this distance (in time or space) affect the way the events are described in the source?
What is the genre of the source (image, book, report, diary, etc)? Why was this the genre used? What purpose does it imply? How does this shape the way the past is presented in the source?
Why (likely) was this document preserved? Whose perspectives on the event described were less likely to be preserved? What, therefore, can your source not tell us about this moment in history?
What other kinds of sources would help us understand these events better?
Sample Essays
“Venceremos Bridgades” contains a handful of testimonies from American citizens who volunteered to aid the process of rebuilding Cuba along socialist principles in the wake of the Cuban Revolution of 1959. Frustratingly, the source does not cite when, where, why, or by whom these testimonies were recorded. Presumably they were created in the US after the events described, but it is difficult to assess how factors such as memory, audience, and purpose may have influenced the stories. We must also consider exactly whose perspective this source provides. The source states that the photographs included were taken by the volunteers themselves; in other words, this is Cuba through their eyes. These volunteers were part of a privileged strata of American society – white college students – and therefore the source cannot inform us what, for instance, African American youth or Latin American youth may have thought about Revolutionary Cuba. It would be fascinating to compare these stories with other sources reflecting those perspectives in order to more fully understand the revolution’s international influence. Further, this source does not allow us to understand what Cuban peasants thought about these American college students. Overall, “Venceremos Brigades” is a valuable source and with additional material could be a part of a important history on the international appeal of the Cuban Revolution.
“Constitution of a Military Dictatorship” includes excerpts from the Brazilian constitution of 1967, which was created to provide legal sanction for the abuses of the military dictatorship that assumed power in a coup in 1964 and retained control of the national government until 1985. It should be remembered that as a constitution this was a highly public document meant to be widely available to lawmakers and citizens, and therefore it presents the dictatorship in their best light. Also, as a constitution the document provided abstract, legal justification for policies. The source thus cannot explain why military leaders undertook any particular action, for it was simply too distant from the conversations in which decisions were made. The source does not state how this constitution was drafted, which would be important to know to properly assess its place in Brazilian history. Who, for example, wrote the constitution and what were their intentions? What legal precedents from prior or foreign constitutions did the drafters draw upon? Was it created behind closed doors or in some public fashion? Did it have public approval? While we can assume the constitution was created to provide legal cover for the dictatorship, it is also not clear whether it worked or mattered. Additional sources – such as legal rulings or trial records – would be needed to understand how the court system handled the document.
