GNU LGPL v3
Author's point of view.
- Questions:
- What was the author’s point of view? How does their job/status/role in society affect the source?
- Does the author’s point of view undermine the explicit purpose of the source?
- How can we tell, if at all, what other beliefs the author might hold?
- Significance for Analysis:
- Factors that may shape point of view include aspects of the creator’s identity (e.g., gender, religion, ethnicity, political affiliation, the author’s relation to the event (e.g., actor, bystander, critic), and the distance in time between the event and the document’s creation. Connect who the author is to what is being said in the document and how they are saying these things (tone).
- Sentence Starter: The reason why (Author) ... argues ... is because ...
Author's purpose.
- Questions:
- Why did the author create the source?
- Why was the document created at this time?
- Why has it survived to the present?
- How does its purpose affect its reliability or usefulness?
- Significance for Analysis:
- When an author creates a source -- whether it is a diary entry or a political treaty, he or she has a purpose in mind: to record the events of the day or to end a war. This purpose might involve convincing another person, controlling the actions of many people, or serving as a reminder to oneself.
- Sentence Starter: The reason the source was created was to ensure ...
Audience.
- Questions:
- Who was the source created for?
- How might the audience have affected the content of the source?
- How might the audience have affected the reliability of the source?
- Significance for Analysis:
- Every document is created with an audience in mind, even if that audience is oneself. When creating a document, authors make decisions based on what they want the audience to know and believe. In doing so, the author might leave certain information out, emphasize some points rather than others, or adopt a specific tone or point of view. Understanding who the audience was presumed to be, and what impact the author wished to have on the audience needs to be identified and explained where this is seen in the document.
- Sentence Starter: The source was intended for (specific group/person) ... and therefore highlights/emphasizes/minimizes ... in order to ...
Historical context.
- Questions:
- When and where was the source produced?
- What contemporaneous events might affect the author’s viewpoint and/or message?
- How does the context affect the source?
- Significance of Analysis:
- Identifying this time and place helps us understand purpose, but in order to understand the context, we need to go beyond simple identification. When a historian talks about context, he or she is referring to specific historical processes and events that can explain both the author’s reasons for writing the document and the ways in which contemporaries understood the document.
- Sentence Starter: The (time/era) helps to explain why (speaker A/ source A) believed/argued (main idea) because ...