"A secondary source is the testimony of anyone who is not an eyewitness — that is, of one who was not present at the events of which he tells." [Gottschalk, Understanding History, 53] Thus even a newspaper article, published the next day, may be a secondary source if not written by a witness to the event; still, in quoting witnesses, it may get as close to the event as is possible.
Secondary sources in History may also refer to articles and books authored by historians, whether for a popular or scholarly audience. Distinguishing between scholarly and popular is relatively easy: count the references. An article in an academic journal reporting historical research will include lots of references; the same historian writing about the same topic in a popular history magazine will include far fewer references - often just a few suggestions for further reading.
Note regarding the image: this red, white and blue map created by NASA combines satellite data to contrast temperature anomalies from two periods in time.
Scholarly Journals
Hispanic American Historical Review
Journal of American History
Western Historical QuarterlyPopular Magazines
American Heritage
American History
Wild WestCBC History Discovery Service searches hundreds of thousands of books, journals, magazines and newspapers from our EBSCOhost, JSTOR, ACLS and other subscription databases (you only have access as a CBC user). Search it using the History OneSearch box (above) or try an advanced search.
Completely (full text) searched by EBSCO Discovery Service:
Academic Search Complete - more than 6,000 full-text periodicals, including 5,000+ peer-reviewed scholarly journals. History journals include History, the History of the Family, and Rethinking History: the Journal of Theory & Practice.
eBook Collection - tens of thousands of ebooks on various topics related to history.
History Reference Center (EBSCO)- numerous secondary sources - reference, magazine and journal articles, biographies, some newspaper articles. While most coverage is duplicated by Academic Search Complete this does include full text from highly cited journals such as Women's History Review that would not otherwise be available.
Mostly (records for all items) searched by EBSCO Discovery Service:
ACLS Humanities Ebooks - thousands of scholarly ebooks covering world history topics.
Gale Academic OneFile - full text peer-reviewed history journals include the Oregon Historical Quarterly.
JSTOR - Thousands of scholarly ebooks and 175 journals in the archival collection Arts & Sciences I, some with issues back to the 1800s. May be a primary source if you are studying the era when the issue was published, otherwise a secondary source.
Western Historical Quarterly, 4/2001-Present, "official journal of the Western History Association, presents original scholarly articles dealing with the North American West."
Partially (records for some items) searched by EBSCO Discovery Service:
ProQuest - more than 2,000 full-text periodicals, with nearly 1,000 scholarly journals. Includes the Journal of Economic History, The Historical Journal, the Journal of Global History and other highly cited history journals from Cambridge University Press.
Not searched
Issues & Controversies in History - hundreds of pro/con articles (secondary) accompanied by primary sources.
Gale Virtual Reference titles:
Oxford Reference Online:
Google Scholar - Search tool for scholarly literature including 'articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions.' Articles posted on free/open websites will have pdf links on the far right; use settings to add the Library Links to Columbia Basin College so you'll see full text links for our databases.
Open Access Journals:
World History Connected - peer reviewed journal of history teaching. https://worldhistoryconnected.press.uillinois.edu/
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