When conducting research, historians often look to primary and secondary sources to better understand past events. Secondary sources provide necessary historical context; they alert readers to major social and political trends, as well as identify key ideological terms. However, original historical scholarship comes from reading, analyzing, and interpreting primary sources. Primary sources provide insight into an individual actor’s movements and motivations, which historians can then interpret for big-picture conclusions.
This week, you are expected to complete a written assignment designed to better prepare you for historical thinking and classroom discussion. They are designed to introduce and assess the field and practice of history.
Please review the Haymarket Affair in our course textbook, American Yawp (Capital and Labor, IV), our Lecture Video (Microsoft Teams Sub-Channel), and the American Experience, “The Anarchists and the Haymarket Square Incident” (Week 3 Lesson Folder). In a 250-word (minimum) paragraph, please paraphrase the historical event from these secondary sources. Use your own words and include proper MLA in-text citations (Author, Section) (Benter, Lecture Minute) after each sentence of found information. (10 points)
Please choose ONE source provided by the Library of Congress’ Topics in Chronicling America: Haymarket Affair. We will now work on Historical Thinking Skills (Sourcing, Contextualizing, Close Reading, Corroborating). Practice these skills by answering the following questions in complete sentences:
Who created the source and who is its intended audience? (2 pts)
What is the historical context of the source? What happened directly before and/or prompted its creation? (2 pts)
What is the main topic, theme, or issue addressed? (3 pts)
Does the author wish to inform or persuade others? How have you arrived at this conclusion? (3 pts)
Please access the American YAWP Primary Source Reader and access the “Capital and Labor” Chapter. After brief review of each document, choose THREE authors and write a brief paragraph (150 words for each author) as to how they would (most likely) respond to the Haymarket Square Incident, given their socioeconomic status, race, and gender. (30 pts Total)
Author One:
Author Two:
Author Three:
source material: 1.https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/chicago-anarchists-and-haymarket-square-incident/
2.https://guides.loc.gov/chronicling-america-haymarket-affair/selected-articles
