Primary Sources: Home

DEFINITION: A Primary Source is a document or physical object which was written or created during the time under study. These sources were present during an experience or time period and offer an inside view of a particular event. 
Examples of primary sources are:

• Diaries, journals, speeches, interviews, letters, memos, manuscripts and other papers in which individuals describe events in which they were participants or observers;
• Memoirs and autobiographies;
• Records of organizations and agencies of government;
• Published materials written at the time of the event;
• Photographs, audio recordings, moving pictures, video recordings documenting what happened;
• Artifacts of all kinds; and
• Research reports in the sciences and social sciences.