What are Secondary Sources?
Secondary Sources:
- Often interpret or analyze primary sources
- Often analyze or interpret a topic or an event
- Are materials or documents created after the time of the event or topic in which you are interested
Examples of Secondary Sources
- Scholarly books
- Scholarly book reviews
- Scholarly articles or essays
- Biographies
- Documentaries
- Textbooks
- Many books and articles with "review," "history," "criticism," "interpretation," "analysis," or "commentary" in the title
How to Find Secondary Sources
- Try doing a Keyword Search as a starting point. A keyword search on civil war will give you a list of sources that mention civil and war, but may not be specific. Try adding more specific keywords: U.S. Civil War, Spanish Civil War, and others.
- Look at the resutls and find a book close to your topic. Open the catalog record to find the subject headings at the bottom of the page, which link to a list of other books on the same topic.