Engaging Undergraduates in Primary Source Research

Lijuan Xu

• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9781538138939
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Library & Information Science
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Despite the plethora of primary sources that libraries have made available to their communities, the published literature thus far is largely limited to the pedagogical significance of special collections and archives. To leverage the wealth of primary sources and to explore the full potential of primary sources in the undergraduate classroom, it is imperative that the conversation include faculty members as well as librarians outside special collections and archives. The ten case studies included in Engaging Undergraduates in Primary Source Research represent the exciting work of faculty members and their librarian partners from various areas of library operations. They offer examples, strategies, and innovative ways to incorporate a wide range of primary materials into undergraduates' diet of secondary source research, including both local archival and non-archival materials, as well as digital and physical materials and non-English language materials.

Co-authored by faculty and their librarian partners, these case studies focus on how students develop and practice skills related to finding and identifying primary information, analyzing and interrogating it, confronting interpretations, and constructing and presenting arguments using primary sources. The emphasis on transferrable skills, as well as the diversity of primary sources and teaching areas they represent, makes it easy for anyone interested to find examples from which they can draw guidance and inspiration to form partnerships and to (re)invigorate students' learning experiences involving primary sources. Furthermore, the collaborative process and the methods to engage students in primary source research that are highlighted in these stories are not unique to primary sources. They can be easily applied in other collaborative teaching efforts involving different types of information, to create skilled student researchers, adept information producers, and informed citizens.

Table of contents

• Series Editor’s Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Teaching Power and Storytelling through Zines Regina M. Duthely and Katherine L. Curtis
• 2 Using First-Person Accounts to Bring Colonialism Home Paul C. Campbell, Jennifer Fredette, and Miriam Intrator
• 3 Imagining the Sonic Past: Using Primary Sources to Understand Music Making in the Early Modern Period Abigail Flanigan, Bonnie Gordon, and Stephanie Gunst
• 4 Creating Lesson Plans on Local History Dunstan McNutt, Carolyn Runyon, and Susan Eckelmann Berghel
• 5 Developing an Open Primary Source Reader on Gender and Sexuality Mir Yarfitz, Kyle Denlinger, Kathy Shields, and Megan Mulder
• 6 The City as a Learning Lab: Using Historical Maps and Walking Seminars to Anchor Place-Based Research Anne E. Leonard and Jason A. Montgomery
• 7 Mapping Tombstone Iconography as Data Carrie Schwier, Theresa Quill, and Jon Kay
• 8 Materiality, Research, and Digital Interpretation: Annotating Daily Life in Medieval and Early Modern China Maglen Epstein, Sara Lynnore, Stephanie Montgomery, and Jillian Sparks
• 9 Tracing Environmental Legislative History in the United States Ana Ramirez Luhrs and Andrea Armstrong
• 10 Contextualizing Scientific Primary Research for Different Audiences Kristin Klucevsek and Melody Diehl Detar
• Epilogue Lijuan Xu
• About the Editor
• About the Contributors