ARCH 230 Architecture & Cultural History I: Evaluating Sources

When you have a research assignment , note what types of articles are required evidence for your thesis or question. Some professors require you to use only scholarly peer-reviewed journals while others might allow professional or trade journals and newspapers.

Scholarly article - Peer-reviewed or scholarly articles are written by an expert or scholar in the field and reviewed by peers who are experts in the same subject.

Professional/trade article - Trade or professional journals have articles written by experts in the field or by staff writers. The articles are reviewed by the editor. The articlesusually do not include reference lists.

Popular journals - Popular journals or magazines are written for a general audience rather than for professionals or scholars. Examples include the New Yorker, National Geographic, and the Rolling Stone.

Questions to Ask when Evaluating Articles

Primary sources enable the historical researcher to get as close as possible to what actually happened during an historical event or time period. A primary source reflects the individual viewpoint of a participant or observer. Here are some examples of primary sources:

• Items that describe events where the author is a participant or observer, such as diaries, letters, memos, journals, speeches, and interviews. Example: Diary of Charles Rumley from St. Louis to Portland, 1862
• Photographs, audio and video recordings, and other electronic records that record an event. Example: Oregon Politics Radio Disc Collection [sound recording], 1938-1958
• Records collected by government agencies such as birth and death records, marriage records, voting tallies, land deeds, and census data. Example: 15th census, population, 1930. Oregon
• Records created by organizations or agencies, such as reports, minutes of meetings, and bylaws. Example: The dawn of British trade to the East Indies as recorded in the Court Minutes of the East India Company, 1599-1603
• Memoirs and autobiographies. Example: Autobiography of Samuel L. Campbell, 1824-1902 : frontiersman and Oregon pioneer : together with his summary of the Whitman Massacre.
• Material published at the time of an event, such as books, newspapers and magazine and journal articles. These are distinguished from secondary sources because they are contemporary. Example: Jones, W. F. D. "An Oregonian Poet Hermit." Overland Monthly and Out West Magazine, V. 25, issue 148, April 1895, pp. 75-378.
• Data collected by researchers, such as field notes, results of experiments, and measurements. Example: Climatological data. Oregon.

Image credit: Electoral Vote Tally for the 1860 Presidential Election, 1861 (page 1 of 3) by The U.S. National Archives, via Flickr

This video demonstrates how you can use the C.R.A.P. test (Currency, Reliability, Authority, and Purpose/Point of View) to evaluate articles.

This video shows you different ways to check whether an article is peer-reviewed. 

Bias is a preference for one thing over another. Research and data are inherently biased due to preferences for certain perspectives. While researchers try to decrease bias in their work it is impossible to eliminate bias completely. Explicit and implicit (unconscious) bias can be found in data sampling, collection methods, analysis and how the data is shared. Bias is present on a systemic level in what gets researched, published, and cited.

As you are researching your topic ask yourself, what perspectives are being favored? What perspectives are missing? Why? How can you add missing perspectives to your paper?”

From: University of Minnesota "Bias in Research and Scholarship"