HIST 1201

AUSTRALIAN HISTORY: CURRENT ISSUES IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

SEMESTER 1 2013
PRIMARY SOURCE ANALYSIS GUIDE

DUE 5PM THURSDAY 28 MARCH

through the Assignment submission box in the Student Centre (Building 8) and via turnitin
750 WORDS (20%)
In this piece of assessment you are required to critically analyse a primary source. The ability to
interrogate to investigate, to pull apart, to unpick a piece of evidence from the past is vital skill in
history (as it is in many other disciplines), and this is what we are testing you on in this task.
There are 2 primary sources for you to choose from (you will find them in the back of the Course
Reader and on Blackboard). Students must choose one source to write about. The first thing students
should do when approaching this piece of assessment is to read the document carefully and
thoroughly. As you do so, ask yourself: what is this document all about? What seems important about
it? What does it tell me about the time and place it has come from? And do I believe it? The second
thing students should do is consult secondary sources to try to get a feel for the context in which the
document was written. It is expected that students will consult at least 3 secondary sources to
provide you with enough context to complete this task. You will find a list of possible references for
each source over the page (and on Blackboard), but you are welcome and encouraged to look for
others.
Once you have done all this, you will be ready to analyse your primary source. You must address the
following questions. Please note that you may choose to give more weight to some than to others
if you think it is appropriate:
1. What does this source say or show?
2. Who created this source, in what circumstances, and for what purpose?
3. How might the circumstances of the sources creation affect what it says and what it does not
say?
4. Should we regard this source as trustworthy? Why or why not?
5. What kinds of corroborative evidence should an historian use to establish this sources
reliability or lack of reliability?
We are not looking for separate sections, with each of these questions as headings; rather, we are
looking for a clear and coherent essay about the primary source that manages to address these
questions as it goes. The best essays will make an argument about the source they are analysing in
other words, they will have something to say about the document that brings everything together, and
they will be able to present evidence to support that argument. Your work will be assessed on the
basis of your understanding and analysis of the document, understanding and analysis of its context,
clarity of expression, and references and bibliography.
Please note that no extensions will be granted without a documentable reason so, without proof of a
medical or other reason. Paid work is not a valid reason for an extension. Details on how to apply for
an extension can be found in the Course Guide.

GENERAL ADVICE
Here are my dos and donts when it comes to this piece of assessment.
DO:

Start early: One of the biggest reasons students struggle with assessment and end up with
lower marks is because they leave things to the last minute. Not only does this mean you
dont have enough time to really think carefully about what you are doing, but it also means
you have no time to overcome any problems you may encounter books may be checked out,
you might not understand an aspect of the question, or your computer may decide to die. If
you start early, these are problems that can be overcome; if you dont, they will become
serious impediments to your successful completion of the task.
Read carefully: All the information you need to complete this task can be found in the
Course Guide (avail on Blackboard). There are sections on Assessment tasks, Assessment
criteria, and the Primary Source Analysis itself. Make sure you read these before you do
anything else. They were written to help you, to give you as much information as we
possibly can.
Ask questions: If anything is unclear, or you are struggling to understand something, dont
be afraid to contact me. I may not reply immediately I have a lot of students but I will
reply and offer you as much advice and help as I can.
Plan your work: Most of you will (hopefully) know the importance of essay planning from
high school. If anything, planning is even more important now than ever before. Sitting down
at a computer and just writing what comes into your head is an inefficient and usually
ineffective way to write anything (and it also makes for frustrating reading as a marker, and
frustrating your marker is not something I would advise you to do!). Your work will make
much more sense and you will be able to do it much more quickly if you plan out what
you are going to write before you start writing. The easiest way to do this is to divide the
essay up into paragraphs, and under each paragraph note what it is about (you should be able
to do this in one sentence) and what evidence you are doing to use to explain this (from the
document or from your secondary sources). Once you have done this, the actual writing will
be much easier all you have to do is follow the plan.

DONT:
Ignore advice: The information and advice we give you is our way of explaining to you how
we are going to mark your work. Ignore this at your peril!
Reference incorrectly: The ability to properly reference so, to explain to the reader where
your information and ideas has come from is a vital historical skill. There is a very clear and
comprehensive guide to referencing at the back of the Course Reader. Please make use of it.
Email me with an extension request the day before (or the day after) a piece of
assessment is due without an actual, documentable reason: I will not give extensions
without actual documentable reasons less than three days before a piece of assessment is due,
mostly for reasons of equity it is not fair to the other students who manage to get work in on
time. Console yourselves with the fact that, statistically, students with extensions spend no
more time on a piece of work than those without them; all they do is procrastinate for longer.

Document 1:
Lang, George Dunmore, Letter to Andrew Lang, 31 March 1858, in The Oxford Book of
Australian Letters, eds Brenda Niall and John Thompson (Melbourne: Oxford University Press,
1998), 69-71.

The following references might be useful when analysing this document:

Attwood, Bain and SG Foster (eds), Frontier conflict: the Australian experience (Canberra: National
Museum of Australia, 2003).
Broome, Richard, Aboriginal Australians: a history since 1788 (Crows Nest: Allen & Unwin, 2010).
Clarke, Patricia, Turning fact into fiction: the 1857 Hornet Bank Massacre, Margin, no 65, April
2005: 8-17.
Elder, Bruce, Blood on the wattle: massacres and maltreatment of Aboriginal Australians since 1788
(Frenchs Forest: New Holland, 2003).
Journeys through Queensland history: landscape, place and society: proceedings of the Professional
Historians Association (Queensland) conference, 3-4 September 2009 (St Lucia: Professional
Historians Association Queensland Inc, 2009).
Manne, Robert (ed), Whitewash: on Keith Windschuttles fabrication of Aboriginal history
(Melbourne: Black Inc, 2003).
Moses, A Dirk (ed), Genocide and settler society: frontier violence and stolen Indigenous children
(New York: Berghahn Books, 2004).
Reid, Gordon, A nest of hornets: the massacre of the Fraser family at Hornet Bank station, central
Queensland, 1857, and related events (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1982).
Reynolds, Henry, Frontier: Aborigines, settlers and land (St Leonards: Allen & Unwin, 1996).
Reynolds, Henry, The other side of the frontier: Aboriginal resistance to the European invasion of
Australia (Ringwood: Penguin, 1995).
Russell, Lynette (ed), Colonial frontiers: Indigenous-European encounters in settler societies
(Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001).
White, Michael, Aboriginal and early settler relations on the Logan and Albert Rivers: early settlers
view, Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland, 15, no 10 (Feb 1995): 468-83.

Document 2:
Menzies, Robert, Australia is at war, in Modern Australia in documents, Volume 2, 1939-1970,
ed FK Crowley (Melbourne: Wren, 1973), 1-2.

The following references might be useful when analysing this document:

Beaumont, Joan (ed), Australias war, 1939-45 (St Leonards: Allen & Unwin, 1996).
Brett, Judith, Robert Menzies forgotten people (Carlton: Melbourne University Press, 2007).
Cain, Frank (ed), Menzies in war and peace (St Leonards: Allen & Unwin, 1997).
Darian-Smith, Kate, On the home front: Melbourne in wartime, 1939-1945 (South Melbourne: Oxford
University Press, 1990).
Horner, DM High command: Australias struggle for an independent war strategy, 1939-1945 (St
Leonards: Allen & Unwin, 1992).
Johnson, Susan and Lindsay Nation, Australia 1939 (Kensington: University of New South Wales
Press, 1989).
Keenan, Michael, Menzies: the wartime prime ministership, 1939-41, in Liberalism and the
Australian Federation, ed JR Nethercote (Annandale: Federation Press, 2001).
Menzies, Robert Gordon, Dark and hurrying days: Menzies 1941 diary, eds AW Martin and Patsy
Hardy (Canberra: National Library of Australia, 1993).