Firsthand and secondhand accounts
Firsthand and secondhand accounts represent two distinct types of narratives that contribute to our understanding of events and experiences. A firsthand account is generated by someone who directly witnessed or participated in an event, providing a personal and immediate perspective. These accounts, often classified as primary sources, can be found in various forms such as diaries, letters, interviews, and original artworks. They are invaluable for offering insight into historical events through the eyes of those who lived them.
In contrast, secondhand accounts are created by individuals who did not experience the events firsthand. These secondary sources rely on firsthand accounts or other documentation to analyze, interpret, or provide a broader context for the events described. Examples of secondhand accounts include textbooks, biographies, and scholarly articles. While they may present a more general overview or analysis, they can also carry biases that influence how the information is portrayed. Together, firsthand and secondhand accounts enrich our comprehension of history, allowing us to piece together a more complete narrative of past events.
Firsthand and secondhand accounts
A firsthand account is a written or verbal description created by someone who witnessed an event or experience personally. A secondhand account is a written or verbal description created by someone who was not present at the original event or experience. Firsthand and secondhand accounts provide different perspectives of the same event, and both are useful for maximizing understanding of the event or experience.
Overview
Firsthand accounts are written by a person who was an actor or eyewitness to an event or time period. In nonfiction texts, firsthand accounts are often included as part of primary source documents. They are meant to be true stories that give a personal point of view on what it was like to experience the event or time period.
Secondhand accounts are written by a person who was not part of the event being described. The author may rely on firsthand accounts when producing his or her text, but the author was not a party or eyewitness to the action. In nonfiction texts, secondhand accounts are part of secondary source documents. Secondhand accounts often supply an analysis of an event or offer a broader perspective.
When used together, firsthand and secondhand accounts help us learn more about the people, events, and ideas that occurred in the past.
Firsthand Accounts
Events and experiences are often best told by the people who lived through them. These accounts provide critical details that might otherwise be hidden from modern observers. Firsthand accounts can be found just about anywhere—in diaries, manuscripts, original laws, speeches, and even paintings and maps. What they have in common is that they were created by someone who lived through the time period or event in question.
Firsthand accounts can be found in primary sources. Primary sources are documents or other artifacts that were created during a certain period in history. For example, letters written by the original American colonists are examples of primary sources from the colonial period, as are maps that the colonists created to show the landscape around them.
Examples of primary sources include autobiographies, memoirs, diaries, interviews, speeches, letters, manuscripts, original works of art or literature, records of organizations and government agencies, laws, treaties, maps, research reports, emails, photographs, video recordings, and audio recordings. In other words, primary sources include any object or artifact that was created in and is reflective of a period in time. They tell the story of what happened. Primary sources are often rare, or “one of a kind.”
Firsthand accounts are important because they offer a look into what the past was really like. They give modern observers the opportunity to understand an event or time period through the eyes of one or more people who actually lived through it. These records are especially important for historians because they cannot use direct observation and experimentation to learn about past events. Historians cannot use typical scientific processes to make their arguments about past events. Instead, they must rely on the different kinds of records left behind.
Secondhand Accounts
Sometimes experiences are told second hand, or by individuals who were not directly involved in the events described. These secondhand accounts are generally written after an event has taken place—sometimes at a point far in the future.
Secondhand accounts are also known as secondary sources because they have been created after the event or time period in question. Secondhand sources often rely on primary sources and discuss text or images that appear in primary source documents. Textbooks and encyclopedias are examples of secondary sources that review events occurring at some time in the past.
Secondary sources often go beyond merely describing the events or people who lived during a specific time. They sometimes compare and contrast different firsthand accounts to draw conclusions about what happened during the time period. They may offer an opinion on a past event or primary source. This opinion is called bias and refers to the attitude or perspective the author takes toward the subject matter. The bias of secondhand authors can make a difference in their description of people or events and even in the information they choose to share with readers.
Some examples of secondary sources include biographies, textbooks, history books, encyclopedias, handbooks, movies or television programs that recreate original events, book reviews, and art that is produced after the event has occurred. Secondary sources might take the form of research papers or journal articles that examine evidence from primary sources to form a theory or draw a conclusion. The common link in these different types of writing is that they are removed from the actual person, place, event, idea, or time period in question.
Secondhand accounts also differ from firsthand accounts in other ways. Secondhand accounts sometimes take a broader view and share more general information than is available in a firsthand account.
Fiction
In fictional writing, firsthand accounts take the form of a first-person narrator or point of view. The story is told from the perspective of an individual person who sees and hears the events taking place. Secondhand accounts in fiction are written from the point of view of a third party to the action, or a narrator. The narrator may be limited or all-knowing.
Bibliography
George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum. “Teaching Primary and Secondary Sources.” Southern Methodist University. Web. 21 Oct. 2014. <http://www.georgewbushlibrary.smu.edu/Teachers/Classroom-Resources/~/media/28B922F0D31D4953A1B6E9F990789A8D.ashx>
Learn NC. “Reading Primary Sources: An Introduction for Students.” UNC School of Education. Web. 21 Oct. 2014. <http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/745>