Analysis

QuickLesson 28: Record Analysis: Critical Appraisal of a Family Bible Record

Every record used for historical research must be critically analyzed, without bias or emotion. Every physical detail of a document or source needs to be appraised. Each and every assertion drawn from the content of that source must be tested against other evidence—internal and external—to determine whether that specific assertion is reliable. Critical analysis is a time-honored standard for historical research.

Document Analysis Exercise: Parish Register

What's the difference between analysis of a record and source identification?

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Disciplined research

“Help!” said the email. "I’m stuck on this one line of research. I’m not a newbie. I’ve done research for years. I spend hours every day online, doing research. I’d appreciate a suggestion from an expert." O.K. This is it ...

QuickTest: A Colonial Trial Docket

The image below shows a page from a county-level docket book. Who can tell us what plea was entered and what action was taken in this court term?(No Dear Readers with a law or paralegal degree, it's not fair for you to answer.) ...

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52 Corporals

Yesterday’s QuickTest presented, for analysis, one page of a record—a military roster providing data on “Corporal Young Lemmas of Company B, 1st Arkansas Regiment, C.S.A." Suzanne Matson earns the prize for the first person to spot the targeted problem. No, a military company would not have 52 corporals. And “Corporal Lemmas” was not a corporal at all.

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QuickTest: Analyzing a Military Roll

For some years, academics have used genealogy sites for source materials. That is good. It is not good, however, when they accept material at face value, without a critical examination of what they are using.

Today’s “test” is a case in point.

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QuickLesson 8: What Constitutes Proof?

Proof is not a document. It’s a body of evidence. As biographers or historians of whatever ilk, we do not ‘prove’ a point by discovering a record that asserts something. That assertion could be wrong. If so, any further work we do on the basis of that misinformation will likely be wrong or irrelevant.