What is a primary source? A secondary source? How can I tell?
People who have direct contact with events, data collection, or experiences are primary sources. People who have spoken with or read the documentation of primary sources are secondary sources.
These terms refer to how removed you are from the real event, object, or place.
The term “authoritative” refers to things “originating with” or “authored by” the person.
In order to glorify God, the goal is to get as connected to God’s reality as possible, so we can minimize the falsifying effects of the sin-damaged human nature.
That’s what we’re practicing when we write assignments. That’s why we use authoritative sources.
Primary Sources
When you give your Christian testimony, the goal is to act as a primary source for the experience of encountering a good God who graciously reaches into time and space. You are a direct witness of how God uses His Word to save from sin and transform a believing person into a new creation.
However, you can’t be a primary source for the life of Christ, the creation of the universe, miracles other people claim to have seen, or anything going on in the world today that you haven’t witnessed directly in person.
A primary source is the account of someone who was actually there in the time and place you’re writing about. 1 John explains this:
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—
1 John 1:1-2
Secondary Sources
A secondary source provides context to primary sources. A secondary source might:
- compile multiple accounts and compare them
- look at multiple studies (collections of data) to determine how well-studied a topic is
- summarize related primary sources in order to create a wider view of an issue.
Luke shows us how a secondary source should function. He is also a primary source for many of the events he records.
Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught.
Luke 1:1-4
The No-Go Zones
Tertiary Sources
Tertiary sources merely review secondary material, often filling space with opinion, agenda or popular viewpoint. These sources do not interact with primary source material on the topic. They form their arguments, comparisons, or experiences based on secondary information.
Wikipedia is a tertiary source, when it doesn’t need fixing due to inaccuracy, bias, or other violations. Higher-quality encyclopedias pay experts to generate a blend of secondary and tertiary source material (an expert opinion).
An expert opinion (tertiary source) is the lowest standard of information in academia.
These can be cited when the goal is to survey expert opinions and sample informed people’s perceptions of reality. To do so, you would need a minimum sample size, which is a bigger project than finding citations.
Editorializing (Opinion)
Social media posts, when not entirely invented, are almost always opinion or agenda. This is not authoritative material, unless the goal is to survey opinions and agendas.
Opinions express “why” ideas. Agendas use “why” opinions to manipulate others’ emotions, beliefs and behaviours. Opinions and agendas substitute human experience for what God has revealed about life and the world.
God is the authoritative author of the world’s why’s, including those that influence our emotions, beliefs and behaviour.
Why Does This Matter?
Your job as a student writer is to use your undergrad time to practice generating, at minimum, a blend of secondary and tertiary source material.
By the end of your undergrad years, you should aim to generate primary source material by documenting your life experiences and comparing them to other primary sources, collecting and comparing data or interviews, and witnessing and recording events.
Tertiary material depends on “so-and-so said the records are good.” Unverifiable information says, “my pastor said this about the recent events overseas.” These make no contribution to our understanding of God’s reality.
Secondary material checks the quality of those records and measurements, edifying others.
Primary material contributes something to the human body of knowledge. It reflects reality, where God’s good plan can be seen taking place. Recording and measuring reality glorifies Him.
Original conclusions are not the same as throwing around opinions. You should think for yourself. Good conclusions maintain a strong connection to verifiable reality. They innovate ways of thinking or working with a subject.
Your God-given personality is incredibly important to this innovation process. Good conclusions are good. This is learning to live and to follow Christ, no matter your topic.
Scripture explains the ultimate purpose and value of these information practices: Human fellowship, love and joy.
[T]hat which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.
1 John 1:3
All of us who meet God are faced with the discomfort of climbing out of our personal viewpoints and connecting with God’s world.
Examples of Source Types
- The authors of the Bible are primary sources. Pastors, professors, sermons and commentaries are secondary or tertiary, depending on what they’re reflecting on. Pulpit storytelling is myth and fiction; unless a story can be verified, it does not rise to the level of even tertiary material.
- Movies, interviews with their writers, their producers and directors, and the books or other scripts they’re based on are primary sources. Actor interviews may or may not be, depending on whether they’re talking about their experience of the story and how it was directed. Sometimes their interviews are mostly promotional. Again, unless a story can be verified, it fails to qualify as primary or secondary material.
- Interviews that directly quote the person being interviewed are primary sources. Interviews that also have the perceptions of the interviewer mixed in are not, unless the interviewer is the topic you’re researching. This includes almost all modern “journalism,” including mainstream, independent, and “citizen journalism.”
- Data such as survey responses and the written assessment of the person(s) who did the survey is a primary source.
- Research papers which collect up the data of many different surveys on the same subject (these are often called “review of the literature” or just “reviews”) are a secondary source. They’re important for understanding how solid or faulty different methods are, as well as evaluating the quality of the ideas the researchers bring to their studies.
- If you collect up linguistic data from concordances and interlinears to help understand the meaning of a biblical text, that’s primary research. You are the researcher! Well done.
- If you survey other people’s collections of linguistic data, you are using primary sources and acting as a secondary source. But if you survey several pastors’ hermeneutical interpretations, you are probably reading their summary of the sources they’ve found. You need to dig into pastors’ sources and check the provenance of pastors’ ideas.
- Many, if not most, evangelical authors, write as tertiary sources. They retell information and add in their opinions, substituting social influence for genuinely authoritative conclusions. Be wary of pop nonfiction.
- North American Christian nonfiction is strongly contaminated by the self-help marketplace. It’s essential to trust your common sense when you come across an opinion or agenda that can’t be supported by authoritative sources.
- One blatant example is Emmerson Eggerich’s Love and Respect book. Although based on a massive survey, the study design surveyed for an unscriptural binary choice between going without love or going without respect. Beyond that, there are multiple competing definitions of love and of respect in our culture.
Self-Evaluation:
Can you identify the difference between a primary source and a secondary source?
Can you identify the difference between an authoritative (primary or secondary) source and a non-authoritative one?
Words: 926 plus appendix | Time to read: 7 minutes | Time to write: Unknown, as this became three articles developing at once.