Tertiary sources synthesize existing information on a topic, drawing from primary and secondary sources and summarizing key information in an easy to read format, with the goal of synthesizing large amounts of information. They are often excellent starting points for research projects because they provide key facts, events and issues in an accessible format. Tertiary sources are also known as background or reference sources.

⇒ Example tertiary source - Canada and the Cold War 

⇒ Academic Tertiary Sources on Canada and the Cold War:

• Oxford Companion to Canadian History
• Canadian Encyclopedia
• Encyclopedia of the Cold War: A Political, Social, and Military History

⇒ Find Tertiary Sources:

• on the Background Sources tab of this research guide
• by searching in LibrarySearch and filtering by Resource Type: Reference Entries
• with very simple search queries - two to three words maximum, e.g., Igor Gouzenko, or Avro Arrow

In the discipline of History, secondary sources interpret and analyze primary sources, and are removed in time from the events they discuss. They can be scholarly or non-scholarly/popular.
 

⇒ Types of Scholarly Secondary Sources

Scholarly monographs: Book length scholarly works that discuss a single topic in depth, present original research, and are written by a single author (or occasionally co-authors). Monographs are great for offering both breadth and depth on a particular topic. 

Edited collections: Book length scholarly works that are organized by an editor(s), where each chapter is an essay written by a different person presenting their own research, and where the chapters offer different perspectives on a common academic theme. 

Scholarly journal articles: A shorter scholarly work (~10-30 pages) published in a single issue of a scholarly journal (which is published on an on-going basis). Journal articles tend to focus on a very narrow aspect of a larger topic.

⇒ Signs of Scholarliness

What are the signs of scholarliness you can look for when assessing an information source? List the ones you know in this Jamboard.
 

⇒ Find Scholarly Sources in MRU LibrarySearch 

Try limiting searches by:

• using the sidebar options (e.g. limit results to only relevant subjects, or to preferred resource type, e.g., books)
• using the advanced search to search for important terms in the subject or title fields on the drop-down menus.
• refining results to only peer-reviewed sources (searches only within scholarly journals)
• to find edited collections, try adding the term editor to your search
• Sign in for enhanced results, to save "pinned" favourites lists and search queries.

Video: Recognising and finding scholarly sources 10:00 min

Skip straight to using MRU LibrarySearch: 3:33

Still looking for information or overwhelmed by LibrarySearch results? Use one of history-specific journal article databases on the ARTICLES tab of this guide. Recommended databases:

• America History and Life (for American AND Canadian topics)​
• Historical Abstracts (for non-North American topics)

How to use America History & Life (2:07 min) 
All advice in this video also applies to using Historical Abstracts

Historical Primary Sources: Documents or other artefacts created at the time in history under study, generally by a person or group that witnessed, participated in or contributed to the events of the day in some way. 

Primary sources take many forms, and the most appropriate or helpful type of primary source will depend on your topic. Some types of primary sources that are broadly helpful in undergraduate History courses, and relatively easy to find, include:

Government reports and other official documents: Royal Commission ... to investigate the facts relating to and the circumstances surrounding the communication, by public officials and other persons in positions of trust, of secret and confidential information to agents of a foreign power. (June, 1946)

Parliamentary debates or "hansard": House of Commons Debates, 32nd Parliament, 1st Session : Vol. 8 "Release of Gouzenko Papers" (March 24, 1981)

Newspaper articles: Mounties definition of subversion dangerous unacceptable (Globe and Mail, 1981)

⇒ Find Primary Sources

• On the Primary Sources for Canadian History tab of this guide (look for the Historical Newspapers and Government & Legal Sources sections)
• On Google - add the terms primary sources or primary documents to your search query
• In LibrarySearch - add sources to your search query, or search for a specific source type e.g., speeches, correspondence, diaries, royal commission

Primary Sources for History

Video Chapters
1:42 - General tips for finding primary sources
4:03 - Finding primary sources in MRU LibrarySearch
5:29 - Finding primary sources via Google
6:55 - Finding primary sources via MRU History Guide, including historical newspapers

Visit the Primary Sources tab of this guide for more advice and access to MRU's digital primary source collections. 

Call number: The address for a physical library item, so you can find it on the shelf. In MRU's LibrarySearch, it is displayed below the title of the book. You can follow the locate icon for a map to the book on its shelf.

Most assignments in History require you to document or cite your sources using Chicago Style. 

MRU Chicago Style Citation Resources: includes a guide for using Chicago style, examples, and instructions for how to insert footnotes into a document. 

As a faculty member at MRU, I have periodic evaluations of my instruction. I would appreciate it if you would take a few minutes to complete the following evaluation, which I will use to improve my teaching.

Login using your MRU username and password.

https://evaluate.mtroyal.ca/blue

Select today’s class from the list on your personalized Blue Dashboard by clicking on the Select link to the far right of the course name. Please complete evaluation and Submit.