Source analysis: written, visual and statistical sources in German and French
This domain tests a procedural skill: you must analyse German- and French-language sources - texts, caricatures and posters, statistics - using a method, and integrate the analysis into a historical argument rather than merely describing content.
Core rules and concepts
- Method, applied every time: (1) Analyse the source - type, author, date, addressee, occasion, transmission; (2) describe content and structure; (3) explain intention and language; (4) evaluate reliability and limits; (5) place in context and draw a conclusion (Quellenwert).
- Written sources: decrees, laws, speeches, affiches and tracts, soldiers' letters, newspaper articles. Watch for rhetorical signals: French « la patrie en danger », « l'impôt du sang », nous/on shifts; German Volksgemeinschaft, Erbfeind, Volksgenosse, euphemisms such as Sonderbehandlung or Evakuierung.
- Visual sources: caption, date, publisher, symbols, caricature techniques (exaggeration, allegory, antithesis, perspective). A poster's commissioning body matters more than its aesthetic quality.
- Statistical sources: identify the variable, the base year, whether the figures are absolute, indexed or percentages; check the aggregate or classification that produced the table. Election statistics, industrial output and casualty figures need source criticism too.
Worked example
A table gives NSDAP Reichstag vote shares: 1928 = 2.6%, 1930 = 18.3%, July 1932 = 37.3%, November 1932 = 33.1%, March 1933 = 43.9% (the latter under open terror). Reasoning: (1) Describe: growth, then a dip in late 1932. (2) Explain: Depression and unemployment radicalised voters; the dip reflects party fatigue and the KPD's stability. (3) Evaluate: the March 1933 figure is not comparable because of repression and the Reichstag Fire Decree. (4) Conclusion: the data show mass support for a party, not a majority for the dictatorship - a distinction candidates routinely blur.
Traps that cost marks
- Paraphrasing the source instead of interpreting intention and function.
- Omitting provenance, then mistaking retrospection for evidence.
- Jumping to moral judgement before establishing what the source says.
- Mixing statistical non-comparables (absolute versus percentage, base years, terror-affected elections).