In a message dated 8/11/2008 3:33:08 PM Pacific Daylight Time, thomas.dalton@gmail.com writes:
That's a bad idea, generally, though. It's just better to actually find a copy of "so and so" and then cite that directly. Especially when you have no idea who the person claiming that "so and so" includes the information is, which is the case with Wikipedia.>>
---------------------------- I agree that a good researcher, biographer, historian, will seek to go to the most primary version that can. However for example, I have access to hundreds of newspapers, the actual images of the actual columns from the time they appeared. Most people do not.
Now let's say I state "Henry Fonda still maintained relationship with his ex-wife Margaret Sullavan as they were seen eating lunch together months after the divorce" and I cite my source as the "Fresno Examiner", 4 Apr 1934.
Now someone could come along to my page, think that's interesting and cut and paste it directly into Wikipedia, obviously citing the newspaper but forgetting the courtesy of citing my work as the secondary citation. They did not actually read the newspaper, they are leaching off my work to present some interesting trivia to the world without even an acknowledgement.
I try not to do that with my own sources, where I can't actually get a copy of the underlying source, and I wish others would make an effort to learn secondary citation. Aside from that it's sometimes rather important to know that a bit of data has been selected and filtered through an intermediary, sometimes that knowledge alone colors the reading.
Will Johnson
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