8RM Documents

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what is a document?
any written text such as letters, diaries and reports
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what are personal documents?
documents that the writer has written for personal reasons containing their feelings and personal information e.g. letters, diaries, emails
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what are public documents?
documents which are produced by the government and other organisations like charities and businesses for the public e.g. reports, articles
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what are historical documents?
any documents from the past
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what are the strengths of personal documents?
cheap to access, no time spent collecting research, detailed, provides information on difficult topics, likely to be genuine, no hawthorne effect, ethical if given permission
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what are the weaknesses of personal documents?
unrepresentitive, may be incomplete, can be interpreted differently, may be exaggerated or biased, could be faked, time consuming to read, hard to access, may have to pay to access, unethical if consent isnt given
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what are the strengths of public documents?
can be found on the internet, no money spent on research, representitive, can be compared, detailed, ethical as they are for the public
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what are the weaknesses of public documents?
can be manipulated or biased, may be interpreted differently, can be hard to access, may not be available on all topics, time consuming to read
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what are the strengths of historical documents?
gives insight into the past, can be used to compare over time, cheap and quick, may be the only information available from the time, ethical
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what are the weaknesses of historical documents?
time consuming to read, hard to access because of 30 year rule, unrepresentitive if written by one person, may be fake or exaggerated, may be damaged or incomplete, can be interpreted differently, may be difficult to understand
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what are the 14 examples of documents?
diaries, letters, pictures, photos, parish records, academic articles, records of institutions, internet, novels, literature, government reports, magazines, newspapers, life histories
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what are the 2 examples of diaries and letters?
Ann Frank's diaries, Thomas and Zaniecki 'the polish peasant in europe in america"
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what is an example of pictures and photos?
aries use of paintings to research childhood in the past
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what is an example of parish records?
lasletts use of parish records to research what the family was like in preindustrial times
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what is an example of academic articles?
articles written by the british journal of sociology
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what is an example of records of institutions?
Rosenhans use of psychiatric hospitals
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what is an example of the internet?
government website
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what is an example of novels and literature?
Jenna Miscgaviages autobiography
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what is an example of government reports?
the scarman report
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what is an example of magazines and newspapers?
mcrobbie used magazines to see how womens representation in the media has changed
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what is an example of life histories?
Barker used life histories in making of a moonie
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what was Jenna Miscaviage Hill's biography?
autobiography of the niece of the leader of the church of scientology, not representitive, may have been exaggerated for sales, written in modern english and easy to understand
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what was Thomas and Zaniecki's study?
a study of the intergration of polish immigrants in america using letters of polish immigrants who had moved to america. may have been faked as cash was offered for them, likely to be truthful, large sample of 700 letters, written in polish
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what was the hitler diaries scandal?
60 journals were discovered by stern magazine, two weeks later they were found to be fake written by a forger known for faking nazi memorabillia. it was later found there were many mistakes and lack of internal checks
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what was the leveson report?
a judicial report investigating the culture, ethics and practice of the british press finding that the press and politicians had been too close and reccommended an independent body to regulate the press and a code of standards for the press
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what is the macpherson report?
a report investigating racism within the police after the death of stephen lawrence finding that the police were institutionally racist and made 70 reccomendations to change the attitudes of the police and other public organisations
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what are the two types of media research?
content analysis and semiology
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what is content analysis?
counting up how many times certain images, themes or words appear to see how they are portrayed by the media
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what are the strengths of content analysis?
cheap, easy to access the resources, creates quantitative data
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what are the weaknesses of content analysis?
doesnt explain why the media portrays things in certain ways, may be interpreted differently. time consuming
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what is an example of content analysis?
ferguson counted how many times women were presented as subordinate and sex objects in women's magazines
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what is semiology?
studying how a topic or group is presented in the media
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what are the strengths of semiology?
high in validity
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what are the weaknesses of semiology?
time consuming, unrepresentitive, background information is needed about the group or topic before
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what is an example of semiology?
cohen studied how mods and rockers were represented as deviant in the media
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what is scotts criteria?
criteria used to find whether the document is useful in research
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what are the 4 parts of scotts criteria?
authenticity, credibility, representitiveness, meaning
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what is authenticity?
whether the document is genuine and complete
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what is credibility?
whether the document is believable/accurrate or exaggerated/distorted
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what is representitiveness?
whether the document represents the whole group being studied
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what is meaning?
whether the document is easy to understand or hard to read
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Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

what are personal documents?

Back

documents that the writer has written for personal reasons containing their feelings and personal information e.g. letters, diaries, emails

Card 3

Front

what are public documents?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

what are historical documents?

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

what are the strengths of personal documents?

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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