Sources
Sources Analysis Answer Guide
Don’t forget: Quote often and begin your response with name of the author, not the Source number. Put the source number in brackets at the end of the quote/paraphrasing.
For example:
This is supported by Jones who states that 'History students would be more popular at parties if they used this method.' (Source 3)
More successful responses:
contain relevant evidence (quotes and observations) from sources when required.
Less successful responses
provide responses without reference to any evidence from the source
state that sources are limited without explaining why using evidence
do not assess the nature of sources clearly
do not explain how the nature and origin of the sources are a strength or limitation
do not include the source in the response.
1. Sources: The Great leap forward
Source 1. My House has two doors. Han Suyin. 1980
The harvest has been bad. We have had many natural calamities, a bad drought in the north. There were shortages. Wanchun produced his ration tickets for the toast he ate. And then I noticed that he was thinner because his collar was too large when he turned his head. 'I have enough because I am an intellectual' he said. Rations differed according to work done. Steel workers got the most in bulk and grain. But intellectuals got more meat, sugar and fats. 'Brain work needs meat and fats' he said……Enough to live on. Not enough to keep them warm and active in unheated houses and offices that bitter winter.
Questions
Use evidence from the source to describe the impact of food shortages during the GLF. (2)
Source 2.
Grain and steel production in China from 1952 to 1967.
Questions
What does Source 1 reveal about agricultural and industrial production in 1957 and 1958 in China? (2)
Source 3. Each village set up production units. Fanshen. Hinton. W. 1966
Each production team sent a group out to make iron. Each group took its own grain and own set of cooking pots and its own system of supply. Each found a suitable camping spot and immediately built a big mud stove. At first members slept on the ground in the open. Although each unit set up its kitchen, each kitchen made hot food available to all who came along. ….No one kept any records. The commune committee guaranteed grain supplies. At first each village set up a complete production unit. As soon as the iron poured out, they notified the Commune to come and check the results. The goal was to get two tons but they never got more than 1.5 tonnes. The iron was too low in quality to be used directly and had to be sent to the steel mill to be reworked .
Questions
According to Source 3, what problems were associated with iron production at the Commune level? (2)
Source 4. Modern China. The Great Leap Forward. Moise 2013
In 1959 the Great Leap began to become a disaster. People were no longer capable of the fantastic exertions of 1958. The shortage of agricultural labour was so acute that the total acreage planted in food crops was significantly below the level of 1957. Most important, the weather was disastrous. The 1959 harvest amounted to only about 170 million tons. Hunger became wide spread, and some people began starve; others went on the road as beggars.
Questions
How does the information in Source 2 support the information in Source 4? (4)
Source 5. The Great leap Forward Burchett. W Burchett 1984
Wilfred Burchett in a 1976 article on the Great Leap made the following startling observation:
'...the master strategic mainspring was the Great Leap Forward. This probably comes as a surprise, because in the outside world there was a general impression that it was one of Mao 's failures - a viewpoint which was discreetly encouraged by leaks to journalists from official Chinese sources, not to mention those by diplomatic contacts in Peking (Beijing] who had obvious axes to grind. According to our own on-the-spot observations at the time and follow-up investigations ever since, the Great Leap Forward was an epoch-making success, the fun dimensions of which are only dimly being realized in the outside world... Virtually all major irrigation and road-building projects, al! key economic developments... had their genesis in this imaginative movement. Mao, in keeping with his style, said nothing publicly to rebut his critics, preferring to let history record the final verdict.
Questions
To what extent do the views expressed in Source 4 differ from those expressed in Source 5? (4)
Source 6. Backyard furnaces 1959. CCP
The Chinese Communist Party published a series of photographs, as shown in Source 6 to promote the success of the Great leap forward.
Questions
Assess the uses and limits of this source for an historian investigating the Great Leap Forward. (4)
With reference to all of the sources, evaluate the proposition that the Great Leap Forward was a disaster for China. (5)
1. The Nanjing Massacre
The Nanking Massacre, occurred from December 1937 to January 1938 during the Second Sino-Japanese War. After capturing Nanking (Nanjing), the capital of China, Japanese troops unleashed a six-week reign of terror. They killed an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 Chinese civilians and disarmed soldiers, often in brutal ways, including mass executions and bayoneting. Rampant looting, arson, and the rape of tens of thousands of women and girls accompanied the slaughter. Despite international outrage and eyewitness accounts from foreigners in the city’s safety zone, Japan denied or downplayed the atrocities, which remain a source of historical contention today.
text https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00094633.2017.1425039
https://divinity-adhoc.library.yale.edu/Nanking/Images/NMP0340.pdf
Source 2.
text
Questions
Source 3.
text
Questions
Source 4.
text
Questions
Source 5.
text
Questions
Source 6.
text
Questions