Alan
E. Mann, AG
alan.familyhistory@gmail.com Accredited
Genealogist
BYU
2007 Computerized Genealogy conference www.alanmann.com/articles
Achieving Consistency in Citing Sources: Demonstration
Using PAF
This
presentation is a demonstration of one approach to enter source citations in a
genealogy database program. While the specifics of which screen or field to use
in data entry will be specific to PAF, the concepts will apply to any major program.My feeling there is a need for this demonstration
comes from my experience with teaching source documentation for the past ten
years in a variety of settings.
While
I attempt to explain the rationale behind why I use the method outlined in this
demonstration, most of the time will be spent talking about how rather than
why. I will point out common errors in trying to include scanned images in
sources in PAF and how to avoid those errors.
This isn’t a scholarly presentation of proper documentation. Rather, I
focus on meeting requirements of good documentation as easily as possible.
First,
please review the National Genealogical Society Standards at www.ngsgenealogy.org/comstandsound.htm.
The purpose of documentation (source citation) is to identify where the
information came from as completely as possible and to make it possible for
that source to be located.
Specifications
of how that information should be arranged and which elements come first and
exactly how it should be presented are important, but focusing on these issues
sometimes overwhelms the novice and leads to their failing to document at all.
My premise is to suggest one method (not THE method) for citing sources that
captures and preserves the essential information as easily as possible.
For
those wanting a full treatment of source documentation, read Elizabeth Shown
Mills’ book Evidence!,
which outlines sources should be cited for publication in accordance with
scholarly standards. Another source specifically for PAF is Family History
Documentation Guidelines 2nd Edition, 2002/3. A copy of this
publication can be ordered from www.svpafug.org/docguidelines.html
- list price: $12.50.
If
these seem too time consuming, let me suggest a basic format which will capture
the essentials for source citation.
Best
of all, when possible, include the source with the
citation. You can do this by using image.
However, you need to be careful. In most cases, you need to add the scanned
image to the citation detail, not to the source itself.
The Difference between
Source Record and Citation Detail
·
A source record in PAF has title, author,
publication information, comments, repository, call number, actual text and
image.
·
A source citation in PAF adds film number,
volume, page number, date, comments, actual text, and image.
·
Both source record and source citation have
fields for actual text and image. The difference is that the any comments,
actual text, or image placed in the source record will apply to anything cited
from that source. Image and actual text given in the source citation apply to
that citation only. For example, a source might be the 1860 census record of a
particular place. Several of your ancestors’ families are listed in that place.
The source might be the census record for that place, but a citation would be
the specific page and line that had that family. Thus, each family might cite
the same source, but each citation would list the page and line of the census
record on which that family appeared. The image of a particular page would only
be attached to the citation for the family that appeared on that page.
·
A source can be oral or written from a person,
a document, or other media. A source citation tells specifically where you got
the information used in entering the family history event or other data. A
source description and/or citation detail gives the information required to
identify the source as a distinct, traceable record.
·
Sources identify the events that validate the
existence of our ancestors and their
familial relationships. Some are connected to an event such as a birth,
christening, marriage, death, burial, or other event. Others remain “individual
sources” unassociated with a particular event.
·
The details from a source are the skeleton of
our family tree.
Grouping
Sources
You need to decide how to list your sources, have a method
for organizing them, and be consistent in how you use them. I find that most
“everyday” researchers are more comfortable grouping sources. What I mean by
this is that a source is an entire book or an entire run of years in a single
parish record, or an entire town or film in a census. For example, birth dates
given for two different individuals in the same book are different people and
different citations, but are the same source
title. If one cites page 12 of a filmed church record and another page 36
of the same filmed record, they are the same source, but with 2 different citation details. Using this method of
looking at a source maintains the purity of the source because a citation
detail distinguishes the two pages. Note that “grouped” is a departure from the
respected book Evidence! by Elizabeth Shown Mills,
which suggests that each source must be unique.
Some contend that two families on the same page of the same census
record should be two difference sources because the informant in each case was
different and therefore the source was different. I suggest this unnecessarily
lengthens and complicates the source titles database.
The
PAF documentation book cited above has a shortcoming--it explains three
different basic ways of organizing sources. It fails to recommend any method
because the Users Group members couldn’t agree on that point. My purpose is to
recommend a single, simple method. Here is my simplified method of citing
sources:
1. Consider a source as the film item, book,
manuscript, newspaper, cemetery, or person from which the data came. Let the
citation detail give the page or folio, section, entry number, method of
communication, or other NECESSARY details.
2. Enter your
source titles consistently for later finding ease. For example, stick with
either parish register or church record, don’t use parish register sometimes
and church record other times, this will result in duplicate entries for the
same record.
3. Generally,
enter record type sources by place and list the places and record types following
the pattern of the Family History Library Catalog (country, state, county, town - record type). Thus a census record would be listed as
4. Think through
the exceptions. For example, where would you put a family bible? It doesn’t really
fit well with a place. Would you list the place the family lived? What if they
moved several times? Would you list the place of publication of the Bible? That
hardly makes sense, the family may never have been there. The following are
exceptions I use from the standard place – record type format.
a.
Family Bibles. I list it by Family Bible: [surname of family].
Others use [surname]: Family Bible, but the result of this is that Family
Bibles are not listed together, but under the individual first letters of the
surnames.
b.
Information obtained by correspondence. The
source is not the correspondence, but the record/book/person containing the
information. For example, in a letter from a minister giving you the entry from
the church register, the source is not the letter nor even the minister, but
the church register. List the church register as the source, but list “obtained
by correspondence from Rev. so-and-so,
c.
Phone or email – just like correspondence, how
the information was relayed to you is not the source. The source is where the
information actually came from—a book, a certificate, a record, or the memory
of the person telling you.
d.
Personal recollection, Personal research,
Personal Memory, or Personal knowledge – the source is the person. List it as Personal Communication – Olivia Taylor,
then list the repository as her address, and list in the citation details how
you obtained the information—by letter, email, phone, in-person interview, etc.
When it comes to “personal research,” obtain what that person’s source was in
their research. If my cousin visited the parish in
e.
Write down the exceptions to place/record type
format you make. You may think you will remember, but most of us will forget.
Even if you have a perfect memory, write it down for the sake of other who may
use your database some day. It’s all part of good documentation…
5. The IGI is
NOT a source. It is a finding aid. The source is the record from which the IGI
came (the extracted film or book, the submission form, or the submitter). The
same applies to Pedigree Resource File, and to a lesser extent, Ancestral File.
What to Include
Many
of today’s genealogists complain about documentation practices in the 1950’s.
Too many of us have seen those long group sheets with lots of sources listed,
but nothing telling you which item of information came from which source. Even
the careful, well-trained researcher used what we today call inadequate
documentation.
I
suggest that the next generation will look back and point out our prevalent
shortcomings. In 2025, one will say, “They recorded where information came
from, but didn’t explain their reasoning or why they picked this date over the other.”
DOCUMENTATION IS MORE THAN JUST SOURCES.
It must also include explanations—even what isn’t there (e.g., The following
attempts to locate the birth certificate have failed, so I used the family
bible and the local church baptism record…). A research log is an essential part
of good documentation. Here’s a sample electronic research log you can
use.
Above
all, always enter your sources as you go. Never enter data without entering the source
at the same time.
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©Copyright 1999-2007 by
Alan E. Mann, AG. All rights reserved. Written permission to reproduce all or
part of this syllabus material in any format, including photocopying, data
retrieval, or the Internet, must be secured in advance from the copyright
holder.