Handout 3:
Document Analysis

Choose a document that accompanies one of the artifacts. Analyze the document by answering the following questions.

What is the document about?
What is the topic of the text?
What are the document's main points?
What evidence supports the ideas expressed in the text?

Who is the author?
What authority does the author have to write about this topic? What in the author's background or position might affect his or her pooint of view?
Can you detect a bias in the author's approach? Give an example.
Does the document reflect the author's values? How?

What is the occasion?
When and where was the document wiritten?
What is the medium or form of the document? (newspaper, speech, etc.)
What events or conditions might have affected the writing of the document?

Who is the audience?
Who was the intended audience?
How might the audience have reacted to the content of the text?
How whould this audience have interpreted the text?
Was there an audience beyond the intended group? How would they have reacted to and interpreted the text?

What is the purpose?
Why was it written?
Was there an implicit purpose or hidden agenda?
Who would benefit or be harmed by the document?