How do you evaluate a historical source's origin, purpose and content for IB History?

Evaluate origin, purpose and content by explaining what a source helps you find out, and what it cannot show. Your judgement must fit the historical question. Saying 'it is biased' or 'it is a primary source' is not enough: explain how that affects its usefulness for your enquiry.

Take this question: How did Chinese Communist Party leaders publicly present their relationship with the United States after Nixon's 1972 visit? A relevant primary source is the party congress press communiqué, or official public statement, dated 29 August 1973. It calls for opposition to the 'hegemonism of the two superpowers-the U.S. and the U.S.S.R.' Here, 'hegemonism' refers to domination by powerful states.

Origin: This is an official party statement issued after the opening to Washington. It shows the position the leadership approved for public release at that moment, making it valuable for this enquiry. It does not establish the views of all Chinese citizens, or reveal the full discussion among leaders before the statement was agreed.

Purpose: The document celebrates the congress, promotes unity and directs political action. Its aim of rallying support helps explain why warnings about foreign powers appear alongside accounts of party achievements. It shows how leaders wanted people to understand the diplomatic situation. It is less useful for finding out what leaders privately agreed to give up in negotiations: a public statement has little reason to reveal that.

Content: Naming both superpowers shows that rapprochement, or improving relations, with Washington had not removed anti-imperialist language from the party's public position. But the excerpt gives no detailed account of US-China negotiations. It therefore cannot show that the opening had failed or that relations with Washington and Moscow were identical.

A further source can test that last inference. The Shanghai Communiqué of February 1972 records both continuing disagreements and planned exchanges. Comparing them allows a stronger conclusion: diplomatic cooperation and public ideological criticism could coexist. Private meeting records would then help explain how leaders managed that tension.

In your own answer, build each evaluation as source feature → value or limitation → link to your enquiry. The same feature can produce both a value and a limitation. An official statement is strong evidence of an approved public message, but tells you little about private opinion. A source written at the time is useful for studying what people then expected. Its lack of hindsight matters only if your question requires knowledge of later outcomes.

Put this approach into practice with the 1973 party communiqué in the Sino-American relations source questions. Can you connect each value or limitation to something specific about the source and what a historian wants to find out?