ia_2011_c_gadd

=Evaluation of Sources (250-400 words) Tips]=

Source 1 – The Nazi Economic Recovery 1932-1938 In terms of origin this source is valuable, the book was written by Richard J. Overy, who is a very well known historian. He has taught History at universities like Cambridge and Exeter for many years, and even has five historical awards including the Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (1997) and Samuel Elliot Morrison Prize of the Society for Military History (2001)[1]. Him being a well known historian makes this reliable because it shows that he isn’t just writing blind. Overy has a lot of historical experience from his days studying and teaching the subject, and this helps with the reliability of the information he produces. The purpose of this book is also reliable; it is simple and easy to understand and was writing for people who want to study just the Nazi economic recovery. With the book being only 67 pages long there isn’t any space for wittering or just random, unnecessary information, it is all just facts and useful information that allows you to easily grasp the concept of the economic recovery.

However, the origin also has its limitations; There are many different historians that have different opinions on the Nazi economic recovery, and the outbreak of World War Two, each having their own views on it. An example of rivalry over the Nazi economic recovery is between Overy himself and Timothy Mason. Mason argued that a "flight into war" had been forced onto Hitler because of the structure of the German economy, and the mess it was in [2]. Overy disagreed with this, saying that the economic problems in Nazi Germany cannot explain the aggression that was shown toward Poland. He argues that the outbreak of the war was because of Nazi choice, not because it was forced upon them. Another limitation it that the book itself wasn’t published until 1982,for the first edition, and 1996 for the second [3]. With so many years between the economic recovery and then the book being published, there are bound to be some part missing; background knowledge, reasons, important facts, meaning that we don’t have the full story and are unable to know exactly how reliable this information is.

Source 2 - A memo by Hitler about the Four-Year Plan In terms of Purpose this source is valuable because it was written by Hitler himself. It was said that Hitler has a "phobia" of writing things down, [4] so the importance of this memo is pretty huge, If there was nothing important or valuable to say, then Hitler would not have takent he time and effort to write it down, he would have simply ignored it and let it pass by. This source is also valuable to my research because it allows me to get a small idea of what was going through Hitler's mind at the time of the economic crisis, and to what extent he was going to go to save the Nazi economy However, Origin is again a reason for the source to be limited, because the memo has been translated from German to English, which could mean that there is some information that wasn't translated. The source also doesn't have a lot of information on the four-year plan, although it is his feelings and thoughts about it, there isn't a lot of actual information on what it is and what it planned to achieve.

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[1] []

[2] [] [3] The Nazi Economic Recovery 1932-1938

[4] Overy, Richard "Misjudging Hitler" pp. 93–115 from //The Origins of the Second World War Reconsidered// edited by Gordon Martel Routledge: London, United Kingdom, 1999 p. 98.