Unit 11　The Media

　　在新闻报道中，原始资料和二手资料区别很大，了解清楚这一点能帮助我们在日常生活中区分事实和观点。

　　Searching for the Truth

　　Collecting and writing news is like researching in history: the best information comes from those who were there at the time. So if we want to study the history of China in the sixth century AD, we look at the writings of the people who lived then. They are called the primary sources because they tell us what it was like to live then. People at a much later date who write about the same events are called secondary sources.

　　In a newspaper the position is different because these two roles are often combined. This means a reporter who investigates a story may be the same person who writes it. If this happens, the reporter is both the primary and the secondary source. But the photographer who works with him/her is still a primary source.It is important to separate primary and secondary sources because it can help us to decide what is true. A primary source is more likely to be true than a secondary one because he/she can give us facts (what happened) rather than opinions (what he/she thinks happened)．

　　1．primary adj. 首要的；主要的；初级的

　　2．combine vt. 结合

　　3．investigate vt. 调查；研究

　　4．separate vt. 区分