Geography and Genealogy: Locating Personal Pasts

by Timothy,Dallen J.

• ISBN13: 9780754670124
• ISBN10: 0754670120
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-03-28
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Dallen Timothy and Jeanne Kay Guelke have thrown open the door to the once derided study of genealogy in geographical investigations. While others have explored personal pasts, the authors of this edited volume offer a nuanced and critical view of how we can gain new insight into past geographies through genealogical records. They examine a host of technologies that offer new means to track people, families, and groups through time and space. Additionally, they offer an penetrating examination of genealogy as a cultural practice with a geography of its own. Craig E. Colten, Louisiana State University, USA Genealogy has become a hugely popular pursuit, as millions of North Americans and Europeans research their family history, trace their forebears, attend family reunions and travel to ancestors'' home sites. This book provides the first ever book to address the geographical and scholarly aspects of this increasingly popular social phenomenon. It is divided into two main sections. The first highlights tools and information sources used by geographers and their applications to family history research. The second section examines family history as a socio-cultural practice, including the activities of tourism, archival research and DNA testing. Genealogy has become a popular pursuit, as millions of Europeans, North Americans and others of European, Asian and African descent research their family history, trace their forebears, attend family reunions and travel to ancestral home sites. It has consequently become ''big business'' and a significant cultural phenomenon. Yet only very recently scholars, including geographers, have begun to examine genealogy and family history as a cultural practice with spatial, economic and political implications. Geographers have much to contribute to the serious study of the family history phenomenon. Land records, maps and even GIS are increasingly used by genealogical investigators. As a cultural practice, it encompasses peoples'' emotional attachments to ancestral places and is widely manifest on the ground as personal heritage travel. Family history research also has significant potential to challenge accepted geographical views of migration, ethnicity, socio-economic class and place-based identities. This book is divided into two main sections. The first highlights tools and information sources used by geographers and their applications to family history research. The second section examines family history as a socio-cultural practice, including the activities of tourism, archival research, and DNA testing. This unique book is the first ever to address the geographical and more general scholarly aspects of this increasingly popular social phenomenon. Contents: Locating personal pasts: an introduction, Jeanne Kay Guelke and Dallen J. Timothy; Part I Tools, Source, and Implications for Geography and Family History: The unfolding tale of using maps in genealogical research, Melinda Kashuba; Genealogy, historical geography, and GIS: parcel mapping, information synergies, and collaborative opportunities, Mary B. Ruvane and G. Rebecca Dobbs; A genealogy of environmental impact assessment, William Hunter; Knitting the Transatlantic bond: one woman''s letters to America, 1860-1910, Penny L. Richards; Remaking time and space: the internet, digital archives and genealogy, Kevin Meethan. Part II Genealogy as a Cultural Practice: Genealogical mobility: tourism and the search for a personal past, Dallen J. Timothy; Genealogy as religious ritual: the doctrine and practice of family history in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Samuel M. Otterstrom; Genetics, genealogy and geography, David C. Mountain and Jeanne Kay Guelke; Conclusion: personal perspectives, Dallen J. Timothy and Jeanne Kay Guelke; Index. About the Author: Dr Dallen J. Timothy is a Professor in the Department of Geography at Brigham Young University Utah, USA. Jeanne Kay Guelke is Professor Emerita in the Department of Geography, Un

Table of Contents

Locating personal pasts: an introduction

Tools, Sources, and Implications for Geography and Family History

The unfolding tale of using maps in genealogical research

Genealogy, historical geography, and GIS: parcel mapping, information synergies, and collaborative opportunities

A genealogy of environmental impact assessment

Knitting the Transatlantic bond: one woman's letters to America, 1860-1910

Remaking time and space: the internet, digital archives and genealogy

Genealogy as a Cultural Practice

Genealogical mobility: tourism and the search for a personal past

Genealogy as religious ritual: the doctrine and practice of family history in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Genetics, genealogy and geography

Conclusion: personal perspectives

Index

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