"To Ignorance and Beyond!!!"

[Nighthawk]

Mmmmm. Tastes like chicken!

Now I'm dreading my boy getting his teeth.

Yeah, my daughter is 14...

[Geoff Withnell]

I got quite the chuckle out of this. If read a certain way, it appears to be a generalisation.



My mother was always proud to introduce me to her friends as "My son the doctor." She would beam happily from her wheelchair and add, sotto voce, "...but he's not the kind of doctor who does anybody any good."

All generalizations are wrong, including this one.

Geoff Withnell

[Tobus]

I'm slightly staggered that Ms Autumn is unaware of the origins of her name.

Most Americans aren't. The "melting pot" mentality has pretty much ruined the significance of our names and family heritage.

[macwilkin]

Most Americans aren't. The "melting pot" mentality has pretty much ruined the significance of our names and family heritage.

I would say our modern society & all its distractions have done that. Many immigrant groups were able to find a middle ground between the old & new worlds. If you want "proof", just visit The Hill in St. Louis. :-)

There is a wonderful book entitled Bowling Alone which discussed how our communities as a whole have suffered in this instant gratification society. I recommend it, but it will make you regret how much modern American society has deteriorated.

T.

[dux]

[delete]

[Bugbear]

Most Americans aren't. The "melting pot" mentality has pretty much ruined the significance of our names and family heritage.

I'm having to accept that half my family has been passing down a false heritage (starting as lies and cover ups) for several generations, and the other side of the family had things mixed up and was doing something similar, though not too far off the mark. Both sides of the family tried to discourage me from picking up other people's cultures, like my friend's and community's, when I was growing up, and it didn't work very well.

On the other hand, I just can't see why I need to dump the traditions and heritage that came from the communities I grew up in and the people I grew up with, being that parts of my family have lived there for several generations. Either way, it leaves me feeling like a bit of an outsider when these discussions come up.

[Whidbey78]

As someone mentioned, the young lady simply may have no interest in her ancestry. I enjoy genealogical research...but I'm the only person in my family who does. While I thrill at each discovery, I've discovered most folks have a polite interest, at best. They're usually more concerned with making it through the work week, getting food on the table and making sure the kids did their homework (which I understand and respect).

I was the one who mentioned it...and it came to mind because I'm one of those with little more than a polite interest. My reasons are strange to many people, but may at some level reflect a lot of people's ideas.

1. I'm from here, not there. I have no actual attachment to any other country beside people who have been dead for a century or more.

2. As was said above, I'm more concerned with here and now, and tomorrow. Taking care of my family (the living ones) is more important than the life story of people I never knew.

3. While I will say that there is nothing wrong with being proud of one's ancestry I can say that I don't get how some take it to extremes. I've seen people get so heated over where their ancestors are from that you wonder if they will have a stroke. I know some older gents of German descent who won't associate with an Italian-American. Why? I don't get it. Carry on traditions, but why carry on old grudges from your grandfather's generation? And why make a big deal about where dead relatives are from when those of us alive today had nothing to do with it. I didn't choose where I was born and niether did my ancestors. It's luck of the draw.

4. I know I'll catch h@ll for this...but many of us don't want to be disapointed in what we find. Grandma might have told stories about how important, influential, and respected her father was, but I doubt he was. He had a small farm in Kansas, and other than census records there aren't any records of him anywhere. Can't even find where he's buried. If he was really so important then someone somewhere would have written down something about him. At the very least somebody would know where they planted his corpse. I know where Comanche, a horse that survived Little Big Horn was buried. How important was Great Grandpa if I can find the hole they stuffed a dead horse into many many years before they stuffed him into one? He died in 1966...not that long ago and can't be found. He was a very very large man, so I doubt the undertaker misplaced him.

5. Some of us, myself included, are perfectly satisfied with a passing knowledge of ancestry. I know countries of origin of my ancestors, and a few names. I really don't care if some of my ancestors came from this town, that county, or whatever. Heck, even if I did know details, who the hell wants to hear about it? I could tell everyone here what address I lived at at age 10 and I can bet dollars to donuts nobody would really care at all. It was part of MY past, MY life and I don't care.

Researcing family history is perfectly fine, but I think that some who do it fail to realize that nobody but themselves and some family members care. Also, in my opinion, for many it's not about what is found, it's the search that interests them. The hunt. Investigation. If that process doesn't interest you, and ancestors lives aren't that big a deal, it's really hard to care much about it.

But if it's a passion of yours, by all means pursue it!!!!

My fingers are sore and the next generation of American Mutt of uncertain origins is crying for a bottle.

[dux]

[delete]

[macwilkin]

I've noticed a couple of comments insinuating that studying the past somehow deprives families today. As someone who has the good fortune to have same avocation & vocation, namely studying & teaching history, I'm a little bothered by this assumption. My study of history takes care of my family, and my genealogical research insures that the contributions of my family live on.

Horses for courses, but to so easily dismiss the hard work of people who tell the story of those who no longer have a voice strikes me just a wee disrespectful.

Edmund Burke once said that you cannot look forward to prosperity without looking backward to their ancestors. The Lakota say something similar about how a people without history is like the wind in the buffalo grass. I begin my classes each semester with these quotes.

T.

[Lachlan09]

Courtmont

Don’t forget “Family Fortunes” ! I nearly fell off my sofa once when a family from the West Midlands was asked by Les Dennis:-

Les “Name a well-known group of islands”

Father “Traffic !”