Genealogy vs. Family History
A friend of mine called me the other day to ask me a question that I’ve been asked on many other occasions…
Are genealogy and family history the same thing?
I answered, “Yes and no.”
“And that means what?” She asked.
After explaining the difference to her, she asked me if I could do an article on the concept, and I agreed to do just that. So, if you already know everything about both terms, you are already ahead of the game. If you don’t, I hope this article helps to clear it up for you. The first thing we must do is check out the official definition of both and go from there.
Genealogy is simply the study of a family’s ancestors with pertinent data such as birth, marriage, and death dates. You can create a family chart suitable for framing your findings. Fill-in charts can easily be found online at sites like Amazon, Etsy, TreeSeek, Easygenie, and many other sites. Most folks who have journeyed into their family’s past will tell you it is an exciting project.
Family history, on the other hand, is an in-depth study of a family lineage with greater emphasis and clarification of each ancestor’s life story.
Genealogy Fan Chart
Today the two terms, Genealogy, and Family History are often used interchangeably within the field of ancestor research, even by many professional researchers. They both involve seeking information about your ancestors, so what is the difference?
An example of genealogy would be researching and learning each ancestor’s name, whom they married (if married), where they were born and where they died, and perhaps where they lived. In other words, genealogy is the study of ancestry and descent and refers more to the actual search for ancestors and descendants, with your pedigree being a single direct line backward from yourself. For example, both your parents, your four grandparents, eight great grand-parents, sixteen great-grandparents, and so on.
Pedigree Chart
An example of family history, on the other hand, would take genealogy to a much more in-depth level to include as much as could be found on each ancestor, including name, whom they married, where they lived, how long they lived there, their religious beliefs, their politics, family stories, legends, myths, and anything and everything else. Maybe Grandpa was a farmer who was also the county sheriff; Great-Grandma was a store owner and had red hair and green eyes. You want to learn it all.
Family history digs extensively into the entire family history of all the individuals in each generation. We want to know how, when, and where they lived, worked, played, and traveled. and the family triumphs and tragedies that occurred and, possibly most importantly of all, place these events within the context of the social, economic, historical, and environmental world in which your ancestors lived. Family History does not seek to judge your ancestors by the standards and legislation of the present day but rather to understand the environment, attitudes, and legislation in which your ancestor lived.
In the early days of genealogy and family history, it was a pastime for the rich and those individuals who had lots of spare time and the ability to visit physical archives during standard business hours. Its primary function was often to prove a familial relationship for the purposes of inheritance. (There were no computers at that time.) I have located biological parents through genealogy on multiple occasions without DNA, which was not even available to the public then. It was all done through dusty old books and long street-pounding legwork.
There is a saying among researchers in this type of field, “We neither own the triumphs of our ancestors nor are we responsible for their failures
or disappointments.” If you are afraid to find skeletons in your ancestors’ past, stick to genealogy. Don’t partake in the field of family history. However, if you’re brave enough, it is an amazing experience to be a detective into your family’s past, the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Family History can also include those members of the family that are a part of the family by way of informal and formal adoption and marriage.
What to do? … What to do?…
Whether you choose genealogy, family history, or a combination of the two, whether to incorporate DNA testing into your ancestral research or choose to research your non-traditional modern family, you should always begin with yourself. After that, research one generation at a time, generally, but not always, working backward as you find and prove or disprove known family facts, always working from a known, proven fact towards your goal.
You usually have three options in your search which are: 1. Do it yourself. 2. Do some of the work yourself with the help of a genealogist. 3. You can hire a professional genealogist to do all the ancestral research for you.
According to most experts, in option one, you would follow a step-by-step process to track and evaluate the documentary evidence, working backward and, if you like, forwards and sideways, starting with yourself, your parents, your grandparents, and so on. There are many excellent free resources online, with more information coming along every day. However, it is believed, according to current estimates, that there are still only between 5% and 10% of available records currently online. Many of these cover the period between the mid-1800s and early 1900s. So if you want to do all of the research yourself, unless your ancestors stayed in a small geographical area for many generations, be prepared to travel.
Partnership Working with a Genealogist
If you choose to work with a genealogist, you can work with a genealogist, at least initially, take a project management lead role. Focus on a starting point with what you know and what you can prove, you would then be given directional step-by-step help to search for what you can yourself, with the genealogist providing additional document retrieval if necessary and taking you through the processes of analysis. This can be designed with as light a hand as required. The focus of the genealogist’s work can be varied as time goes by and your knowledge grows and/or switched to searching for documentation that is not available online. This option can often work very well with stage payments (depending on your genealogist), which can be varied to suit time, budget, and information found.
Or you can hire a genealogist to follow a particular family line or research one individual from your family tree. Sometimes all you may need is someone to pick up, copy and email a digital copy of a specific document that can only be retrieved from an archive that is just too far away from you to make retrieval cost-effective to do it yourself. It would be worthwhile for you to check out Genealogists.com. It’s an effective way of covering many different geographical areas for specialist research.
When it comes time for you to write your family history or genealogy, you may want the genealogist to write the book for you or just to edit your own work. You might want help with layout, offering different ideas for visual and oral presentation, or organizing for the printing of the final work. The choice is always yours.
Then, there is always the decision to have a genealogist do all the research, analysis, and reporting, and should you want, will design and write a hard copy or e-book for you. Budgets should be agreed upon in advance. The cost will vary, depending on surviving records and how far back you wish to search, and probably most importantly, where records pertaining to your ancestor(s) are found.
Whatever your personal family journey involves, I hope you have as exciting an adventure as I have had over the years. Remember that your research is never done. You’ll always be able to find more if you continue to research.
God Bless
Patricia Richards Harris
Doddridge County Historical Society