General Chat

Having agreed to do a lightning talk on my family research, I was wondering how you would describe what it is in 50 words. I need some ideas for my introduction. Thanks in advance for your help. ;-)

To give you an idea, my first attempt is
"Investigating the surnames which make up who you are, the first names your family love, what your ancestors did as a job & discovering why they moved to wherever they did, uncovering family secrets, trying to give substance to family rumours & finding relatives, your immediately family didn't know about."

This may help

Genealogy is the study of families and the tracing of their lineages and history. Genealogists use oral traditions, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kinship and pedigrees of its members. The results are often displayed in charts or written as narratives.

The pursuit of family history tends to be shaped by several motivations, including the desire to carve out a place for one's family in the larger historical picture, a sense of responsibility to preserve the past for future generations, and a sense of self-satisfaction in accurate storytelling.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy

Roy

I would call it a Family Treasure Hunt - when any little bit of information is gathered and added to a tree it just makes the whole Hunt so exciting :-D

I like it Nolls - thanks, can I use that? ;-)

I WOULD SAY I HEARD MY ANCESTORS WERE SOMEWHAT
COLOURFULL FROM AN UNCLE.
GYPSIES TRAMPS AND THIEVES,
ALSO FOUND OUT MY UNCLE TOLD PORKIES,
BUT I WANTED TO PROVE THE POOR SIDE
WERE MORE INTERESTING AND WERE STRONG PEOPLE
WITH HARD LIVES :-D

My general comment about family research is that in every family there are secrets it is like being a detective sorting out the truth from the stories. A serious researcher has to put aside all sentiment and work on the facts.

How I miss Treasure Hunt with Anneka. And how tired the format of WDYTYA has become (excepting USA which is pretty cool).

What a great idea, Nolls. To describe genealogy as a Family Treasure Hunt. Rachael could even hand out a few facts about her own family and see if her audience can find some interesting clues. So much more interesting to keep it simple and involve audience than spout out a lot of waffle - however brilliant :-D :-D

Thanks Everyone - the whole talk is 20 slides, 20 seconds per slide & they move on automatically... so Yes JohnLoveHorlicks, I will be providing some informatoin on my family as well as giving hints & tips on how you get started. Only 3 of my slides contain words in the descriptions, the other 17 have pictures to keep the audience entertained.

Might use an amalgamation of all suggestions on here when I write the final draft on Monday. :-)