Ancestry Magazine

United in a common goal, we, the readers of Ancestry, are working to learn about our ancestors’ lives. Though each of us may be alone in this task within our own families, we share a common interest with millions of people. Through this interest, we gain an understanding of not only our family but also our own ethnic identity. Our ethnicity, which is a part of our personal history, helps mold our own individuality. It is a powerful influence in determining our identity, and we are together in the quest to learn who we are.

America in the past has been called a “melting pot,” implying that we believed the distinctions among people of different ethnic backgrounds were unimportant. At one time this viewpoint may have been true; today, however, American interests are more in line with preserving ethnic identities rather than blending and losing all traits of other cultural pasts.

A sense of belonging and historical continuity are basic psychological needs. We need only browse the cookbook aisle in a bookstore to see the growing emphasis not only on cultural qualities but on regions as well. A quick look along the shelf will reveal Italian, French, Chinese, and Japanese cookbooks, as well as those devoted to Southern, Western, New England, or California cooking. Today, both our foreign cultural backgrounds and our regional residences help to identify us as Americans.

It seems that as the twentieth century arrived, bringing many new immigrants representing many ethnic groups to our shore s, our need to differentiate our identities grew. This need may be more strongly represented in urban and suburban areas, where the ethnic flavor is more diverse, than in more rural communities that have remained relatively stable.

Many studies have been conducted on the assimilation of ethnic groups into American culture, the obstacles faced by the newly arrived, and the difficulties of being children of immigrants. A family’s dreams or fears in departing from their homeland and coming to America become part of its heritage. A popular recent movie is The Joy Luck Club. This movie, previously a novel by Amy Tan, is about the relationships between first- and second-generation Chinese-American mothers and daughters. Other immigrants share similar experiences as their children are assimilated into American culture, leaving their immigrant heritage behind.

As we who are studying our families histories know, some point in the growth of the family, someone asks, “Who am I?” If each of us took a moment to remember when and why we decided to trace our family histories, and shared the reasons with other genealogists, we would find that there are really only a few common reasons to trace family history. Often the decision is precipitated by a change in the makeup of the family. It can be the death of the oldest relative, the arrival of a grandchild, or a visit from a cousin from abroad. At some time, each of us decided that we wanted to know more about our family’s history and therefore our own history. Thus, we began our never—ending quest to know who we are and from where we came.

An integral part of the answers to these questions lies in our cultural heritage. Since we are a nation of immigrants (including Native Americans as an ethnic group), the search for our family’s history will eventually lead us to our immigrant ancestors and thus to our ethnic identity. Some of us will discover that we came from one or two ethnic groups; others will have such a diverse ethnicity that it might as well be nonexistent.

Though we may be generations from our immigrant ancestors, we must still understand each immigrant group from which we have descended to effectively unravel our family history. We need to study the characteristics of the different ethnic groups to understand why our ancestors behaved as they did. We will want to research the immigrant population in the geographic region where our family settled, to locate records, and to analyze the information we find or don’t find. Through careful study of our ancestors, their ethnic groups, their history in a particular area, and their migration history, we can identify which records to obtain and where to find them.

Ethnic research can begin in many places at the same time. Genealogists often preach that you must start with yourself and work backward. While this approach is tried and true, if you know your ethnic identity, you can also research the history of the ethnic group in your community at the same time. By becoming aware of certain characteristics of ethnic groups, you will learn something about the records they created. For example, if you are Italian-American, you may find that you must search a much broader period for naturalization papers for your Italian immigrant ancestor than for those of your Irish great—grandfather. Italians often became citizens up to 20 years after their arrival, while Irish usually became citizens within a few years of arriving in America.

In realizing your ethnic identity, you will also come to understand something about your own upbringing and that of your parents and grandparents. Our parenting skills are passed down from generation to generation, not learned in school. We learn how to be parents at the knees of our mothers and fathers, who learned from their parents. How we deal with certain situations—anger, joy, stress, friendship, family relationships, grief, responsibility—can oft en be attributed to our upbringing and also to our ethnicity.

In Ethnicity and Family Therapy (Guilford Press, New York, NY, 1982), Monica Goldrick discusses the social characteristics of different ethnic backgrounds. She states that ethnic values and identification are retained for many generations after immigration and play a significant role in family life and personal development. Though the book is written for other therapists, rather than the lay person, the language used is easy to understand and not overly technical. The book proposes cultural profiles of groups rather than individuals. The profiles are not necessarily truthful for all of a culture, but they provide guides to be used as maps to better understand the ethnic characteristics which may explain certain behaviors. “Ethnicity,” Goldrick says, “remains a vital force in this country, a major form of group identification, and a major determinant of family patterns and belief systems.”

Suzanne McVetty is a professional researcher, specializing in Irish, New York and New York City, and Long Island research. She is also a consultatnt, lecturer, and teacher of genealogy.