To not understand why some people want to get into contact with long lost distant relatives or research long dead decendants?

[misspontypine]

I am watching some Sunday evening crap tv. The program is about people from the USA coming to Sweden and learning more about their Swedish roots. Most of the people on the show have one Swedish great grandparent or grandparent (a couple only have a Swedish great great grandparent) so they are 1/16 1/8 or 1/4 Swedish.

They research their Swedish decendent and find people who also have the same decendent and meet up with lots of tears and hugs (the Swedish long lost relative often looks pretty shocked and confused about the outpooring of emotions from someone they don't know and only share a great great grandparent with.)

I have an aunt who spends her spare time researching our family tree but ironically I have only ever met this aunt once, I am her living breathing neice and she is more interested in finding out which church her great great grandparents were married in.

I have adopted siblings and my opinion is that labels (grandma, sister, uncle) don't actually mean anything it is the time you spend together and the love you give each other that is important.

AIBU to think it is odd that some people think that a tiny amount of shared DNA with another person (living or dead) means that that person is worth researching and possible traveling far to meet?

[CogitoErgoSometimes]

I also researched selected members of my family tree for reasons of finding out whether certain family stories were true. Not interested in knowing I trace back to the Vikings... Found a not-so-distant relative actually did murder one of her children. Upsetting.

[Dobbiesmum]

We started to research because DH and DS found a memorial with his family name on it stuck in the middle of nowhere up here in the Pennines but donated by the people of a particular American town. His family have been local for generations and it's a very particular name so we had a look. It opened up a really interesting story and grew from there.
The contrasts between our families got more fascinating the deeper we looked. It turns our that a section of both of our families ended up in America and fought on opposite sides in the war of independence, and fought at the same place at the same time!
Both of our ancestors are still remembered for different reasons, mine is more well known than his but it's nice that they are both still commemorated in their own way.
I think it's the idea that the people we are descended from aren't just names on a gravestone, they were real living human beings that sometimes made a difference. I like that idea

[Lililly]

www.pinterest.com/pin/22447698115877725/
This infographic shows how futile it is to try to go back more than a few generations, after that there are so many that becomes ridiculous! It is sad, because women take their husbands name we tend to search back through the male lines

[hiddenhome]

YABU

I grew up in care with no contact with birth family at all. I know very little about extended family members and was thrilled last year when I started researching and actually located a second cousin and his family. I have some photographs and get to keep in touch. These are the only people that I have that I am related to. It helps me to know where I originate from (West End Newcastle Slums)

[throckenholt]

It is sad, because women take their husbands name we tend to search back through the male lines

I don't - I am very egalitarian - they are all my ancestors and I am interested in all of them (if they were interesting).

[SirChenjin]

I didn't - I went back through my mother's line.

[BlackbeltinBS]

It is sad, because women take their husbands name we tend to search back through the male lines

I went in every direction I could find evidence/it was interesting!

[throckenholt]

I was quite partial to the maternal line - mother's mother's mother's .... but I got stuck quite early on on that one :(

[comewinewithmoi]

It's really interesting.

[LeGavrOrf]

It wouldn't interest me either.

I love history, both social and political, but I have absolutely no interest in tracing my family. Based on my immediate family they would probably be a load of scumbags and charlatans anyway.

That's just on my mother's side. I don't know who my father is, I have been given a name but god knows if it is correct. I have never been interested in finding out.

[nomorecrumbs]

Lililly - I've paid to get my mtDNA tested and my maternal line is fascinating. It shows I have Turkish roots thousands of years ago (you'd never have guessed from my colouring - clearly it's been much diluted by Norman blood since!)

Annoyingly my maternal line gets stuck in Ireland in the 1800s because there are very scanty records there.

[TeWiSavesTheDay]

My mum and her sibling have got really into all this since their father died. Their father was pretty unpleasant and isolated them from their wider family, so I think they enjoy finding these people that they remember from childhood and finding out that some of them are good/kind/nice people.

[cory]

I suppose the only justification for resarching long dead descendants would be if you're Rip Van Winkle or one of the Seven Sleepers; might be quite interesting to see what had been going on while you were out of it.

[cory]

Lillily, the first of your objection doesn't hold: if the number of ancestors doubled with every generation, there wouldn't have been standing room back in the Neolithic!

What happens after a while is that the lines start to converge after a while, so that you greatgreatgreataunt on your father's side is also your greatgreatgreatmother on your mother's side or whatever; particularly in rural communities with lots of intermarriages.

Also, there will never be as much information on every single line going back: my aunt has done my family back to the 1500's along one line but most lines peter out sometime in the 1700's.

Don't think there is any particular incentive to only pursue the male line either: both men and women have their original surname on their marriage certificates and can be followed back that way.

[misspontypine]

Please excuse my stupid decendents/ancestor mistake! I am English but I mostly speak anothe language and I find myself forgetting English. I forgot the word for wardrobe the other day, I actually had to google translate the word from my 2nd language into English. I feel very stupid!

Thank you for sharing all your stories, I can see I was being unreasonable. I have lots of knoledge from both my maternal and paternal sides as there are people on both sides who are interested in family history. I should listen to them a little more when they talk about it!

[QueenofallIsee]

Think some Americans are obsessed as they are such a 'young' culture relatively speaking - native americans are the only folks who can claim long history, everyone else is originally 'from' somewhere (JFK in Ireland anyone?) and we in the 'old world' often don't have the same obsession. I am interested in history and genelogy so enjoy investigating but I don't find myself wanting to embrace random Swedes!

[cory]

I think some people (a lot of people) are simply wired so that they want to find things out. It's an instinct that has kept humanity going, but not everybody finds immediate outlet for it in their daily work. As we can't all go on Himalayan expeditions to look for the yeti or solve murder cases, geneaology affords a relatively cheap and accessible way of satisfying that instinct.

[liquidstate]

I am soooo uninterested in tracing my family history. It baffles most people I know as I am a professional historian so technically it should be right up my street. I even got a book on it one year for Christmas as the relative in question noticed I like watching 'Who do you Think You Are?'

But nah I can't be arsed!

[morethanpotatoprints]

Yes YABU

I too am adopted and after many years trying to find living blood relatives, I gave up and started on ancestry, so I could at least tell my dc something about their roots.
A coincidental entry for info lead me to my birth family.

Its good to know your roots, how your ancestors lived, who they were and also any different nationalities or skeletons in closets

I agree though, some people take it a bit more seriously and get more involved than others. But it's each to their own, and you shouldn't judge.

[Blockette]

My Grandmothers sister was taken away on the trains (from Poland) by the Germans (or could have been Russians) during the 2nd World War because she was ill. She was only 8 at the time. No one knows if she survived or not, so my family have been looking to see if they can find anything about her.

Apart from that though, I can't say I'm too interested.

[DontMentionThePrunes]

I'm quite interested, I mean it's not central to my life or anything, but I would like to know about my ancestors in a social history kind of a way.

[Hulababy]

I have also researched the female lines too. Marriage records often show maiden names, and fathers too. So you work back using that information.

[shockers]

I am researching my grandparents on my birth father's side because they both died before I was born, so I was denied a relationship with them. My father moved to the other side of the world after forging a close relationship with me up to the age of three, so even though he's still living and breathing, I'm not terribly interested in getting to know him any better. If he'd cared, he wouldn't have left.

[SatinSandals]

It is just as easy to research the female lines, I do them all.