Follow Friday: Resources for Studying Genealogical Standards

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In yesterday's blog posting, I noted in passing, "One thing that has become clear in the last few years is that the modern genealogist believes in education." So do I. That is why I am embarking on an additional topic for The Demanding Genealogist. I plan to use the Follow Friday theme to talk about studying genealogical standards. In conjunction with the blog, I will over time develop a website by populating it with resources for study. Please bear with me as I take time to introduce this topic.

There is no summit which, once reached, is the end of the climb

It’s time to think in positive terms about how we all learn to do a better job at genealogy. There isn’t a summit which, once reached, is the end of the climb. Instead, each time we get a bit better in our skills, we see the next rise ahead of us, the next thing to learn.

In that spirit, I’ve established a website called Genealogical Standards Study Resources at http://genstandards.weebly.com/ in order to track and categorize resources for studying genealogical standards. The categorization will be roughly in tune with the current published standards.[1] You can visit the site now, but I do warn you that the various categories will be populated over time, so be sure to keep watching for my Follow Friday postings. "Under construction" is the current most popular listing on that site. If you have ideas to add, please leave me a comment on the Home page of the site.

Response to "What Is Forensic Genealogy?"

Photograph courtesy of Colleen Fitzpatrick

Prior Use of the Term Forensic Genealogy

On Wednesday, my inbox included a blog posting from Michael Hait about forensic genealogy in which Michael Hait interviewed Leslie Lawson, President of the Council for the Advancement of Forensic Genealogy  http://michaelhait.wordpress.com/2012/05/23/forensic-genealogy/.[1] What struck me was that the council’s approach negated the prior use of the term “forensic genealogy.” We have discussed this term in the Forensic Genealogy group on LinkedIn (disclosure: I manage the group). When the narrow definition of the term was used there, many genealogists stepped forward to defend the prior and broader use of the term.[2] In other words, the council's definition doesn't hold water with many in the field.

As background, please understand that genealogists have been aiding in probate work and missing heir work for decades. During that period of time it was called probate or missing heir work. The first use of the term “forensic genealogy” was in a book title for a work by Colleen Fitzpatrick, Ph.D.[3] Colleen was an explorer in previously uncharted territory. She used extreme analytic skills in discovering information in photographs, DNA, and databases. Colleen was not narrowly discussing probate work when she coined the term Forensic Genealogy. When my friend Sharon Sergeant broke a few fraud cases involving the publishing industry, she was being a forensic genealogist. She analyzed photographs and documents in different languages to discover the truth.[4]