Genealogy Archives | National Humanities Center

Genealogy

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My Father’s Name: A Black Virginia Family after the Civil War

By Lawrence P. Jackson (NHC Fellow, 2004–05) Armed with only early boyhood memories, Lawrence P. Jackson begins his quest by setting out from his home in Baltimore for Pittsylvania County, Virginia, to try to find his late grandfather’s old home by the railroad tracks in Blairs. My Father’s Name tells the tale of the ensuing journey, at … Continued

Sarra, Unreal Houses

Unreal Houses: Character, Gender, and Genealogy in the Tale of Genji

By Edith Sarra (NHC Fellow, 2016–17) The Tale of Genji (ca. 1008), by noblewoman Murasaki Shikibu, is known for its sophisticated renderings of fictional characters’ minds and its critical perspectives on the lives of the aristocracy of eleventh-century Japan. Unreal Houses radically rethinks the Genji by focusing on the figure of the house. Edith Sarra examines the narrative’s fictionalized images of aristocratic … Continued

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Origin Stories: Or, Making Sense of Surprises in the Family Tree

My Humanities Moment happened when my husband and I received the results of the genetic testing kits we’d ordered. The stories that my husband’s DNA told matched up pretty closely with his family’s history, but mine delivered some surprises. In addition to indicating a lot of northwestern European and Central European ancestors, which I expected, … Continued

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A Timeless Description

I feel robbed that I did not get the opportunity to ask my Great Uncle Burl what it was like to train in North Africa or share stories of being at the Duomo in Florence. I was a young teen when he passed, and he did not share the horrors he saw as part of … Continued